Poetry

Plot

Yang Mi-ja, a 66-year-old grandmother, has a part-time job taking care of Mr. Kang, an elderly man who has had a stroke. At home, she cares for her ill-mannered 16-year-old grandson, Jong-wook, whose divorced mother lives in Busan. When Mi-ja mentions to a doctor that she has recently been forgetting everyday words, the doctor recommends she get it checked out. She notices a poster advertising a poetry class at a local community center and decides to enroll. The course assignment is to write one poem by the end of the month-long course. At the suggestion of her teacher, she begins writing notes about the things she sees, especially flowers.

One day, the father of one of Jong-wook’s friends, Ki-beom, insists that Mi-ja join him and the other boys' fathers for a meeting. She is told that the group of boys have repeatedly raped a girl, Agnes, over the past six months, before she jumped off a bridge into a river and drowned. Her diary was discovered, though only four members of the school's faculty were aware of the situation. The fathers fear that if it becomes generally known it will ruin their sons' futures, and the school fears a scandal that will tarnish its reputation. To avert a full police investigation, the parents of the boys offer to pay a settlement of 30 million won to the widowed mother, a poor farmer. Mi-ja, who cannot afford her 5 million won portion of the payment, is pressured to ask her daughter (Jong-wook's mother) for the money. Though Mi-ja occasionally speaks to her daughter on the phone, she does not mention the situation. When Mi-ja is diagnosed with early-stage Alzheimer's disease, she again neglects to tell anyone. She attempts to confront Jong-wook about his actions, but he simply ignores her.

Mi-ja begins attending a local weekly poetry reading. A brash man, Detective Park, frequently reads beautiful poetry at these readings, but follows them with crude sexual jokes that offend Mi-ja. However, Mi-ja is told that the man is a policeman with a good heart, and was recently reassigned from Seoul after exposing corruption within its police force. Park later notices Mi-ja crying outside one poetry night, and asks what is making her upset, to which she does not answer.

Mi-ja temporarily quits her job caring for Kang after he makes a desperate sexual advance toward her. She later returns after a journey to the bridge where Agnes jumped, and her hat flies off into the water. She walks down to the riverbank and sits, writing poetry until it begins raining. Dripping wet, she returns to the elderly man, agreeing to have sex with him, though they both appear emotionless during it.

After Mi-ja accidentally tells a journalist too much, the fathers decide to use Mi-ja’s low class standing as leverage, and she is told to travel to the countryside to convince Agnes' mother to accept the settlement. Mi-ja eventually comes across her working in the field, near her house, only to have small talk, and does not bring up the settlement. Regardless, the fathers later find out that Agnes’ mother has agreed to settle.

Mi-ja asks Kang for the money she needs. Kang pays her, believing it is blackmail. Once the settlement has been paid to Agnes' mother, Mi-ja phones her daughter to come home, and insists that Jong-wook shower and cut his nails. That night, Detective Park comes to arrest Jong-wook, with no protest from Mi-ja.

The film concludes with Mi-ja's poetry teacher discovering a bouquet on the class podium with her poem, "Agnes's Song", but Mi-ja herself is not present. Her daughter returns to an empty home, and calls Mi-ja's phone, but receives no answer. The teacher begins to read Mi-ja's poem to the class. Mi-ja speaks in voiceover, though the voice of Agnes herself takes over midway through, following Agnes from the science lab, where she was raped, to the bus, to the bridge where she is to jump. Agnes turns to the camera, half-smiling, leaving Mi-ja's fate on an ambiguous note.

Cast

Yoon Jeong-hee as Yang Mi-ja

Lee David as Park Jong-wook

Kim Hee-ra as Mr. Kang

Ahn Nae-sang as Ki-beom's father

Kim Yongtaek as the teacher

Park Myeong-sin as Agnes's mother

Jang Hye-jin as Kang's daughter-in-law

Kim Hye-jung as Jo Mi-hye

Production

The idea for the film had its origin in a real-life case where a small town schoolgirl had been raped by a gang of teenage boys. When director Lee Chang-dong heard about the incident, it made an impact on him, although he hadn't been interested in basing a film on the actual events. Later, during a visit to Japan, Lee saw a television program in his hotel room. The program was edited entirely from relaxing shots of nature, "a peaceful river, birds flying, fishermen on the sea – with soft new-age music in the background," and a vision for a possible feature film started to form. "Suddenly, it reminded me of that horrible incident, and the word 'poetry' and the image of a 60-year old woman came up in my mind."

Lee wrote the lead character specifically for Yoon Jeong-hee, a major star of Korean cinema from the 1960s and 1970s. Yoon later expressed satisfaction with how the role differed from what she typically played in the past: "I've always had the desire to show people different aspects of my acting and (Lee) provided me with every opportunity to do just that." Before Poetry, the last film Yoon appeared in was Manmubang ("Two Flags") from 1994. Production was led by Pine House Film, founded in 2005 by the director, with co-production support from UniKorea Culture & Art Investment.

Filming started on August 25, 2009 and ended three months later in Gyeonggi Province and Gangwon Province. Lee was initially worried that Yoon's long experience might have bound her to an outdated acting style, but was very pleased with her attitude, saying, "She performed her scenes with a willingness to discuss and this is difficult to find even in younger actors."

Release

On May 13, 2010, N.E.W. released Poetry in 194 South Korean theaters with a gross revenue corresponding to around US$258,000 during the first weekend. As of August 1, 2010, Box Office Mojo reported a total revenue of US$1,301,057 in the film's domestic market. The film sold 220,693 tickets nationwide in South Korea.

The international premiere took place at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival, where Poetry was screened on May 19 as part of the main competition.

The Korean DVD was released on October 23, 2010 and includes English subtitles. The film was distributed theatrically in the United States by Kino International.

It was screened at the 28th Busan International Film Festival as part of 'Special screening' on 5 October 2023.

Reception

Critical response

As of May 15, 2025, the film has a 100% approval rating from critics with 71 reviews on film review aggregation site Rotten Tomatoes, with a weighted average of 8.64/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Poetry is an absorbing, poignant drama because it offers no easy answers to its complex central conflict." At Metacritic, based on 23 critical reviews, the film had a score of 87 out of 100, categorizing it as having received "universal acclaim". "Given the abundant potential for missteps into sappiness with this sort of premise," Justin Chang wrote in Variety, "what's notable here is the lack of sentimentality in Lee's approach. At no point does Poetry devolve into a terminal-illness melodrama or a tale of intergenerational bonding." Chang continued by noting how Lee's background as a novelist sometimes shows through, and that "[t]here are longueurs here... that could be trimmed, though overall this absorbing film feels considerably shorter than its 139 minutes." It was included in CNN's list of top ten best movies of 2011, and Chicago Tribune film critic Michael Phillips named Poetry his favorite film of 2011. In 2020, The Guardian ranked it number 4 among the classics of modern South Korean Cinema.

Accolades

Lee won the Best Screenplay Award at the Cannes Film Festival. At the 47th Grand Bell Awards, Poetry won the prizes for Best Picture, Best Screenplay, Best Actress and Best Supporting Actor. The film received the Korean Association of Film Critics Awards for Best Picture and Best Screenplay. The jury of the 31st Blue Dragon Film Awards decided to exclude Poetry from the selection, since Lee had announced that he would boycott the ceremony. Still, they nominated Yoon for Best Actress as they thought the director's decision should not affect the cast. The award was eventually shared by Yoon and Soo Ae, for her performance in Midnight FM. At the 2010 Asia Pacific Screen Awards, Lee received the award for Best Achievement in Directing and Yoon for Best Performance by an Actress; the film was also nominated in the categories Best Feature Film and Best Screenplay. It was also nominated for the Grand Prix of the Belgian Syndicate of Cinema Critics.

In 2011, Poetry was nominated as Best Film at the 5th Asian Film Awards, where Lee won Best Director and Best Screenplay. It also received the Le Regard d'Or ("Golden Gaze") Grand Prix and FIPRESCI Award at the Fribourg International Film Festival. After France honored Yoon as an Officier dans l'ordre des Arts et Lettres ("Officer of the Order of Arts and Letters), she was named Best Actress at the Cinemanila International Film Festival. Yoon also won the Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award for Best Actress for her performance, marking the second consecutive year a Korean actress won the award after Kim Hye-ja won for Mother in 2010.