Family Ties

Mira is a shy, single woman who runs a small restaurant and tends her plants with love and care. Her life is thrown into mayhem when her brother Hyungchul (Uhm Tae-woong), shows up out of the blue after five years’ absence, some of them spent in jail. Hyung-chul not only settles down at Mira’s place but is soon joined by his new wife, Mu-shin (Goh Doo-shim), a much older woman who smokes like a chimney – and Mira’s a non-smoker. As if the house wasn’t crowded enough, Mu-shin’s young stepdaughter knocks at Mira’s door one fine day, and moves in. The film’s second part centres on Sunkyung (Kong Hyo-jin), who discovers that her mother – with whom she has a terribly difficult relationship – is seriously ill. Unhappy about her life, Sun-kyung decides to leave the country, but her plan is disrupted by her mother’s death and by the presence of Kyung-suk (Bong Tae-kyu), her half-brother. Like threads neatly woven into the fine tapestry of a vivid family portrait, the intertwined lives of these characters come together years later in the third section of the film. [AsianMediaWiki]