Il Mare

Country: Korea
Genre: Romance
Release Year: 2000
Type: Movie

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Il Mare Review
Kim Eun-Joo leaves her beautiful sea-side house, named Il Mare, to move into an apartment complex. Before she leaves, she writes a letter to the next occupant, asking him to forward her mail to her new address if one of her letters gets sent to the mailbox. Han Sung-Hyun is the one who finds the letter and sees that the date is written as 1999. He's living in the year 1997, and he is the first occupant of the house, so he thinks the letter must be a mistake. He writes back to her telling her that she must've written to the wrong person. But as they write more letters, Kim Eun-Joo and Han Sung-Hyun realize that they are communicating back and forth through time. Both of them share their problems with each other; Kim Eun-Joo shares her problems with her fiancée that left her and Han Sung-Hyun shares his pain of his dad's death. They realize that the mysterious person they are communicating with through this mailbox is the only other person that can mend their wounds, and they fall in love. However, they must find out if it's possible to overcome their time difference and if their destinies can align.

This story could have been pretty interesting, but after watching it I felt that it was shallow and undeveloped. When they are supposedly in love, I was still wondering how it happened. The characters barely questioned the logical aspects of the movie. Of course, it is hard to maintain realism when the movie is about time travel. The movie should have developed the relationship between Eun-Joo and Sung-Hyun a little further before the climax, because I felt very little emotion throughout this movie.

The ending is another illogical twist regarding time travel and time paradoxes. Although it's a happy ending, it was too artificial and forced. Still, I think if the movie ended tragically, there would be no point to the movie at all. The whole movie basically revolved around the growing love of two strangers, and if the two of them ended up without meeting each other, the movie would be even more pointless.

Jun Ji-Hyun is a talented actress, but this movie was before her prime. Her character is only somewhat developed throughout this movie, and I thought her personality didn't really shine. The character, Han Sung-Hyun, is the same; he wasn't well developed and his personality is suppressed. Because there was almost no character interaction except through letters, it was hard for me to see any on-screen chemistry and even harder to see that they were in love.

The movie isn't horrible, but it really isn't that good either. I'll admit the storyline had great potential, but the acting and script was below par. The storyline's premise was actually the reason I decided to watch this movie. The movie is definitely watchable, but it's just not as emotionally satisfying as I would have hoped.

Written by Lance

Rating Meter: 70 %