I got home a little later than I thought I would last night due to a delicious duck dinner and didn’t think I would have time to watch a whole movie before I slept.  Turning on the tv, I saw that Hyperbole of Youth was showing on KTV but it was well into the movie, or at least past the singing nurse scene, and since I own the DVD, I kept looking. I started watching a British movie called Doomsday on another channel, but found it to be unwatchable. It seemed like it ripped off every movie from 28 Days Later to Alien 2 to Braveheart. After thirty minutes of that, I turned it off and had even less time. I decided to watch a short film instead. Earlier in the week I had recieved an order of DVDs. Among them was a collection of shorts I had been hesitant to buy because of the price. The four disk set was on sale for 40,000 won–down from 60,000–and I figured the price would not go lower than that I bought it. There was no English title on the collection, but it translates as ‘Short Films Like a Jewel in my Heart’ and consists of 25 movies–all subtitled. Among them was the film I chose to watch, Bread & Milk.

Bread & Milk is not the first film of the collection, but I remembered the title from years ago. It had won several awards at film festivals when it debuted in 2003. And after watching the story, it is easy to see why. It is the story of man, the only person we see during the entire film, and his struggle against the universe. At the beginning of the movie, he is at the end of his rope and believes he is finished. He has taken out a huge insurance policy that will help his family in the case he has an accident, and then proceeds to try to arrange a suicide that will look like an accident. However, fate has other plans for him and the man finds that his struggles with the forces of the universe are far from over.  It is really an excellent film and has made me excited to see what else is in the collection.

Bread and Milk was directed by Won Shin-yeon. Won began his career, not as a director, but as a minor actor. He debuted in a children’s film in 1991 and did not direct until 2001 with a feature length film called Jeok that never saw a release. This was followed by the very successful short film Cradle Song in 2002 and then Bread & Milk the next year. In 2005, Won tried his hand at another feature length film The Wig and then followed these with Bloody Aria and Seven Days. Director Won is currently working on a live action version of Robot Taekwon V.

The first image in this article is that of the DVD collection. If you are interested in seeing Bread & Milk or other shorts, then you should check with where you buy your DVDs to see if they can get it for you. Pricey, but worth it.