Obsessed
情愛中毒
Storyline
The whole story, ending included.
1969, an army base, a colonel and his subordinate's wife; the melodrama that made Lim Ji-yeon.
South Korea, 1969. Colonel Kim Jin-pyong came home from the Vietnam War a hero and now commands a training unit, living in the officers' quarters of an army base with his wife, Lee Sook-jin, the daughter of his commanding general. She is set on seeing him made a general and longs for a child. He cannot sleep, and gets through the days on pills. Captain Kyung Woo-jin, a junior officer who idolises him, moves in nearby with his wife, Jong Ga-heun, who hangs cages of songbirds by her door. She is ethnic Chinese, a war orphan whom Woo-jin's mother took in as a girl and raised to marry her son.
When the officers' wives visit a military hospital, a patient takes Ga-heun hostage, and in the struggle Jin-pyong shoots her by accident. He visits her bedside and cannot stop thinking of her. After a party at which he kisses her, they meet in secret and become lovers; he sends her husband to Seoul so that they can be alone. She tells him that Woo-jin sexually abused her when she was thirteen, and that she cannot bear her husband's touch.
When Woo-jin's mother guesses that Ga-heun is in love, Ga-heun ends it. Jin-pyong has Woo-jin falsely accused of smuggling to get him posted away, then, when she pleads, takes the blame himself and gives up his command. A special order from the president makes him a general all the same. At the celebration Sook-jin announces that she is pregnant. Drunk, Jin-pyong begs Ga-heun to follow him to Seoul, and when she refuses he shouts his grievance in front of everyone. The whole base learns of the affair.
His father-in-law sends him to Vietnam. He asks Ga-heun to leave with him. She says she loves him, but not enough to give up her life, and he tries to take his own life. He survives, is divorced and leaves the army in disgrace. Two years later, at an official function, men from a special unit in Vietnam tell Ga-heun that Jin-pyong was killed there while guiding them. They give her the photograph he held as he died, the two of them dancing, with “My love” written on the back. She weeps.
Starring
Song Seung-heonas Colonel Kim Jin-pyong
A decorated Vietnam veteran commanding a training unit, sleepless and living on pills, who falls for his subordinate's wife.
Colonel Kim Jin-pyong’s story
Jin-pyong came home from Vietnam a hero, and the men he lost there come back to him in nightmares. When a patient at the military hospital takes Ga-heun hostage, his gun goes off in the struggle and wounds her, and after that he cannot keep away. He kisses her at a party and sends her husband to Seoul. When she ends it, he frames Woo-jin for smuggling, then takes the blame himself when she pleads. Made a general all the same, he shouts out the affair before the whole base. She will not leave with him, and he tries to take his own life. He survives, is divorced and leaves the army in disgrace. Two years later he is killed in Vietnam guiding a special unit, a photograph of the two of them dancing in his hand.
Lim Ji-yeonas Jong Ga-heun
Captain Kyung's wife, an ethnic Chinese war orphan who keeps songbirds and begins a secret affair with her husband's commander.
Jong Ga-heun’s story
Ga-heun was taken in as a girl by Woo-jin's mother and raised to become her son's wife. One night, when the colonel stops at her door, she scolds him for blowing smoke at her birds. Shot by accident when a patient takes her hostage, she lets his visits grow into an affair, and tells him that Woo-jin sexually abused her when she was thirteen and that she cannot bear her husband's touch. When her mother-in-law sees through her, she ends it, then pleads for her husband when Jin-pyong frames him. She will not follow him to Seoul; asked to leave with him, she says she loves him, but not enough to give up her life. Two years later, handed the photograph he held as he died, she reads “My love” on the back and weeps.
Cho Yeo-jeongas Lee Sook-jin
Jin-pyong's wife, a general's daughter set on her husband's promotion and longing for a child.
On Joo-wanas Captain Kyung Woo-jin
Ga-heun's husband, a junior officer eager to please the colonel he idolises.
Why it matters
Obsessed was sold in Korea as an erotic melodrama, opened at number one and made Lim Ji-yeon, in her first feature, a name. Beneath the love scenes it is a story about who can afford an affair. Jin-pyong is a war hero married to a general's daughter; when he loses his marriage and his career, he loses them by his own choice. Ga-heun has no such margin. She is an ethnic Chinese war orphan in a Korean army town, married to the son of the woman who took her in, a man who abused her as a girl, and she lives in a compound where every officer's wife is watching. Her refusal to run away with him is the most clear-eyed moment in the film. The Korean title means “human addiction”, and the film leaves open whether what consumes a sleepless veteran is love, or one more way of not facing the war he brought home.