Memories of the Sword

Memories of the Sword (2015) is a South Korean period martial-arts drama directed by Park Heung-sik. He co-wrote it with Choi A-reum. It is set in the final years of the Goryeo dynasty. Three warriors once led an uprising on behalf of the impoverished. One of them betrayed the others, and the uprising's leader died. Another fled with her sword and an infant girl.

Eighteen years later the fugitive, Wol-so (Seol-rang), is blind. She has raised the girl, Hong-yi (Kim Go-eun), as her adoptive daughter and swordswoman. Hong-yi is lively and confident, and she is drawn toward the capital. There she attracts the attention of Yu-baek (Lee Byung-hun), a powerful general with royal ambitions.

The film is billed as the clash of "three swords": one that covets the kingdom, one that upholds a cause, and one that seeks revenge. It is less a pure action spectacle than a brooding revenge-romance. Its pace is deliberate, and it spends as much time on regret as on combat. It also reunites Lee Byung-hun and Jeon Do-yeon for the first time since The Harmonium in My Memory (1999).

The film argues that revenge is inherited grief. It is passed from one generation to the next and tends to consume the people who pass it on. The title points to memory as the real weapon: the past, with its lost ideals and old loves, wounds more deeply than steel. Park Heung-sik frames the swordswoman's story as a young woman's coming-of-age. She must decide whether to be defined by a hatred she was given or by the life she might choose. The tale also shows how a righteous cause can curdle into ambition, and how loyalty and love can be corrupted by both.

It can be read as a personal tragedy of unresolved love and guilt among three people. It can also be read as a political allegory about how revolutionary ideals decay into the pursuit of power. A third reading sees it as a female coming-of-age story in which Hong-yi has to untangle her own will from the one her mentor wrote for her.

The film arrived as a Korean take on the art-house wuxia tradition associated with Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, House of Flying Daggers and Hero. Reviewers made those comparisons, some of them unfavorable. Screen Daily noted that it opened weakly against much bigger summer hits. It is best known today as a showcase for its stars, with Kim Go-eun in a martial-arts lead role.

Audiences and critics praised the visuals and the strong cast. Reviewers called it a tragic revenge-romance rather than a typical action film. The criticism centered on a slow pace, a thin or weak story, and the director's inexperience with period filmmaking, which Screen Daily called palpable. Box office was disappointing in South Korea. Overall it is seen as a handsome but uneven film that is worth watching for its aesthetics and acting.