MANSHIN

A life documentary of a woman who was shunned for being possessed by spirits as a girl, oppressed for following superstitions as an adult, how she grows to be a great shaman who embraces the pain of all people, and how she comes to be honored as a national treasure of Korea with her outstanding artistic talents throughout Korea’s tumultuous history. Both the life of Kim Keum-hwa and significant moments of modern Korea are chronicled through reenactment of real stories, rare archive footage, stylized Korean ‘contemporary-traditional’ music and performance, and visually provoking mythical fantasy scenes. It gives an experience of surpassing the border between past and present, South Korea and North Korea, urban and vernacular, life and afterlife, and reality and fantasy.