Often compared to the American indie MEMENTO and the French shocker IRREVERSIBLE, the timebending South Korean drama PEPPERMINT CANDY unfolds in reverse chronological order to lend an even greater aura of doom and despair to its tragic tale of innocence lost. The series opens in spring of 1999 as a bitter, dissolute businessman, Yong-ho (Kyung-gu Sol), stands on a beautiful railway bridge and throws himself in front of an oncoming train. From there, the film travels back in time to reveal 20 years of Yong-ho`s heartbreaking history, from the marital and business failures of middle-age, to an adulthood spent torturing political dissidents for the nation`s dictatorial police force, and, finally, to an idyllic youth brimming with dreams, optimism, and first love. Director Chang-dong Lee (OASIS) makes the potentially gimmicky narrative structure work in service to the plot rather than the other way around, for an emotionally devastating personal odyssey that also works as a subtle commentary on 20th-century Korean history.
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