Oh! Soo-jung (2000)

English title: Virgin Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors.

Synopsis (spoilers): A man wants to have sex with his girlfriend, but she is a virgin and is afraid of it. They had met through a film director who seemed to have some interest in her too. The man is a rich gallery owner and the woman works for said director as, it appears, some sort of assistant (some sources say writer, but I don't agree). The film director is counting on the gallery owner to finance his movie but the latter backs away from it after the director doesn't return a camera he had borrowed and their friendship turns sour. There is a second woman who seems to be interested in the gallery owner, but I don't know what or who she is exactly. Possibly she is the one whose name he whispers in his girlfriend's ear? Whatever... The story is told twice, with slight variations both in contents and in viewpoint.

Appraisal (spoilers): The narrative has some formal elegance to it, and the characters, though moved by not always clear forces, have some internal consistence. Some interesting moments: the woman on the suspended car holds someone else's baby; the protagonist claims to have a good memory but repeatedly offers proof to the contrary (forgets his gloves on the bench, can't remember where he picked the chopsticks/napkins from); he describes how his brother met his wife when she was very young and jokes that "he raised a child and gobbled her up" (one of the women gets offended and leaves and his other friend tells him that she met his husband when she was in high school); he confesses his admiration for this same brother (whom he lives with). Everything is very understated and the connections between events is sometimes hard to figure out. I am not sure I like this filmmaker.

Rating: 50