[2008 ACF Post - Production Fund]
Director Roh Gyeong-tae tends not to craft the story in a way that helps audiences understand the whole picture at once, but rather does it so the audience can take their time to see the connections between characters in his films. The patterns of the characters are tied down to the spaces they belong to, moving slowly in their own world. In that sense, the title Land of Scarecrows represents the director’s vision quite clearly. The story is about three people, a transgender named Jang Jiyoung, her Filipino foster child Loi Tan, and Rain, who came from the Philippines to get married. Their isolated days entangle with each others’, and their loneliness and misfortunes are infectious. The encounters of the characters are not for warm and fuzzy human relationships, but for maximizing their isolations. The dry images and the coldness of the sounds are the core of the repeated rhythm of this film. And the bare background which is far from reality is the starting point of expressing the irony of the story. (LEE Sang-yong)