Weary of college life, Byeong-tae (Kim Soo-chul), a philosophy student, leaves home to wander the streets. At a police station, he meets Min-woo (Ahn Sungki), a beggar, who leads him to a red-light district where Byeong-tae falls in love with a sex worker named Chun-ja (Lee Mi-sook). Helping Chun-ja escape the brothel after she expresses her wish to return home, the trio set off towards the south with nothing to their names. Constantly singing the beggars’ ballad and delivering long tirades that, “a beggar owns nothing,” Min-woo never dismisses Byeong-tae’s dream to, “catch a whale.” Though appearing as light as a feather, Min-woo harbors a deep despair in his eyes, subtly hinting at his past as a student activist. It is entirely thanks to Ahn Sung-ki’s performance that audiences naturally warm up to a character caught between such extreme lightness and gravity. Portraying a youth despised by the world, he metaphorically reflects the spirit of the era. (KIM Song-hee)