Ode to My Father moves US audiences

Actor Hwang Jung-min in a scene from “Ode to My Father” / Courtesy of CJ E&M

By Choi Yearn-hong

The original Korean title of the hit film “International Market” was changed to “Ode to My Father” for the Western audiences.

I think the western title is more poetic and has more meaning to me as a Korean son during the Korean War (1950-1953) thankful for my father, and all fathers who endured difficult times in fighting poverty in a war-torn country.

As a Korean-American, I want to dedicate this movie to Captain Leonard LaRue of the Ship of Miracle who saved 14,000 North Korean refugees in December 1950.

The movie’s Korean title is “International Market” in the southern port city of Busan. My American friends cannot or may not figure out what the international market means or implies. The international market sold foreign goods during the Korean War (1950-53) and after. Some called it Yankee market.

The movie begins with the SS Meredith Victory, also known as the “Ship of Miracles” and its Captain, Leonard LaRue.

This freighter ship was intended to sail to Heungnam Port in North Korea in order to supply oil to the U.S. troops, but could not, because the U.S. forces had already retreated from the massive Chinese attack on Dec. 10, 1950. Captain LaRue decided then to use this opportunity to evacuate the thousands of North Koreans seeking safety in the South. In the end, Captain LaRue saved 14,000 refugees and transported them to Busan in the freezing winter waters.

In those disorderly chaotic crowds in the Busan harbor, one family separated.

The storyline of the movie begins when Duk-soo and his family separate upon arrival as Duk-soo’s father remained in the port to find his daughter. Before they part, Duk-soo’s father makes Duk-soo promise to take on the role of the first son and support the family while he is gone. Mother and her two sons and one baby daughter settled in Busan.

A difficult life was waiting for the family. Duk-soo took the promise to heart and took on jobs in order to make a living for his family. He later went to West Germany to work in coal mines in order to earn money to support his family in the 1960s. He saved and bought a house. He married a Korean nurse whom he met in Germany.

Later, in the midst of the Vietnam War, he decided to move to Vietnam to buy the shop his aunt, his father’s sister, owned and managed in the International Market. Understanding the dangers that lay ahead of him in a war torn country, we later learn that Duk-Soo came to Vietnam with the hope that this is where he would eventually reunite with his father, as promised by his father in his last words to him before separating at Heungnam port.

Time passed like an arrow. His aunt and his mother passed away. One dramatic story was finding his own sister separated in the port in December 1950 when the nation’s largest broadcaster KBS opened the nation-wide campaign to find “separated families” in 1983.

Duk-soo and his family had a telephone contact with a woman in Los Angeles. She was the Duksoo’s lost sister at the Heungnam port. She was adopted by a U.S. soldier and grew up in Los Angeles. She came to Busan to see her family. One year later, her mother passed away. Duk-soo realized the time passed like an arrow. He is an old man to have grandchildren. He sacrificed his life for the family as the first son, and gave up hope to find his father. Then, he made a decision to sell the shop in the International Market.

Duk-soo represented the Korean people of his generation in poverty who witnessed the nation’s economic development. The movie is dedicated to all fathers who overcame all the difficulties, pain and sorrow. The father’s will to the first son who must take care of the family was fulfilled. His life experiences became a symbolic of modern Korea.

Sacrifice for the family was the motive for hard working people. This movie showed how beautiful one man’s sacrifice is. It is no wonder that it has attracted 10 million people in Korea in less than a month, and 100,000 viewers in the United States.

It was an incredibly sentimental movie for me; I had tears in my eyes throughout. I wish and hope this movie may teach all those who are interested in knowing how Korea achieved its miraculous economic development.

Choi Yearn-hong, poet and writer, is the founding president of the Korean Poets and Writers Group in the Washington Area.