The big payoff moment is so small and passes so quietly that it's almost unbearably beautiful.
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04/24/09
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Treeless Mountain (2009)
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Reviews Counted:35
Fresh:30
Rotten:5
Average Rating:7.6/10
Consensus: Intermittently wondrous and harsh, this sensitive drama about two abandoned sisters gives time and space to the intimate and beautiful moments of childhood.
Theatrical Release:Apr 22, 2009 Limited
Synopsis: When their mother needs to leave in order to find their estranged father, seven year-old Jin and her younger sister, Bin, are left to live with their Big Aunt for the summer. With only a small... [More]
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Reviews for Treeless Mountain
..the film is tender, touching and charming, a portrait of quiet resilience and sisterly devotion...
09/20/09
Interesting if occasionally limiting.
08/07/09
A wonder-inducing drama about a six-year-old Korean girl who takes on adult responsibilities when she and her little sister are abandoned by their mother.
03/22/09
Treeless Mountain casts a sad, pellucid spell. It looks at life from three feet off the ground and meets the hardening gaze of its 6-year-old protagonist head on.
06/18/09
Top Criticvery real magic emanates from Treeless Mountain like vapor from a block of dry ice
04/21/09
...requires the commitment by the viewer to get involved in the lives of the little girls. But, for the real film buff, this is a true labor of love and worth the effort.
06/13/09
So Yong Kim's quiet film which takes its time observing the minutiae of every day life has an undercurrent of grander themes at play.
06/01/09
Treeless Mountain has the tang of real life, though this is realism that has been filtered through 60 or so years of world art cinema.
04/22/09
Top CriticRelying on the essentially inert performances of child actors, So Yong Kim draws on a deep understanding of how movies work but also taps into her own experiences. That's a potent combination.
06/13/09
Is it fair for the director to strip away so much and leave us feeling so helpless? I’m still in pain; I don’t know.
04/20/09
Top CriticSo Yong Kim's remarkable film never spells out exactly what Jin or Bin is thinking, the camera implies how they see.
05/07/09
The film is spare and a bit static, the plot a buildup of mundane moments, but Kim's conceptual smarts and firm direction are impressive, as are the performances from such little children.
06/19/09
Kim is undoubtedly a skilled director, but she’s someone who seems more content to observe than state.
09/08/08
It's subtle, moving and, despite the grim subject, hopeful.
07/17/09
Skillfully unsentimental -- because of, but also despite, the presence of two irresistible, unself-conscious performers in virtually every scene.
04/22/09
Top Critic[An] affecting, semiautobiographical story of two sisters from Seoul who are abandoned by their parents at a brutally tender age.
04/22/09
So Yong Kim has made another minimalist masterpiece, a quiet movie of sharply observed details and two girls who will break your heart.
05/15/09
Top CriticIn modest, lovingly observed ways, the director gives her characters -- and, one hazards, herself -- the gentlest gift of sweet possibility.
07/17/09
Top CriticDeeply rooted in the perspectives of its ill-fated heroines, Treeless Mountain finds a place in the modern abandoned-child narratives alongside Ramin Bahrani's Chop Shop and the inferior period piece Blame It On Fidel.
04/22/09
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