Hotel by the River

South Korea, 96m, DCP

Showtimes & Tickets

Screened February 22–March 7, 2019

Aging poet Younghwan (Ki Joobong) summons his estranged sons (Kwon Haehyo and Yu Junsang) to a solitary hotel beside the Han River. While awaiting their arrival he encounters two women (Kim Minhee and Song Seonmi) and is struck by their angelic beauty, but the women have come to the hotel to do some healing of their own. As Younghwan moves between the women and his bickering sons, he finds his mind divided between the immediate and the ineffable. A gently powerful meditation on family and death, this is one of the most affecting films in Hong’s oeuvre.

A Cinema Guild release.

A film by Hong Sang-soo

One of Hong’s most unexpectedly poignant works… It’s a film for fans of Hong, [Eric] Rohmer and maybe Ingmar Bergman.”

The New York Times