The Attorney
is a 2013 South Korean courtroom drama film directed and co-written by Yang
Woo-suk, in his directorial debut (Yang was previously a film producer and webtoon
author). With 11,375,954 tickets sold and revenue of ₩82.9 billion, The Attorney became the 8th best-selling
Korean film of all time, and the second highest-grossing Korean film of 2013.
It
was inspired by the real-life "Burim case" of 1981, when during the
authoritarian Chun Doo-hwan regime, 22 students, teachers and office workers
who belonged to a book club were arrested without warrants on fabricated
charges that they were North Korea sympathizers. Roh Moo-hyun, then a tax
lawyer from Busan, formed a legal team with his allies (including Moon Jae-in
and Kim Kwang-il) to defend the arrested individuals against the government.
After the case, Roh became an influential human rights lawyer throughout the
1980s; he later entered politics and became the ninth president of South Korea.
Plot:
With
only a high school diploma, legal attorney Song Woo-suk (Song Kang-ho) is
somewhat of an outcast in Busan society ruled by university connections.
Determined to become economically affluent, he accepts cases that colleagues
shun, and with his business acumen and appetite for money, he soon builds a
successful practice dealing with real estate and tax law. But Woo-suk becomes
embroiled in a civil liberties case involving a group of young student
activists detained by police, who are accused of being communist sympathizers.
One of them is Park Jin-woo (Yim Si-wan), the son of Choi Soon-ae (Kim Young-ae),
a restaurant owner that Woo-suk is indebted to. When Woo-suk sees that Jin-woo
has been tortured by interrogators, he decides to take on the case.
Cast:
· Song
Kang-ho as Song Woo-suk
· Kim
Young-ae as Choi Soon-ae
· Oh
Dal-su as Park Dong-ho
· Kwak
Do-won as Cha Dong-young
· Yim
Si-wan as Park Jin-woo
· Lee
Sung-min as Lee Yoon-taek
· Jung
Won-joong as Attorney Kim Sang-pil
· Song
Young-chang as Judge
· Jo
Min-ki as Prosecutor Kang Young-cheol
· Lee
Hang-na as Song Woo-seok's wife
· Cha
Eun-jae as Miss Moon
· Jung
Joon-won as Song Gun-woo
· Cha
Gwang-soo as Park Byeong-ho
· Ryu
Soo-young as Lee Chang-joon (cameo)
Within
ten days of its release, The Attorney
had been seen by over 3.4 million people in South Korea. By the
end of the year it became the 8th best-selling local movie of all the time. It
reached 7.8 million admissions in 18 days, making it the fastest Korean film to
pass 7 million admissions since the 2012 film The Thieves, which did it in 13 days. It became the tenth movie
to break the 10 million admissions mark in Korea. The film grossed a total of ₩82,880,761,300 in
South Korea, with 11,375,954 tickets sold.
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