Pandora (2016 film)

Pandora
International poster
Hangul	판도라
Hanja	판도라
Revised Romanization	Pandora
McCune–Reischauer	P'antora
Directed by	Park Jung-woo
Written by	Park Jung-woo
Produced by	Kim Chul-yong Park Kyung-sook
Starring	Kim Nam-gil
Cinematography	Choi Young-hwan
Edited by	Park Gok-ji
Music by	Jo Yeong-wook
Production company	CAC Entertainment
Distributed by	Next Entertainment World
Release date	December 7, 2016 (2016-12-07)
Running time	136 minutes
Country	South Korea
Language	Korean
Budget	₩530 million (US$477,000) (est.)[1]
Box office	US$32 million[2]

Pandora (Korean: 판도라; RR: Pandora) is a 2016 South Korean disaster film written and directed by Park Jung-woo, starring Kim Nam-Gil. The film was released in South Korea on December 7, 2016.^[3]

Plot[]

Jae-hyeok is a middle aged man who works at the local power plant, which is the only thing providing the town with energy, and the provider of most of the jobs. Jae-hyeok lives with his mother, sister in law, and nephew Min-jae. Jae-hyeok wishes to leave the town and the plant behind him and work on a fishing vessel to make money for his family, but is discouraged by everyone he knows.

Pyeong-seok is a member of the plant, who tries to get the president to shut down the plant, but he dismisses the claims, saying nothing will happen. One night, the animals of the town mysteriously run into the water.

Then, the next day, while Jae-hyeok is working, an earthquake suddenly strikes the town, causing one of the nuclear reactors to overheat. Attempts to cool it down are botched, as water does nothing to stop it. During an attempt to get out, the whole basement caves in, killing most of the crew. Jae-hyeok is one of the few to get out, and continues to get people to safety, until he collapses from nuclear radiation. Meanwhile, the president and his government debate allowing the reactor to vent radioactive particles into the air to relieve pressure from the core. The President insists on evacuating at least those closest to the reactor first. This backfires when the reactor stack explodes from the pressure, leading to a full nuclear meltdown.

Meanwhile, the KCDC quarantines the town's residents not far from the reactor. After Jae-hyeok's girlfriend, Yeon-joo, gets proof that the reactor exploded and delivers the news, the KCDC locks the town's residents in the evacuation center and put up an internet jammer. Rendering their phones useless. Yeon-joo spreads the word and later the residents manage to break out and get back in the buses to continue evacuating. Back at a local hospital, situations grow tense as Jae-hyeok's situation gets worse, and the medical team runs out of medical supplies. The reactor is not cooling down and the only option is to send a team in to blow the floor out from under the spent fuel rods and create a new container in the tank below.

Jae-hyeok agrees to a rescue mission, calling a distraught Yeon-joo before getting on a bus back to the town. Jae-hyeok remembers his childhood times before the nuclear disaster, before coming to the plant. By now, the only way to prevent the disaster from irradiating the entire country is to destroy the plant itself. Jae-hyeok willingly goes, having been exposed to too much radiation. Having lost both his father and brother to radiation poisoning, he knows he's going to die soon and he chooses to go back into the radiation to save his family. However, he shuts the others out of the main room, choosing to sacrifice himself to stop the disaster. He uses his final moments to broadcast a farewell message to his family and Yeon-joo before blowing up the plant, killing himself in the process.

Cast[]

• Kim Nam-gil as Kang Jae-hyeok, the childish protagonist, who works at the nuclear power plant
• Kim Young-ae as Mrs. Seok- the mother of Jae-Hyeok, who owns a restaurant and lost her husband and other son to a similar accident
• Kim Ju-hyeon as Yeon-joo, Jae-hyeok's fiance, who works as a tour guide at the power plant. She is also Jae-hyeok's childhood friend
• Jung Jin-young as Pyeong-seok, one of the heads of the plant, who grows more concerned about safety of the plant
• Moon Jeong-hee as Jung-hye, Jae hyeok's sister in law and a widow who lost her husband (Jae hyeok's brother)
• Kim Dae-myung as Gil-seop, one of Jae Hyeok's friends, who aids Jae Hyeok in the nuclear mission
• Lee Geung-young as Prime Minister
• Kang Shin-il as Mr. Kong, a grumpy old nuclear power plant worker and father of Gil-seop
• Yoo Seung-mok as Mr. Kam- the other power plant head, who suspects something is off about the plant
• Joo Jin-mo as Minister
• Song Yeong-chang as New Director
• Kim Young-woong as Mr. Hwang
• Kim Myung-min as South Korean President
• Kim Hye-eun as First Lady
• Oh Ye-sul as New Nurse

Release[]

Pandora is the first Korean film that has been pre-sold to Netflix. In November 2016, three weeks before the theatrical release, the company acquired exclusive international rights for streaming Pandora in 190 countries.^[4][5]

Awards and nominations[]

See also[]

• Fukushima 50

References[]

External links[]

• Pandora at HanCinema
• Pandora at IMDb
• Pandora at Rotten Tomatoes
• Pandora at the Korean Movie Database
• Pandora at Naver Movies (in Korean)