Marina's sister drowned herself, her brother is both headstrong and weak, and her widowed mother has a reputation for sleeping around. Plus, Marina, who's family was rich before the war, is aloof: so she's the object of the jealousy and scorn of Hydra's young men, especially Christos, whom she rejected. She fears harassment whenever she leaves her house. When two Athenians on vacation board at Marina's family home, things come to a head: she falls in love with Pavlos, one of the visitors, and he with her. The young men in town stalk and jeer her; then play a cruel trick on Pavlos that goes awry with tragic results. Can any good come from the catharsis of tragedy?
Marina's sister drowned herself, her brother is both headstrong and weak, and her widowed mother has a reputation for sleeping around. Plus, Marina, who's family was rich before the war, is aloof: so she's the object of the jealousy and scorn of Hydra's young men, especially Christos, whom she rejected. She fears harassment whenever she leaves her house. When two Athenians on vacation board at Marina's family home, things come to a head: she falls in love with Pavlos, one of the visitors, and he with her. The young men in town stalk and jeer her; then play a cruel trick on Pavlos that goes awry with tragic results. Can any good come from the catharsis of tragedy?
Split into two parts, shot in black and white, the opening chapter First Love, Yoshiko follows a Korean director (Lim Hyung-kook) who is scouting for locations for his next film in the Japanese rural town of Gojo, and is joined by his assistant director Mijung (Kim Sae-byuk) who interprets for him. There he meets the locals including an elderly lady and a civil servant (Ryo Iwase) who helps him tour the area. The second part, Well of Sakura, captured in colour, is inspired by a story told in the opening chapter of a romance between a Korean woman and a local man. Mijung is now an actress while the civil servant is a persimmon farmer as they walk around the town and learn about each other.