Kim Ji-young, Born 1982

Plot

The film starts off by showing Ji-young (Jung Yu-mi) doing typical housewife activities. She is a stay-at-home mom whose main responsibility is raising her daughter whilst her husband, Dae-hyun (Gong Yoo) works a day job at an office. Through flashbacks we see that Ji-young used to work at a marketing firm and was happy while she was being productive and having a career. She also looked up to one of her female seniors, team leader Kim, who has risen to quite a high position in the company whilst being a mother at the same time as there is discrimination towards working mothers in the workplace. On one occasion team leader Kim calls in Ji-young to praise her for doing well at work.

A few years later, now as a stay-at-home mom, Ji-young starts to develop feelings of being trapped and unfulfilled. As well as losing a bit of her personal identity, she also suffers from postpartum depression. Due to all these, Ji-young unknowingly started to develop a mental disorder which consists of her seemingly becoming briefly possessed by the personality of her mother or late grandmother. During these possessions she will start to act and say things that her mother or late grandmother would say, even going as far as to mimic their vocal tones. She usually starts acting like this under situations where she feels a significant amount of stress or underlying unhappiness; for instance, during a visit to her mother-in-law's house and some instances in front of Dae-hyun. Dae-hyun starts to notice this and becomes very concerned, he starts to video record instances of Ji-young's possessions and eventually approaches a psychiatrist and asks her for help, to which the psychiatrist requests to see Jiyoung immediately.

Dae-hyun subtly encourages Ji-young to go and see the psychiatrist by giving her the psychiatrist's card. However, to his disappointment, Ji-young does not see through on the appointment as she realizes how expensive the sessions would be. Still feeling despondent while being a stay-at-home mother, Ji-young starts to contemplate working again, and considers getting a part-time job working at a bakery. Eventually, Ji-young decides to get in contact with team leader Kim who has started her own marketing firm. Dae-hyun realizes how important work is for Ji-young and how it has the potential to cure her strange malady. He encourages Ji-young to return to work and says that he will take parental leave for a year and become a stay-at-home father and take over the responsibility of raising their daughter. Ji-young is happy to return to work. While her strange bouts of possession continue to plague her at home, they do not happen as often, and she is notably in better moods.

Cast

Main

Jung Yu-mi as Kim Ji-young, Dae-hyun's wife, former employee of the company and housewife with some unusual symptoms

Kim Ha-yeon as 12 year old Ji-young

Gong Yoo as Jung Dae-hyun, Ji-young's husband and employees of the company who noticed her abnormality

Supporting

Kim Mi-kyung as Kim Mi-sook, Ji-young's mother who open the restaurant

Gong Min-jeung as Kim Eun-young, Ji-young's older sister who has a career as a teacher

Lee Na-yoon as Young Kim Eun-young

Park Sung-yeon as Kim Eun-sil, team leader

Kim Sung-cheol as Kim Ji-seok, Ji-young's younger brother

Lee Bong-ryun as Hye-soo

Kim Gook-hee as Soo-bin's mother

Lee Eol as Young-soo

Cha Mi-kyung as Mrs.Jung, Dae-hyun's mother

Son Sung-chan as Mr.Jung, Dae-hyun's father

Woo Ji-hyun as Byung-shik

Kang Ae-shim as Ji-young's grandmother

Yoon Sa-bong as Soo-hyun

Special appearances

Ye Soo-jung as Ji-young's grandmother

Yeom Hye-ran as Woman with scarf in the past

Production

Development

The film marks actress-turned-director Kim Do-young's debut feature film. While adapting the novel into a film, Kim's "biggest task was to weave the series of independent episodes in the original material into a story with a central narrative."

Casting

On September 12, 2018, Jung Yu-mi was confirmed to play the titular role of the film. On October 17, Gong Yoo was confirmed to play Kim Ji-young's husband, starring for the third time alongside Jung Yu-mi after Silenced (2011) and Train to Busan (2016). After these announcements, the cast received hateful comments from anti-feminists (comments which had already been made when the novel became popular in South Korea), but both actors "said that they didn't mind the haters as much as many had feared [and] instead, their desire to do the story justice was their main focus."

Filming

Principal photography began on January 21, 2019, in Gwangmyeong. Filming was completed in April.

Release

On September 21, 2019, a character poster featuring Jung Yu-mi was released with the announcement of an October release. On September 26, the official trailer was released. On October 12, it was confirmed that the film would premiere on the 23rd.

The film will be screened at the 2nd Pyeongchang International Peace Film Festival, whose year's theme is "woman," in June 2020 in the Spectrum K section.

Impact

According to a study made by the National Library of Korea, Cho Nam-joo's Kim Ji-young, Born 1982 was the most borrowed novel in South Korea in 2019 for the second consecutive year. The book was mostly borrowed by women in their 40s and the number of loans increased by 43% in October when the film was released.

Reception

Box office

In South Korea, the film topped the box office for the week of October 27, 2019. It surpassed 1 million moviegoers in five days, 2 million in eleven days and 3 million in eighteen days. As of November 2020, the film has reached 3,679,099 total admissions grossing $27,168,574 in revenue.

Critical response

According to Pierce Conran of the Korean Film Council, "reviews for the film have been strong while the largely female audience (roughly 68%, according to Naver portal viewer ratings) have also been extremely positive."