# Heavenly Homecoming to the Stars
**Heavenly Homecoming to the Stars** (별들의 고향, *Byeoldeul-ui gohyang*) is a 1974 South Korean drama directed by Lee Jang-ho in his feature debut, based on the serialized novel of the same name by Choi In-ho. It follows Gyeong-a, a young woman destroyed by a series of exploitative relationships after she comes to the city, and it became the biggest box-office hit in Korean film history up to that time, drawing about 465,000 admissions during a 105-day run.[1](https://escholarship.org/content/qt67b379gj/qt67b379gj.pdf?t=ru6l76) • [2](https://www.korea.net/koreanet/fileDownload?fileUrl=pdfdata%2F2016%2F01%2FK-MOVIE2015_en_0105.pdf)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Release | April 26, 1974, South Korea; premiered at the Kukdo Theater, Seoul[1](https://escholarship.org/content/qt67b379gj/qt67b379gj.pdf?t=ru6l76) • [3](https://cine21.com/movie/info/?movie_id=1786) |
| Director | Lee Jang-ho, his feature debut, made while he worked at Shin Sang-ok's Shin Films company[4](https://biff.kr/eng/html/archive/arc_history_view.asp?kind=history&m_idx=30157&pyear=2017) |
| Source | Serialized novel by Choi In-ho, who said he wanted to write about "a woman whom a city killed"[2](https://www.korea.net/koreanet/fileDownload?fileUrl=pdfdata%2F2016%2F01%2FK-MOVIE2015_en_0105.pdf) |
| Box office | About 465,000 tickets sold over 105 days, a record for Korean film at the time[1](https://escholarship.org/content/qt67b379gj/qt67b379gj.pdf?t=ru6l76) • [5](https://uhpress.hawaii.edu/title/lee-jang-ho/) |
| Running time | 105 minutes (the Korean Film Archive lists 110 minutes)[3](https://cine21.com/movie/info/?movie_id=1786) • [6](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/films/index/filmsView.jsp?movieCd=20100268) |
| Principal cast | An In-suk (Gyeong-a), Shin Seong-il (Mun-ho), Yoon Il-bong (Man-jun), Ha Yong-su (Yeong-seok), Baek Il-seob (Dong-hyuk)[7](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/heavenly_homecoming_to_stars) |
| Awards | Paeksang Arts Awards 1975: Best Cinematography and Best New Director[6](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/films/index/filmsView.jsp?movieCd=20100268) |
## Spoilers
### Plot
Gyeong-a (An In-suk), deserted by her first love Yeong-seok (Ha Yong-su), recovers and marries the middle-aged Lee Man-jun (Yoon Il-bong) as his second wife. He leaves her when he learns she had been pregnant before their relationship. She takes to drink and is turned into a bar hostess by Dong-hyuk (Baek Il-seob). She then meets the painter Mun-ho (Shin Seong-il) and the two live together, but Mun-ho, himself severely alcoholic, decides he cannot love her and leaves, placing his money by her sleeping head. A year later her body is found in the winter snow.[6](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/films/index/filmsView.jsp?movieCd=20100268) • [2](https://www.korea.net/koreanet/fileDownload?fileUrl=pdfdata%2F2016%2F01%2FK-MOVIE2015_en_0105.pdf)
The film is told in non-linear fashion and opens with its own epilogue, Mun-ho carrying a small white box of ashes across a frozen forest, so the audience knows Gyeong-a's fate from the start.[8](https://windowsonworlds.com/2016/02/01/heavenly-homecoming-to-stars-%EB%B3%84%EB%93%A4%EC%9D%98-%EA%B3%A0%ED%96%A5-lee-jang-ho-1974/) Choi In-ho's stated subject, "a woman whom a city killed," frames the story: Gyeong-a is one of the many young women who came to Seoul during 1970s industrialization and ended up working as bar hostesses.[2](https://www.korea.net/koreanet/fileDownload?fileUrl=pdfdata%2F2016%2F01%2FK-MOVIE2015_en_0105.pdf) • [8](https://windowsonworlds.com/2016/02/01/heavenly-homecoming-to-stars-%EB%B3%84%EB%93%A4%EC%9D%98-%EA%B3%A0%ED%96%A5-lee-jang-ho-1974/)
## Source novel and production
Choi In-ho's novel was first serialized in a newspaper, where it became a must-read and a popular discussion point among readers of all ages before the film was made.[8](https://windowsonworlds.com/2016/02/01/heavenly-homecoming-to-stars-%EB%B3%84%EB%93%A4%EC%9D%98-%EA%B3%A0%ED%96%A5-lee-jang-ho-1974/) Lee Jang-ho, who had studied under the director Shin Sang-ok and worked at Shin Films, made the adaptation his debut.[4](https://biff.kr/eng/html/archive/arc_history_view.asp?kind=history&m_idx=30157&pyear=2017) The screenplay was by Lee Hee-woo, with cinematography by Jang Seok-jun and music by Kang Geun-sik and Lee Jang-hee.[3](https://cine21.com/movie/info/?movie_id=1786)
The soundtrack became one of the most sought-after Korean LPs of the 1970s, and the popular song "I Am Nineteen," associated with Yoon Shi-nae, circulated widely along with the film's dialogue, helping the movie become a cultural event beyond its ticket sales.[9](https://letterboxd.com/misterminsoo/film/heavenly-homecoming-to-stars/) • [10](https://cinemaanthology.com/korean/films/heavenly-homecoming-to-stars/) In 1975 both Lee Jang-ho and composer Lee Jang-hee were arrested for marijuana use, as were many in the arts industries of the period.[9](https://letterboxd.com/misterminsoo/film/heavenly-homecoming-to-stars/)
## Style and genre
The film combines conventional melodrama with techniques unusual for Korean commercial cinema of the time: dizzying flashbacks, extreme camera angles, avant-garde montage, jump-cut-like editing, and an often distorted soundtrack.[11](https://harvardfilmarchive.org/calendar/heavenly-homecoming-to-stars-2017-02) • [5](https://uhpress.hawaii.edu/title/lee-jang-ho/) Kim See-moo, author of a monograph on Lee Jang-ho, credited its success to a break with the clichéd framework of the melodrama genre, a new kind of love story, and the experimental plotting and editing of the then-newcomer director.[5](https://uhpress.hawaii.edu/title/lee-jang-ho/)
Scholars have classified the film both as a hostess melodrama, by subject matter, and as a youth film, by director and audience. The term "youth film" was in fact used for the first time in connection with this picture: a Chosun Ilbo article of April 30, 1974 labeled it a youth film because it showed new Korean film trends comparable to the New American cinema, comparing it to *Easy Rider* and *Midnight Cowboy*.[1](https://escholarship.org/content/qt67b379gj/qt67b379gj.pdf?t=ru6l76) The film introduced the youth culture of the times, acoustic guitar, jeans, and draft beer, to Korean film, and it led directly to later hostess melodramas such as *Yeong-Ja's Heydays* and *Winter Woman*.[4](https://biff.kr/eng/html/archive/arc_history_view.asp?kind=history&m_idx=30157&pyear=2017)
## Reception and legacy
The film's commercial performance was unprecedented: about 465,000 admissions in 105 days set a Korean box-office record, and it was for a time the biggest hit in Korean film history.[1](https://escholarship.org/content/qt67b379gj/qt67b379gj.pdf?t=ru6l76) • [2](https://www.korea.net/koreanet/fileDownload?fileUrl=pdfdata%2F2016%2F01%2FK-MOVIE2015_en_0105.pdf) The film's hit status instantly made Lee a leading commercial filmmaker and prompted a flood of pictures focused on women working in nightlife and hostess economies.[10](https://cinemaanthology.com/korean/films/heavenly-homecoming-to-stars/) At the 1975 Paeksang Arts Awards it won Best Cinematography and, for Lee, Best New Director.[6](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/films/index/filmsView.jsp?movieCd=20100268)
A sequel, *Heavenly Homecoming to Stars 2*, followed in 1978, continuing the story with Mun-ho, who has lost Gyeong-a, meeting a new woman at a bar.[11](https://harvardfilmarchive.org/calendar/heavenly-homecoming-to-stars-2017-02) • [12](https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/items/72930/bitstreams/192959/data.pdf) The original film has since been restored and re-released on Blu-ray with English subtitles, and it is also available free from the Korean Film Archive's YouTube channel; it screened in retrospectives at the Busan International Film Festival in 2017 and 2018 and at the Jecheon International Music & Film Festival in 2019.[8](https://windowsonworlds.com/2016/02/01/heavenly-homecoming-to-stars-%EB%B3%84%EB%93%A4%EC%9D%98-%EA%B3%A0%ED%96%A5-lee-jang-ho-1974/) • [6](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/films/index/filmsView.jsp?movieCd=20100268) On the aggregate site Rating Graph it holds an average rating of 6.3 out of 10 from 106 votes.[13](https://www.ratingraph.com/movies/heavenly-homecoming-to-stars-ratings-103852/)
## References
1. [Youth Films or Hostess Melodramas? (UC Riverside dissertation, eScholarship)](https://escholarship.org/content/qt67b379gj/qt67b379gj.pdf?t=ru6l76)
2. [The World's Spotlight on Korean Film (Korea.net, K-MOVIE 2015 PDF)](https://www.korea.net/koreanet/fileDownload?fileUrl=pdfdata%2F2016%2F01%2FK-MOVIE2015_en_0105.pdf)
3. [별들의 고향 (Heavenly Homecoming To Stars), Cine21](https://cine21.com/movie/info/?movie_id=1786)
4. [Heavenly Homecoming to Stars, Busan International Film Festival archive](https://biff.kr/eng/html/archive/arc_history_view.asp?kind=history&m_idx=30157&pyear=2017)
5. [Lee Jang-ho by Kim See-moo, University of Hawai'i Press](https://uhpress.hawaii.edu/title/lee-jang-ho/)
6. [Heavenly Homecoming to Stars (1974), Korean Film Archive / KOFIC](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/films/index/filmsView.jsp?movieCd=20100268)
7. [Heavenly Homecoming to Stars, Rotten Tomatoes](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/heavenly_homecoming_to_stars)
8. [Heavenly Homecoming to Stars (별들의 고향, Lee Jang-ho, 1974), Windows on Worlds](https://windowsonworlds.com/2016/02/01/heavenly-homecoming-to-stars-%EB%B3%84%EB%93%A4%EC%9D%98-%EA%B3%A0%ED%96%A5-lee-jang-ho-1974/)
9. [Review by Joshua Minsoo Kim, Letterboxd](https://letterboxd.com/misterminsoo/film/heavenly-homecoming-to-stars/)
10. [Heavenly Homecoming to Stars, Cinema Anthology](https://cinemaanthology.com/korean/films/heavenly-homecoming-to-stars/)
11. [Heavenly Homecoming to Stars, Harvard Film Archive](https://harvardfilmarchive.org/calendar/heavenly-homecoming-to-stars-2017-02)
12. [Dissertation on the Young Sang Sidae film movement, IDEALS (University of Illinois)](https://www.ideals.illinois.edu/items/72930/bitstreams/192959/data.pdf)
13. [Heavenly Homecoming to Stars (1974) ratings, Rating Graph](https://www.ratingraph.com/movies/heavenly-homecoming-to-stars-ratings-103852/)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Drama and biographical films (individual works) › Drama films 1970s › Released 1970 to 1974*
*Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
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License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license