# The Good Lawyer's Wife (바람난 가족)
**The Good Lawyer's Wife** (바람난 가족, *Baram-nan Gajok*, literally "A Family Having Affairs") is a 2003 South Korean drama film written and directed by Im Sang-soo, produced by Myung Films, about a middle-class Seoul family in which nearly every member carries on an extramarital affair[1](https://www.koreafilm.or.kr/library/search/video/25000). It was Im's third feature, after *Girls' Night Out* and *Tears*, and it competed at the 2003 [Venice Film Festival](https://www.edgepedia.org/venice-film-festival)[2](https://www.koreafilm.co.kr/news/news2003_7-29.htm) • [3](https://thefilmemporium.blogspot.com/2012/05/cinema-on-park-review-good-lawyers-wife.html). The film drew 1,748,263 admissions in South Korea and earned Im the Best Director award at the Flanders International Film Festival[4](https://cine21.com/movie/info/?movie_id=7084) • [5](https://www.koreafilm.co.kr/news/news2003_10-20.htm).
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Original title | 바람난 가족 (*Baram-nan Gajok*); international title *A Good Lawyer's Wife*[1](https://www.koreafilm.or.kr/library/search/video/25000) |
| Director and writer | Im Sang-soo (임상수), his third feature[1](https://www.koreafilm.or.kr/library/search/video/25000) • [2](https://www.koreafilm.co.kr/news/news2003_7-29.htm) |
| Release | August 14, 2003, South Korea; 104 minutes; adults only (청소년 관람불가)[4](https://cine21.com/movie/info/?movie_id=7084) |
| Principal cast | Moon So-ri (Eun Ho-jeong), Hwang Jung-min (Joo Young-jak), Youn Yuh-jung (Hong Byeong-han), Kim In-mun (Ju Chang-geun), Bong Tae-gyu (Shin Ji-woon)[4](https://cine21.com/movie/info/?movie_id=7084) |
| Box office | 1,748,263 admissions in South Korea[4](https://cine21.com/movie/info/?movie_id=7084) |
| Festival honors | Venice competition 2003; Best Director (The Robert Wise Award) at the 30th Flanders International Film Festival[3](https://thefilmemporium.blogspot.com/2012/05/cinema-on-park-review-good-lawyers-wife.html) • [5](https://www.koreafilm.co.kr/news/news2003_10-20.htm) |
| Production | Myung Films; distributed by Chungeorahm Film[1](https://www.koreafilm.or.kr/library/search/video/25000) • [4](https://cine21.com/movie/info/?movie_id=7084) |
## Spoilers
### Plot
The family at the center of the film consists of Joo Young-jak ([Hwang Jung-min](https://www.edgepedia.org/hwang-jung-min)), a lawyer in his thirties who takes on relatively principled cases; his wife Eun Ho-jeong ([Moon So-ri](https://www.edgepedia.org/moon-so-ri)), a former dancer who now dances at a neighborhood dance studio; and their adopted seven-year-old son Su-in[1](https://www.koreafilm.or.kr/library/search/video/25000). Outwardly the household looks untroubled, but the couple is no longer satisfied in bed, and Su-in is troubled by learning he is adopted[1](https://www.koreafilm.or.kr/library/search/video/25000).
The affairs extend through the older generation. Young-jak's father Chang-geun ([Kim In-mun](https://www.edgepedia.org/kim-in-mun)), who lost his family during the [Korean War](https://www.edgepedia.org/korean-war) (the 6.25 War) and has depended on alcohol ever since, is diagnosed with terminal liver cancer; he and his wife Byeong-han ([Youn Yuh-jung](https://www.edgepedia.org/youn-yuh-jung)) have not had sex in fifteen years[1](https://www.koreafilm.or.kr/library/search/video/25000). Young-jak carries on an affair with a younger woman, Yeon (Baek Jeong-rim), while Ho-jeong begins an affair with Ji-woon (Bong Tae-gyu), the teenage boy next door[1](https://www.koreafilm.or.kr/library/search/video/25000). When Chang-geun dies, Byeong-han shocks the family by announcing that she will marry her lover, an old elementary school classmate[1](https://www.koreafilm.or.kr/library/search/video/25000).
The story turns darker after Young-jak, using a business trip as a pretext to travel with his mistress, crashes into a drunken motorcycle courier. Fearing that his affair and fault will come to light, he uses his standing as a lawyer to corner the man, who loses his job and takes revenge by abducting Su-in and throwing him from a construction site building before killing himself[1](https://www.koreafilm.or.kr/library/search/video/25000). Unable to escape the shock of their son's death, Ho-jeong and Young-jak fight bitterly, using each other's affairs as ammunition, and finally decide to go their separate ways[1](https://www.koreafilm.or.kr/library/search/video/25000). In the closing movement, Ho-jeong is pregnant by Ji-woon, and the couple leaves in taxis toward their respective lovers[4](https://cine21.com/movie/info/?movie_id=7084).
## Production and casting
**Casting change.** In October 2002 the production announced [Kim Hye-soo](https://www.edgepedia.org/kim-hye-soo) in the role of Ho-jeong, alongside Hwang Jung-min as Young-jak[6](https://cine21.com/news/view/?mag_id=13489). Moon So-ri ultimately took the part, replacing another actress who dropped out just days ahead of filming[7](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/news/inFocus.jsp?blbdComCd=601018&mode=VIEW&pageRowSize=10&seq=275). Moon had won the Marcello Mastroianni Award at Venice for Lee Chang-dong's *[Oasis](https://www.edgepedia.org/oasis-2002-film)* only a year earlier, and her performance here was widely noted as a complete change of persona[7](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/news/inFocus.jsp?blbdComCd=601018&mode=VIEW&pageRowSize=10&seq=275) • [8](https://www.koreanculture.org/films/2004/2/26/a-good-lawyers-wife).
The crew included cinematographer Kim Woo-hyung, editor Lee Eun-soo, and composer [Kim Hong-jip](https://www.edgepedia.org/kim-hong-jip), with Shim Jae-myung as executive producer[4](https://cine21.com/movie/info/?movie_id=7084). At the film's first press screening at the Seoul Theater in July 2003, Moon So-ri said she had prepared by practicing dance before shooting and by watching documentary films about mothers in circumstances similar to her character's[2](https://www.koreafilm.co.kr/news/news2003_7-29.htm).
## Reception and festivals
**Box office.** The film opened on August 14, 2003, and drew 1,748,263 admissions[4](https://cine21.com/movie/info/?movie_id=7084). The Korean Cultural Service New York reported that it topped major Hollywood movies at the Korean box office during 2003, with audiences drawn by its provocative promotion[8](https://www.koreanculture.org/films/2004/2/26/a-good-lawyers-wife). Screen's reviewer Patrick Frater attributed the strong domestic result partly to social commentary touching on the Korean War, adoption, and cross-generation cohesion[9](https://www.screendaily.com/a-good-lawyers-wife/4014941.article).
**Festivals and awards.** *A Good Lawyer's Wife* was invited to compete at the 2003 Venice Film Festival, where it screened to generally favorable reviews[7](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/news/inFocus.jsp?blbdComCd=601018&mode=VIEW&pageRowSize=10&seq=275) • [8](https://www.koreanculture.org/films/2004/2/26/a-good-lawyers-wife). At the 30th Flanders International Film Festival, which closed on October 18, 2003, Im Sang-soo won the Best Director award, The Robert Wise Award; the top prize that year went to [Jim Sheridan](https://www.edgepedia.org/jim-sheridan)'s *In America*[5](https://www.koreafilm.co.kr/news/news2003_10-20.htm). The film also won the Best Actress and [Cinematography](https://www.edgepedia.org/cinematography) awards at the Stockholm Film Festival and a Special Jury Prize at the Bergen festival, and it was invited to the World Cinema section of the 2004 [Sundance Film Festival](https://www.edgepedia.org/sundance-film-festival), held January 15 to 25 in Park City, Utah[10](https://host.cine21.com/news/view/?idx=0&mag_id=22081).
In South Korea, the film was nominated in the 2003 대한민국영화대상 (Korean Film Awards) for Best Film, Director, Screenplay, Best Actress (Moon So-ri), Supporting Actor (Sung Ji-ru), and Supporting Actress (Youn Yuh-jung)[11](https://www.yeongnam.com/web/view.php?key=20031029.00000008.000030). At the Yeongpyeong (영평상) awards, it took the screenplay prize for Im Sang-soo, and the film was included in the critics' 2003 Best 10 list[12](https://host.cine21.com/news/view/?idx=1&mag_id=21759).
## Themes and critical reading
The Korean title, which translates literally as "A Family Having Affairs," signals the film's scope: not a story of one straying spouse but of a whole household, with the wife, husband, and mother-in-law all involved in extramarital relationships[13](https://www.asianmovieweb.com/en/reviews/a_good_lawyers_wife.htm). The Busan International Film Festival's program note described it as showing "the disintegration of a lawyer's family in a comical and yet shocking way," hitting at "the illusion of the middle class ideology and family values" through uninhibited depiction of sexual acts and deliberately aloof characterization[14](https://www.biff.kr/eng/html/archive/arc_history_view.asp?kind=history&m_idx=8045&page=1&pyear=2003&sec=167).
Korean critics read the film as an attack on the patriarchal family system. A 2008 academic analysis placed it among films that depict marriage and the family undergoing dissolution and reconfiguration in Korean society[15](https://journal.kci.go.kr/ccs/archive/articlePdf?artiId=ART001305529). A Weekly Kyeonghyang essay argued that the film is less about a married woman coolly enjoying an affair than about the rot in the roles of father, husband, and son as practiced since the 1960 civil code, calling it a compressed symbolic chronicle of "failed men"[16](https://weekly.khan.co.kr/article/5484). Im himself said the film was less an attack on monogamy as a cultural institution than an attempt to seek an exit from a violent male-centered society through women's strength and value[15](https://journal.kci.go.kr/ccs/archive/articlePdf?artiId=ART001305529).
International reviews were more mixed. Screen called it a polished domestic drama rich in energetic sex scenes and frank dialogue, with a gut-wrenching twist midway, but judged some subplots underplayed or unnecessary for audiences outside the festival circuit[9](https://www.screendaily.com/a-good-lawyers-wife/4014941.article). The Korean Film Council's retrospective history called it "perhaps the most complex affair drama that Korean cinema has ever produced," using the family's many trysts to dramatize the breakdown of family units under male guilt and growing female empowerment[7](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/news/inFocus.jsp?blbdComCd=601018&mode=VIEW&pageRowSize=10&seq=275).
## References
1. [바람난 가족, 한국영상자료원 (KOFA) 영상도서관 자료검색](https://www.koreafilm.or.kr/library/search/video/25000)
2. [<바람난 가족> 첫 언론시사 성황리에 마쳐…, 코리아필름 (2003)](https://www.koreafilm.co.kr/news/news2003_7-29.htm)
3. [Cinema on the Park Review: A Good Lawyer's Wife, The Film Emporium (2012)](https://thefilmemporium.blogspot.com/2012/05/cinema-on-park-review-good-lawyers-wife.html)
4. [바람난 가족 (A Good Lawyer's Wife) 상세정보, 씨네21](https://cine21.com/movie/info/?movie_id=7084)
5. [임상수 감독, 플랑드르국제영화제 최우수감독상 수상, 코리아필름 (2003)](https://www.koreafilm.co.kr/news/news2003_10-20.htm)
6. [임상수 감독의 <바람난 가족>에 캐스팅된 김혜수, 황정민, 씨네21 (2002)](https://cine21.com/news/view/?mag_id=13489)
7. [A GOOD LAWYER'S WIFE, Korean Film Council / Korean Film Archive, In Focus (2019)](https://www.koreanfilm.or.kr/eng/news/inFocus.jsp?blbdComCd=601018&mode=VIEW&pageRowSize=10&seq=275)
8. [A Good Lawyer's Wife, Korean Cultural Center New York (2004)](https://www.koreanculture.org/films/2004/2/26/a-good-lawyers-wife)
9. [A Good Lawyer's Wife review by Patrick Frater, Screen (2003)](https://www.screendaily.com/a-good-lawyers-wife/4014941.article)
10. [<바람난 가족> 선댄스 영화제 초청, 씨네21 (2003)](https://host.cine21.com/news/view/?idx=0&mag_id=22081)
11. [대한민국영화대상, 부문별 후보작 공개, 영남일보 (2003)](https://www.yeongnam.com/web/view.php?key=20031029.00000008.000030)
12. [<살인의 추억> 영평상 주요부문 석권, 씨네21 (2003)](https://host.cine21.com/news/view/?idx=1&mag_id=21759)
13. [A Good Lawyer's Wife (South Korea, 2003) review, AsianMovieWeb](https://www.asianmovieweb.com/en/reviews/a_good_lawyers_wife.htm)
14. [A Good Lawyer's Wife, Busan International Film Festival archive, 8th (2003) Korean Panorama](https://www.biff.kr/eng/html/archive/arc_history_view.asp?kind=history&m_idx=8045&page=1&pyear=2003&sec=167)
15. [유진월, 여성의 섹슈얼리티와 결혼/가족제도의 변모양상 연구, 비교문화연구 제12권 제2호 (2008)](https://journal.kci.go.kr/ccs/archive/articlePdf?artiId=ART001305529)
16. [김종휘, '바람난 가족'과 이 땅의 남성들, 주간경향 (2003)](https://weekly.khan.co.kr/article/5484)
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