[The Marines Who Never Returned]

The film The Marines Who Never Returned (1963), directed by Lee Man-hee, is a Korean War film produced in a period, not too far after the real war had ended. As mentioned in David S. Diffrient’s reading, the movie not only illustrates the anticommunism of the Park Chung Hee regime, but also takes a “humanistic approach to the Korean War” (Diffrient, 22) one of which that shows comradeship in the battle line.

For instance, at the beginning of the film, there is a scene that shows a shooting between the marines and the communists. While the heartless communists shoot the woman who is trying to flee with her daughter, the marines succeed in rescuing the young girl, and they take good care of the orphan (Young Hee).

             Another interesting point of the story was the depiction of the brothers – one of the squad members’ brother was a communist. This reminded me a lot of another famous Korean War film, where two brothers stand against each other across the 38 line. The two Koreas have been frequently described as brothers (since they are one huge family) – but why is it that the one fighting for the North is described as the older brother in both this film and Tageukgi: The Brotherhood of War (2004)? Is there a particular reason? In a South Korean perspective, it is South Korea that gives aid to North, not the other way around. And I think (at least in Asian context), the older sibling has more responsibility in taking care of the younger sibling. In that sense, shouldn’t the person representing South be described as the elder?

             Personally, I found the description of the war times very realistic throughout the movie. Some may disagree, but this film was produced in the 60s. Perhaps the fact that Korean War took place only a decade ago allowed the director to reproduce the battlefront similar to what really took place. The explosions, and shooting were quite impressive when thinking about the 60s – recent techniques (computer graphics) were not available, so it must have been done during the actual process of making the film.