Overview: Following a dream about her dead twin sister, thriving corporate tycoon Gong Do-hee (Yoon Jeong-hee, Poetry) takes a drive to the seaside. But her splendid outing becomes a nightmarish one when she is kidnapped and forced to live with a gruff island fisherman who insists that she is his runaway wife.

Featuring a timely message about political oppression that evaded the stringent censors of the day, this daring modernist work from prolific Korean cineaste Kim Soo-yong (Mist) stands as one of the boldest works of Korean cinema’s darkest era - the 1970s.

Blu-ray Verdict: The film feels like the moments after waking up from a nightmare where you have to check what reality you’re in, stretched into a good 90 minutes - where both realties are real, and tinged with their own horrors!

Splendid Outing is very well shot with this weird wide-angle lens, and lots of funky fantastic imagery - it manages to absolutely nail the line between dreamlike and reality with its edit. Its horrors are very, very real too, which just adds to the whole ambiance that it is trying, and succeeding in bringing forth.

The only criticism I might have is that it’s pretty damn heavy handed with its touches on the life of Korean women in a way I can see being found miserable. I don’t really think it is like this, but that is just the way it comes across, moreover the way it is portrayed. Cinematic license, I guess.

It is a heavy watch with heavy themes of abuse and general misogyny, and I can’t recommend it to everyone, but personally I absolutely loved it. I think it is absolutely brilliantly executed and, at times, it truly got under my skin in a really strong way.

LIMITED EDITION CONTENTS:
New 4K restoration by Radiance Films
Uncompressed mono PCM audio
Audio Commentary by Ariel Schudson (2025)
Interview with filmmaker Lee Chang-dong (2025)
Interview with assistant director Chung Ji-young (2025)
Stranded but Not Afraid: The Island Women of Classic Korean Cinema - a visual essay by Pierce Conran
Newly improved English subtitles
Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Time Tomorrow
Limited edition booklet featuring new writing by Chung Chong-hwa and Pierce Conran and archival writing by Director Kim Soo-yong
Limited edition of 2500 copies, presented in full-height Scanavo packaging with removable OBI strip leaving packaging free of certificates and markings

Official Purchase Link

www.radiancefilms.co.uk