After a failed suicide attempt the main character wakes up in a hospital where he realizes things seem a bit different.
The film touches on many issues surrounding mental health practices, depression, suicide and how to move on after loosing a loved one.
Synopsis
As gloomy as the above description is above Hellowoo Goseuteu is a film that is best described as a comedy.
After the main character awakes in a hospital bed, he realizes that he can see and hear people who shouldn't be there. Weird, right?
He soon finds out that these people are ghosts and cannot move on to the afterlife. After exiting the hospital, the main character goes on with life just as miserable as before.
But his new ghost friends continue to bother him relentlessly. No matter how hard he tries to rid of them, they stay by his side. They persist that he is the only one who can help them move on but he does not want anything to do with them.
Eventually after some time (and a considerable amount of pestering) he finally decides to help out the crew of ghosts.
In order to help them move on the ghosts each send him on wacky missions. Each of which put him in comical situations with the hope that the ghosts will leave him alone.
The remainder of the film follows the main character and his rag-tag crew of ghosts as they find out why none of them can move on and what his holding them all back (the main character included).
Important Themes
Hellowoo Goseuteu is a film that at first seems to be a very one-dimensional film. But over time it grows on to telling quite a profound story.
In doing so, the film sheds significant light on mental health and suicide.
Currently Korea holds the 4th highest suicide rate worldwide with the highest rate of male suicides in all OECD countries in 2013. And in the last 25 years the suicide rate has tripled.
To this day, mental health remains to be quite the taboo topic in South Korea. With the immense advancements in technology, we as human beings have built a massive reliance on technology.
Altogether it has changed how we communicate, absorb information and socialize. And with that new stresses have been created. More and more people are becoming transfixed on these newer perceptions on reality and aren't plugging into the real world.
With all of these developments, talking about mental health is still frowned upon in popular Korean society. However there have been improvements over the years.
More and more k-dramas and films are beginning to shed light on the topic. Films just like Hellowoo Goseuteu!
One of the most popular talkshows on Korean television is Hello Counselor. The show focuses on real-people who talk about their day-to-day issues with a group of peers.
TV shows and films like these continue speak to important issues and it is a real pleasure to see them do so well. It projects a very hopeful future for not only talking about mental health, but for taking action to defeating social stigmas and stereotypes associated with mental illnesses.
Conclusion
Altogether Hellowoo Goseuteu is a film which brilliantly balances cute humour, sadness, grief and optimism.
It is a well constructed film that pulls everything together at the end for a very satisfying and emotional ending. I cannot express just how much emotion I felt after viewing the film (which speaks to how good I the ending is).
Hellowoo Goseuteu is definitely a film you should see.
Aside from the important subject matter, at the core it tells a story of perseverance and how to deal with grief in an always moving, unforgiving world.
