The Coachman is the 23rd blu-ray title planned by the Korean Film Archive and produced by Blue Kino. Released in February 1961, The Coachman won the Silver Bear Extraordinary Jury Prize at Berlin International Film Festival in the same year, the first Korean film to win at a major international film festival outside Asia.

The Coachman is one of the films that made Korean cinema history. As mentioned above, it not only won an award at Berlin International Film Festival but was also selected as one of the representative Korean films of the 1960s in various lists, including the 100 Korean Films chosen by the Korean Film Archive in 2014. Portraying the lives of a working-class father and his children, exploring their hopes and the hardships they endure, The Coachman presents diverse subjects, including the reality of the class system, domestic violence and poverty as experienced by working-class families, from multiple angles, going beyond the story unfolding within the family. Highlighting the protagonist working as coachman, a profession that is fast becoming a rarity, the film illustrates the various changes in Korean society brought about by modernization. In so doing, rather than merely a simple family movie, The Coachman became a masterpiece depicting Korean society in the 1960s realistically.

The coachman’s path as he travels through Seoul with his horse-drawn cart shows various parts of the city at that time at a slow pace, which would not have been seen like this with the movement of modern vehicles. These places were not shown for visual pleasure, that is, they were not cinematically designed to capture scenes of the big city of Seoul. Places such as Okin-dong and Nuha-dong where the protagonist’s family live, Seongnam Cinema in Namyeoung-dong where the father is dating, Seoul Freight Office, Changchung-ro, and the road in front of former Seoul Capitol building are closely related to the characters in the film, and also to the lives of the Seoulites of the time. The strong presence and concreteness of these places, which cannot be revivified solely by the settings of the story, could be as proof that the film is linked to the reality of the time, to people’s lives of the time, and to the meaning of the film’s existence. It could also be the director’s attitude and philosophy. On the other hand, The Coachman demonstrates that the value of old films can be gauged by the value of the historical record as much as the aesthetics or commercial success.

The commentary by director Kim Hong-jun and programmer Kim Hyeong-seok is intriguing. They provide an erudite commentary on Korean cinema of that time, the director’s x-x-x-x-x-objectives for each scene, the actors and the scenery. This well-informed commentary might allow today’s viewers to understand the film made 60 years ago better from all angles. An introduction to the director and a review of the film by Cho Jun-hyeong from the Korean Film Archive are included in the booklet. There is also an extensive explanation by Kim Young-joon, a researcher of Urban History, of the scenes of Seoul shown in the film, providing an excellent guide for those viewers who want to know more about the scenes of 1960s Seoul. Also included are paintings by the artist, Kim Gwang-seong, which is a separate volume supplement offering a valuable opportunity to possess some stills of the Seoul scenes The Coachman depicts.