The Isle (2000)

Love, that most insidious and disconcerting emotion, goes everywhere. As enveloping as the very air we move through, more permeating than water, the inexplicable and intransigent tendency of one human to be seized by an overwhelming, self-consuming, soul-deep desire for another person is one of the most joyful and one of the most tragic aspects of being alive. In some cases, such as the tumultuous ardor that invades the being of a mute shopkeeper who sells bait and sometimes herself to passing fishermen in The Isle (2000), the inseparable joy and tragedy feed the flames of one another. A darkly and lushly poetic look at love and its ruins, this Korean-made cinematic dream is one that the viewer will not awake from until long after the end credits have run.