South Korea, 1975.  It was a time of oppression, despair and justified paranoia.  Law-school graduate Kim Hong-Su is researching and writing a book on Jeon Tae-Il, a young labor activist from a poor family, who burned himself to death at the age of 22 as an extreme gesture of protest against the government's failure to implement and enforce its promised labor laws.  His biographer Kim is himself wanted by the police for anti-government activism. 

Kim Yong-Su visits Jeon Tae-Il's mother and comes to know how Jeon Tae-IL became a radical activist.  Korea was in the first throes of "economic growth" in the mid-1960; the dictatorial government insisted that an export-led economy was the only path to prosperity, and workers were supposed to make every sacrifice for the "cause". 

Jeon Tae-Il's life began to change the day he saw one of the young women coughing up blood after contracting tuberculosis from working long hours in unventilated work areas.  Jeon and some of his colleagues working in the Pyung-Hwa market formed the "Fools Association" to struggle for better working conditions and more humane treatment.  But the political climate did not let them do that and Jeon was fired from his job for insubordination. 

After that he retreated for a while to Mount Samgak, but returned to the Pyung-Hwa Market, determined to give his life for the labor movement.  He formed the Samdong Association to represent the interests of workers in Seoul's three most notorious light-industry centers.  The Association initially succeeded in calling press attention to the plight of workers, but there were no visible results.  All this series of developments plunged Jeon into despair and he felt he had no choice but to resort to his final act of self-immolation to add momentum to the labor movement in general. 
 

<Festivals> 
 -Invited to Hong Kong Film Festival 1995 
 -Qualified for Berlin Film Festival 1995