프로그램 노트

Based on a true story from Transylvania, Romania, R.M.N. delivers a series of events that take place when foreign workers are hired at a local bakery factory. These events symbolically show how baseless hatred is shared, neglected, and eventually returns with unexpected consequences in the end. Matthias, who used to work as a foreign worker in a German slaughterhouse to earn a high income, assaults a colleague who has made racist remarks about him and runs away to his home country. His old lover, Csilla, hires a Sri Lanka-born employee at her bakery to cut down on wages, eventually facing fierce opposition from the villagers who say they cannot trust the food foreign workers make. Matthias, who was once a victim of xenophobia, is however unresponsive to the wrongdoing of his hometown community that expresses the same hatred he once suffered. In the film, such contradictions and paradoxes serve as powerful elements. Towards the end of the film is a 17-minute long take showered in various remarks, which are incisive and thought-provoking even for those of us too numb to react to ‘You bad boss,’ a buzzword to laugh at foreign workers whose Korean are not sufficient. The film is screened in competition at the Cannes Film Festival in 2022. (KI Hyungmin)