“In Our Prime” Trailer & Summary
“In Our Prime” is a 2022 Korean film about Lee Hak-Sung (Choi Min-Shik), a genius mathematician who desires freedom of learning. He hides his identity and story, and works as a security guard at a private high school that gathers the best of the former 1%. One day, he meets Han Ji-woo, a high school student who has given up on mathematics. To Han Ji-woo, who is lost in a world of searching for the right answer, Lee teaches him how to find the right answer, and he is about to have an unexpected turning point in his life.
“In Our Prime” has an IMDb rating of 6.7 / 10 , and I like it very much. The story of “In Our Prime” plot is a good design. “In Our Prime” plot is not complicated, but the emotional presentation is actually quite good ~ this film is recommended to watch, follow the mathematician to “think” about life issues ~
“In Our Prime” movie review & explained
As a student of the new generation, I was once like Ji-woo in “In Our Prime”, who was eager to find “answers” . I think everyone who lives in this fast-paced generation must be like this, hoping that life can follow many formulas to get the results of life and get quick results and answers. “In Our Prime” is about mathematics, but the greatest feeling I got from “In Our Prime” is “the realization of life issues”.
In “In Our Prime”, the character of Han Ji-woo is contrasted with Hak-sung because Han Ji-woo is one of the top 1% of schools in the country, and all he pursues is “grades”. In other words, the importance of “thinking”. Even if you have the answer, if you don’t understand the reasoning and logic, then even if you have the answer, it may not be a useful answer for you.
I like the quote “In the wrong question, you can’t find the right answer“, which shows not only Hak-sung’s life experience and understanding, but also the dullness of Ji-woo’s school, which only emphasizes on getting “standardized answers”. This is why in the plot of “In Our Prime”, Ji Woo’s teacher has been prejudiced against Ji Woo because he is “poor” and hopes that Ji Woo will transfer to a normal high school so that he can at least be in the top few grades, have a good future, get a good job, etc. But is this a good formula for life?
In the plot, Han Ji-woo doubts himself twice, “Do I want to transfer to another school? In the process of thinking twice, Hak-sung does not give Ji-woo an answer directly, but takes him to think about what he wants for himself, which echoes the concept of “the process of solving a problem is more important than getting an answer” that Hak-sung has been emphasizing, because the school’s class guide is using “result theory” to let Ji-woo decide, which is like taking in all the answers from the teacher gives, But what Lee uses is to let Han Ji-woo think, not every answer is correct, because if the question is wrong, the right answer can never be found.
The role of the teacher is like a role of a socially biased secular value, following a consistent formula that is considered good for the students, for higher education, and for the Life Winning Group, but it makes people reflect that even this life formula may not be applicable to everyone. Especially when the teacher of the class is willing to leak the questions in order to let the students get the Olympia award, the answer is already a meaningless achievement for the students.
The story of Hak-sung in “In Our Prime” is also designed by the scriptwriter to be a story that he can’t get through. The plot is very well-drawn, especially in the rivalry scene with Han Ji-Woo, which is full of Hak-sung’s experiences and insights, and also reveals that Hak-sung was forced to sacrifice his “pursuit of academic freedom” and therefore began to face his own trauma past.
In “In Our Prime”, Han Ji-woo is not only the character who is helped, but also the key character who helps Hak-sung, who says, “To solve mathematics, what you need most is not a smart brain or endless effort, but courage: even if you can’t solve a math problem today, you can still think, ‘Ah, this problem is too difficult, so I guess I’ll have to solve it tomorrow. This undoubtedly tells us not to be afraid of dilemmas we don’t understand or can’t solve, just like solving difficult problems in life, having the courage to face and think about them is the only way to get the right answer.
As a defector, Hak-sung came to Korea because of his pursuit of academic freedom and his desire for knowledge, but as a result, his son received bullying and persecution from his school, which is why Hak-sung did not want to go back to North Korea, and also why he refused to be publicized as a mathematician, because this was a wound he could not face, and he did not have the courage to face his past self. Therefore, I really like the way Hak-sung faced the pain in order to help Han Ji-Woo clarify the leak, and through Han Ji-Woo’s role as a son, Hak-sung switched his emotions to love and care for Han Ji-Woo, giving himself the courage to face his past self.