Filmmaker Yun starts making a documentary about tidal flats in 2006. However, the Saemangeum reclamation project is enforced, the world’s largest tidal flat has dried up. Feeling a sense of loss, Yun gives up on the documentary she was trying to make. Ten years later, Yun moves to Gunsan, the “city of Saemangeum,” like fate, and meets Dong-pil, a member of the Citizens Survey Group. For 20 years, Dong-pil has been collecting evidence that endangered birds live in the tidal flats. Dong-pil's son, Seung-jun, who has been following his father in search of shorebirds since he was learning to walk, has become his father’s reliable companion and gathers evidence of life. Dong-pil misses and cannot forget the group dance of the shorebirds that he saw a long time ago. Hearing his story, Yun feels his fascination conveyed to her. She resumes making a documentary, which she gave up on in the past and sets out to find beauty.

This film is the story of citizens who do not yield to the violence of the government project and resist by the act of recording. This is also about the “memories” of people who cannot forget the beauty. The moment I heard the story of a man who can’t forget the group dance of the shorebirds, the wonder, the longing, and sense of loss he must have felt overwhelmed me. That’s what drove me to make this film for 7 years. In this world where the beauty to remember is gradually disappearing, we record today, believing in the power of memories and records.

2022 Busan International Film Festival