With only 200 days left until the college entrance exams, while everyone else is focused on studying, In-hye - in charge of the animal pen - is busy lecturing a duck. As punishment for carrying a knife, Seo-hee is soon assigned to join In-hye in cleaning the pen. The two girls discover an abandoned meadow nearby and accidentally lose Hee-seon(the duck) there. Meanwhile, Teacher Kim Ah-tae gathers four students - In-hye, Seo-hee, Jung-ae, and Soo-min - who have been given up on by their school, parents, and even themselves, and forms a "college interview prep group." On the day of their actual university interviews, In-hye and Seo-hee ditch school and head to the meadow to search for Hee-seon. They pitch a tent and spend nights in the woods, gradually adapting to life in the wild.

"When I was in high school, I felt like one of the small animals in the enclosure." The film originates from the desire to tell a story about breaking free from a stifling school life to create a refuge of one's own. In-hye, Seo-hee, Jung-ae, and Soo-min are all facing the confusion surrounding their college entrance exams. Expected to blindly aim for universities dictated by their grades, none of them know what they truly want. In their journey to rescue small animals and build a sanctuary in the wild, they begin to feel their own strength for the very first time. The Gorals is a “girls’ adventure drama” about finding sanctuary - both for teenage girls trapped by the pressure of the exam system and for small animals denied the dignity of being seen as living beings.

2025 제30회 부산국제영화제 올해의 배우상