The Letter from Graeme

Korea | Film 90min, TV 53min | 4K | Color

Logline

One day, a filmmaker received an 8mm video tape left behind by a stranger. Crossing twenty years, that record becomes a letter reconnecting people to one another.  

Synopsis

Graeme Peden, a New Zealander, died in Anyang, South Korea, in 2008. Twenty years later, the 8mm tapes he left behind arrive in the hands of a documentary filmmaker. After his death, his life fell into mystery. Tracing the woman seen in the footage, and his wife who left no trace at all, the filmmaker pieces his memory back together, as Anyang's fans gather to fill the gaps left unrecorded. His video letter finally reaches his family in New Zealand, and Graeme returns to Anyang, the place that was once his home.

Director's Statement

We all live anonymously somewhere in the world, loving someone, remembering a place, leaving behind traces of our time.

Graeme, from New Zealand, left his own — the alleys of Anyang, its football stadium, the people he loved — recorded on 8mm tape. Made for a family he never fully reached, it arrived in my hands twenty years later.

Letter from Graeme follows how a stranger's record crosses time to reach another, and how the departed live on in memory. Through this late arrival, I trace how people are drawn back together, and face a connection we have long forgotten.

Director NA Baru

Producer KIM Taera