Notebook from My Mother

Directed by Kim Seong-ho (김성호)

Written by Kim Min-sook (김민숙)

103min | Release date in South Korea: 2018/03/15

Synopsis
In mother's notebook, there is a recipe for life.

Ae-ran (72) is a mother who runs a banchan, or side dish, store in the neighborhood. She's not on very good terms with her part-time lecturer son, Gyu-hyeon (42). Gyu-hyeon despises his mother's bad temper, but he's no angel either. Ae-ran makes good food with the best ingredients so she has a lot of customers. Whenever Ae-ran needs to remember something or how to make something she writes everything down in detail in a notebook. One day, Ae-ran is diagnosed with Alzheimer's. She can't remember what's important and remembers what's not. She can't remember how to make pickles but she remembers her son who died 40 years ago. Her symptoms gets so bad that she has to close her store and Ae-ran takes herself to a sanatorium as she doesn't want to burden anyone.

With his mom gone, Gyu-hyeon discovers the notebooks while cleaning and goes through them. It not only has the recipes for her food, but also her hopes and despairs. The two used to get along and were happy. Then, Gyu-hyeon goes into the kitchen and starts cooking according to her recipes.

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