The World of Love (세계의 주인) Film Review

With The World of Love, Yoon Ga-eun continues her impressive streak of realistically depicting young lives in interesting and dynamic ways.

Joo-in is a popular student at school and lives with her mother (Jang Hye-jin, Parasite) and little brother. Their father is referenced, but his absence and lack of communication is notable. The trio share what looks to be a healthy home life, with late-night magic shows by the brother a particular highlight for the family. The deeper trauma that Joo-in harbours only begins to come to the surface when it is announced that a local man is about to be released from prison after serving time for the sexual assault of a third grader. Joo-in’s resistance to the signing of a petition against his release is curious, and Yoon plays her cards close to her chest, never revealing The World of Love’s deeper plotlines too quickly, favouring organic events over exposition dumps.

It makes the revelations that come to light that much more heartrending and shocking. After seeing Joo-in’s continuous questioning of one particular sentence in the petition, it doesn’t come as a surprise when we learn that she was sexually assaulted as a child by a family member, but the ferocious, long-buried scars that start to surface again are still shocking to witness. Much of The World of Love’s power within this plotline comes from the central performances—in particular from Seo and Jang.

The former is a charismatic, lively presence on screen, always highly watchable in the film’s lighter moments. As the story moves into darker territory, Seo employs an impressive emotional range to showcase Joo-in’s deep trauma. One particular car wash scene stands out as an excruciatingly emotional moment between mother and daughter. Jang is just as impressive. She is a more restrained presence—her guilt at Joo-in’s abuse never fully surfaces—but is just as engrossing to watch. These are the two strongest characters in The World of Love; others are generally well-rounded too, but others, such as Joo-in’s father, are notably underwritten, with his particular plotline becoming lost amidst the suffering.

Yoon’s screenwriting skills are clear to see throughout The World of Love, but she elevates what could have been a good drama into something truly great with more complex additions to the plot—most notably, the cyclical nature of abuse. Whilst it might be introduced a little too late in the film and isn’t resolved wholly satisfactorily, Yoon is adept at creating even more layered moments to already difficult situations. The World of Love is a highly engrossing drama, one imbued with a necessary warmth. Both the film and Joo-in’s eventual focus on love is far from cloying, and is instead a much-needed embrace of positivity to counteract the terrible suffering that we have witnessed up until that point.

The World of Love (세계의 주인) will be screened at the BFI London Film Festival on 14-19 October, 2025. The film will be released in South Korea on October 22.