Bardo

The Last of the Sea Women

On the shores of Jeju Island, a fierce group of South Korean divers fight to save their vanishing culture from looming threats.

Mom, the Star, and the Sea Anemone

My Mother the Mermaid

Na-young works at a post office and is sick and tired of being around her shamefully unyielding mother and her pushover father who's excessively nice. The only thing that she can look forward to is her trip abroad in a few days. But one day, her father leaves home without any notice. Her mother doesn't care what happens to him and doesn't care to look for him. Na-young has no choice but to give up her dream trip abroad and to search for her father instead. Once she arrives at her parents' hometown, Na-young is shocked to meet someone she'd never expect, even in her dreams.

Mermaid Unlimited

Yeong-joo, a former synchronized swimming athlete goes to Jeju Island to put together a synchronized swimming team for a performance. She slowly befriends the haenyeo, or female divers, and gradually begins to fit into their way of life.

Everglow

Everglow begins with the cute struggle of Kyung-hoon , who visited Jeju to make a documentary about Jin-ok, a female diver. Kyung-hoon's work becomes a sincere mission for the souls buried in the deep sea and mountains.

Canola

A girl who went missing after an accident returns 10 years later and reunites with her grandmother.

Sumbisori

Hae-jin, 29, struggles to adapt to life in Seoul and returns to her hometown of Jeju. There, she reunites with her mother, Ok-ran, and her grandmother, Kang-ja, who has spent her life as a haenyeo. Hae-jin decides to become a haenyeo, but Ok-ran strongly opposes it. The conflict between them intensifies, while Kang-ja is diagnosed with dementia.

Breathing Underwater

In Jeju Province, located off the southern coast of Korea, are the women of the sea, those who hold breath for life. These women still exist and they still dive the old way, without tanks. They go into the waters of 10- to 20-meter depth to harvest seaweed and shellfish to make a living. They make a living in the same sea, but each haenyeo’s sea of life is different. The community is divided into three tiers- Group A, B and C, based on skills and capabilities. One’s rank is determined by sum or breath. Sum, is pre-determined at birth. Therefore, sum is desired. However, the ocean is harsh. May you desire! But seek what is not yours, the ocean will devour you. Life, for these women of the sea, is about holding one’s breath, and containing and controlling one’s desire. The film is a six year record of the lives of the haenyeos in Udo, an islet in the province of Jeju, known to be the birthplace of haenyeo. It is a close look into the lives that stand on the boundary of life and death.

Daughter of the Sea

Battling deep depression, Jaeyoun returns to her roots on the island of Marano, South Korea, to visit her family of female free fivers known as haenyeo. To her surprise, she finds a connection to nature and her ancestors that literally saves her life.

Legend of the Waterflowers

Hyun Soonjik is the oldest living resident in Jeju Island. A natural diver with good skills, she became a high rank Haenyeo at an early age and has led an astonishing career of diving for eighty-seven years. Though she looks more comfortable when she is under water than when she is at home, she quit diving in October, 2020, and goes to sea every day, missing her old life as a diver. When she does, Chae Jiae who has been disciplined by Hyun, accompanies her and looks after her. Together they head for Deulmoolyeo, a place that only Hyun can find, to see the water flowers that bloom under water.

Lessons from Jeju

Seven months pregnant and apprehensive of the effect motherhood would have on her career as a professional freediver, Kimi Werner took a trip to the island of Jeju in South Korea to meet her heroes, the haenyeo – a group of freediving and fishing women often regarded as Korea’s first working mother’s whose culture dates back centuries.