The Bros

Seok-bong is a fortune-seeking archaeology lecturer obsessed with lost relics, convinced that finding them could free him from debt and give his life meaning. His younger brother, Joo-bong, is an ambitious construction executive whose career depends on securing consent to reroute a major highway through a hill owned by their ancestral family in Andong. Estranged after a violent confrontation at their mother’s funeral years earlier, the brothers reunite reluctantly when their father dies. On the drive to Andong, they hit a woman named Ro-ra Oh, who survives but loses her memory, and they bring her along as they enter a multi-day funeral governed by rigid Confucian rituals, simmering resentments, and suffocating family hierarchies.

Ro-ra turns out to be a Cultural Heritage Foundation analyst investigating two gold Buddhas hidden during the Japanese colonial era. Seok-bong learns from her that, based on new findings, the gold Buddhas may be located on their family property rather than in North Korea as officially recorded, and he resolves to take responsibility for uncovering the truth. As the funeral unfolds, each brother secretly pursues his own goal. Seok-bong digs through the house and grounds searching for clues about the treasure, while Joo-bong maneuvers among elders and relatives to obtain signatures for the highway project, even as his corporate job appears to be nearing its end.

The brothers’ schemes collide amid mounting family tensions, the theft of family artifacts, and revelations that their father himself was adopted, exposing the hypocrisy behind the family’s obsession with bloodlines, tradition, and honor. The situation deepens when Ro-ra appears to be a ghost rather than a living person, and the brothers come to believe she is the spirit of their mother from a long-forgotten family photograph. Seok-bong also learns that his mother suffered from dementia in later life and that his father never wanted his sons to follow the rigid Confucian model of family responsibility, in which the designated or eldest son must live in the ancestral home and preserve the family legacy. These revelations force the family to confront buried guilt and a system that sacrificed the living for the dead. The brothers set aside their sibling rivalry and successfully halt the highway project, believing the spirits of their mother and ancestors reside on the hill. By the end of the funeral, Joo-bong leaves his corporate job to start a new life with his girlfriend in his hometown and to focus more on family responsibilities, while Seok-bong abandons the search for the gold Buddhas and turns his focus to treasures elsewhere. The brothers finally acknowledge their shared love and care for one another and for what remains of their family.

Principal photography began on January 6, 2017, and wrapped on March 5, 2017.^[5]

The film was released in the local cinemas on November 2, 2017.

During the opening weekend the film sold 605,690 tickets at the box office, trailing behind Thor: Ragnarok which was released at the same time in Korean cinemas.^[6] By the ninth day since the film was released, The Bros surpassed 1 million viewers.^[7]