From the amazing moving image culture of South Korea (Parasite, Squid Game, et al.) comes this quietly powerful drama about identity set against a backdrop of today’s accelerated and isolating technological society. Twenty-something Jina lives in a small unit of an anonymous city apartment building and is the top employee at a credit-card call centre. Craving solitude, when she leaves home to go to work she puts her headphones on and never takes her eyes off her phone. Even her irritating neighbour, who is constantly trying to make a connection with Jina by hanging out and smoking in the hallway, cannot break through that invisible wall she has put up around herself. Moreover, her estranged father’s incessant calls to inquire about her recently deceased mother’s inheritance largely go unanswered. Jina is a loner and likes it that way; that is, until one day when a loud, ominous thud is heard next door in her neighbour’s place. Jina’s life will soon change direction dramatically and her solitary ways won’t be enough to handle what the world throws at her. Both an intimate character study and a commentary on the role of technology, Aloners is an absorbing first feature by a promising director, Hong Sung-eun.

- Tom McSorley