The gorgeous and gripping adaptation of Min Jin Lee’s bestselling novel is dangerously close to a masterpiece.
“The whole Koreans versus Japanese situation why can’t people just get over that?”
muses Solomon’s American boss, Tom (Jimmi Simpson, delivering peak financial-bro).
But for the characters inPachinko, history is something that must be honored escape is both impossible and ill-advised.
Still, she and directorsKogonadaandJustin Chonnever rush the characters, or their moments of elation and grief.
While sharing a meal with a fellow Korean expat, Sunja takes a bite of rice.
Her eyes fill with wonder, and then tears.
“This is rice grown in our country,” she marvels.
The series covers only a portion of Lee’s nearly 500-page saga.
