Between Goodbyes

Born in South Korea, but adopted by Dutch parents and raised in the Netherlands, Mieke lives happily as a queer woman with her partner in the city of Utrecht. But when her guilt-ridden birth parents reach out to her after years of separation, Mieke’s life is upended. She  must come to grips with who she is, and also who she might have been — made all the more complex by the entrenched homophobia that still exists in South Korean society.

Filmmaker Jota Mun — themself a Korean adoptee — traces Mieke’s story, recounting the events leading up to her reunion and observing her ongoing internal conflicts about her birth parents and where she belongs. Equally affecting is the film’s sympathetic focus on Mieke’s vulnerable mother Okgyun, who desperately seeks forgiveness for giving her daughter up for adoption. Beautifully conceived and profoundly multilayered, Between Goodbyes is a heartbreaking and uplifting story of family, identity, and acceptance.

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