Break the Silence: The Movie

This is BTS's third cinema documentary, and what separates it from the earlier ones is that it pushes the stage into the background. It follows the Love Yourself Speak Yourself world tour, but what it shows is not the concert: flights between cities, hotel rooms, rehearsals, and each of the seven interviewed separately. The idea is in the title. Each member says something to camera he cannot say in front of a crowd: exhaustion, the sense of emptiness on stage, the moment he considered leaving. That is not something promotional material in the K-pop industry generally does, and it is the film's reason for existing. Park Jun-soo directed. It played in cinemas worldwide in September 2020, one of the few large releases to open theatrically during the pandemic. Who it is for: BTS listeners and viewers who like documentaries about what fame costs. Who it is not for: anyone expecting a concert recording, since the performances are here only as context.