Hong Kil-dong

Born in Hanseong as the illegitimate son of a nobleman during the Joseon period, Hong Kil-dong survives an attempt on his life arranged by his stepmother, who hires bandits to kill him. A monk rescues him, takes him away and trains him for years in the martial arts. Grown, he begins defending villagers against those who exploit them and eventually faces an incursion of Japanese ninja. Kim Kil-in directed, working from Hong Gildong jeon, the anonymous classic Korean novel that makes its hero a kind of Robin Hood. Although it is a North Korean production, it was widely distributed in the Soviet Union and across the Eastern bloc. It was especially popular in Poland and remains one of the films a whole generation there remembers.