Last night i watched a beautiful movie i like to recommend. It´s called 'The Bow' by S-Korean director Kim Ki-duc and was released already 2005. It is a really poetic and silent movie with great actors.

From Wikipedia:
The Bow is set entirely on a rotting 40-foot boat anchored off the coast of Korea. An old man (Jeon Seong-hwang) maintains it as a fishing platform for tourists with the help of a beautiful 16-year-old girl (Han Yeo-reum) who appears to be mute. Visitors to the boat chat about the rumors. He brought her out when she was just six years old. Her parents are looking for her. He plans to marry her on her 17th birthday. The stories sound farfetched, as does the idea that the old man is also a fortune teller, but they all turn out to be basically true. She is everything to him: a kidnap victim/daughter/girlfriend/fiancée. The old man fends off the fishermen, who make advances at the girl, by shooting arrows at them while the girl just smiles. He predicts fortune by shooting three arrows at a Buddha image on the side of the boat as the girl swings dangerously in front of it. The girl whispers in his ear and he whispers in the person's ear his fortune. She's not a bad archer either and is more than capable of protecting herself. When he's not wielding the bow as a weapon, the old man converts it into a musical instrument and plays it like a violin.

The old man's arrangements start to come apart when the boat is visited by a fishing party that includes a sweet-natured student (Seo Si-jeok) who falls in love with the girl at first sight ...

On youtube i found this trailer https://youtu.be/eXDkdjHAVIU

The end is a bit kitschig still a very sweet movie with powerful symbolism and a lovely soundtrack by Kang Eun-il playing the Haegum, a traditional Korean string instrument.

An old man (Jeon Seong-hwang) maintains it as a fishing platform for tourists with the help of a beautiful 16-year-old girl (Han Yeo-reum) who appears to be mute. Visitors to the boat chat about the rumors. He brought her out when she was just six years old. Her parents are looking for her. He plans to marry her on her 17th birthday. The stories sound farfetched, as does the idea that the old man is also a fortune teller, but they all turn out to be basically true. She is everything to him: a kidnap victim/daughter/girlfriend/fiancée.

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So this old man is basically a kidnapper and paedophile. He took her when she was six years old (!) without her parent's consent, with the idea he could have sex with her when she became 17.

You say

She is everything to him: a kidnap victim/daughter/girlfriend/fiancée.

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A child (or adult) kidnap victim cannot be the same as a fiancée, a daughter or a girlfriend.

I mean aren't there too many real life cases of little girls being abducted and abused to justifiably romanticise it into a film

I understand there is poetic license, it's an artsy film, but from what you've written it sounds dubious to me.

Trojina said:

I understand there is poetic license, it's an artsy film, but from what you've written it sounds dubious to me.

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I know a tale which was turned into a movie several times. It is about a wolf who swallows a grandmother whole... pretty amoral

In short: watch the movie

Trojina said:

So this old man is basically a kidnapper and paedophile. He took her when she was six years old (!) without her parent's consent, with the idea he could have sex with her when she became 17.
You say
A child (or adult) kidnap victim cannot be the same as a fiancée, a daughter or a girlfriend.
I mean aren't there too many real life cases of little girls being abducted and abused to justifiably romanticise it into a film
I understand there is poetic license, it's an artsy film, but from what you've written it sounds dubious to me.

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Hi Trojina:

You have all the reason. I didn't see the film but I know that art can embellish even the worst things. Even war, rape, torture, murder... And this is not good.

But things are not what they seem, for arriving at a moral we must see the film. All we aren't but captives of our destinies. And love is a matter of destiny. We cannot force another to be object of our most tender feelings. Love cannot be planned. The project of the old man was predestined to fail.

When Lilly speaks of love at first sigh I understantd that both, girl and boy, fell in love. Maybe predestined love.

Maybe the blindess of the old man is touching, in the film, because it tells us that all we are blind, all we capable of falling in the same mistakes, all we hungry of love, all we predestined to lose our temporary possessions.

Maybe the film is poetic because it shows images of youth and youth is almost always poetic.

Source: [HanCinema's Image Gallery] Kim Ki-duk's "The Bow"
Link: http://c.hancinema.net/hancinema-s-image-gallery-kim-ki-duk-s-the-bow-68388.html

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In our lives good and bad actions go intermingled. But don't tell me that abuse is good even if sometimes the victims can recover of the experience and enjoy their lives. In the most of cases it doesn't happen. And don't tell me that abusers behave with the best intentions. Maybe I lack of faith.

In spite of all, maybe, it worths to watch the film.

All the best,

Charly