South Korean documentary film “A Man Who Heal the City” intrigues us as observing one decent old man from the distance for a good reason. Although he helped and supported many different people for several decades as a respected local patron and philanthropist in his small city, he was so humble and casual about that he was not so willing to say much in front of the camera, and there is some amusing tension between him and a local journalist doing some research on his many good deeds in the past.

At first, a bunch of interviewees in the documentary gladly tell us about what an exceptional human being he is. Thanks to his very successful oriental medicine pharmacy mainly driven by his good will and sheer diligence, Kim Jang-ha earned a considerable amount of money every day during the prime of his life and career in a small local city named Jinju, but, instead of spending on himself or saving for himself, he simply donated his money for many different causes ranging from scholarship to public welfare, and he is still willing to go on as much as possible even though he is about to retire now.

As a journalist who once worked in a local newspaper supported a lot by this admirable old man, Kim Joo-wan has been certainly interested in writing a book about him, but Kim Jang-ha is initially adamant about not telling anything about what he did for many other people out there. In his viewpoint, he simply did what was needed to be done for them, and he certainly did not want to boast about that at all. No matter how much Kim Joo-wan tries, Kim Jang-ha remains calmly unflappable, and the mood becomes a bit humorous as the camera focuses on a series of rather silent moments between them.

After that point, Kim Joo-wan decides to interview instead a number of people who know Kim Jang-ha, and all of them surely have plenty to tell in front of the camera as remembering how much they were respectively helped by him in one way or another. When Kim Joo-wan goes to a little country village where Kim Jang-ha started his pharmacy business, a couple who were his neighbors tell us about how Kim Jan-ha was quite philanthropic even during that time. There also were hundreds of poor students considerably helped by the scholarship funded by him, and one of them is currently working as one of the judges in the Constitutional Court of South Korea. As shown from one archival video clip, this man still remembers how much he was helped by his generous benefactor at that time, and I can only hope that he will continue to remember that to the end as a public servant.

Besides his scholarship, Kim Jang-ha also founded a private high school in the 1980s simply because he had enough money for that, and the former teachers of that school reminisce about how exemplar he was as the founder/board chairman. He never interfered with how they taught those students, and he also willingly protected them from the pressures from the power that be, just because he really trusted and supported them. When many of teachers formed a union several years later, he never objected to that from the beginning, and he did not give a damn at all about how much he was pressured or criticized for that.

In addition, Kim Jang-ha was quite open-minded about public welfare, and we see several examples of that. For instance, he has been the patron of a local theater company, and he supported an organization for illuminating many hidden pasts of his city. He has also been very passionate about several issues of equality, and he actually funded a local shelter for female domestic abuse survivors.

Later in the documentary, Kim Jang-ha becomes a bit more opened to Kim Joo-wan, though he remains as quiet and humble as usual. He still does not talk much about his private life, so Kim Joo-wan and director Kim Hyun-ji interview his wife instead for a while, but she simply implies that it has been not so easy for her and her family to live with him. After all, as the family members of a man who has been regarded like a living saint, they have to be rather cautious about their words and behaviors, don’t they?

In the end, there comes a bittersweet moment as Kim Jang-ha is going through what will be the last day for his pharmacy business, and it is touching to watch how he is appreciated by a bunch of people dropping by his pharmacy for showing genuine gratitude. Understanding how humble he is, they simply give a little flower bouquet, but that is more than enough for him to say the least, and he is already ready to move onto what will be the last chapter of his life.

Overall, “A Man Who Heals the City”, which was initially produced as a TV documentary but then got released in South Korean theaters a few weeks ago, is a modest but moving presentation of one remarkable human being who has spread good will throughout his whole life, and he would be certainly admired by my late mentor/friend Roger Ebert. Ebert once said this: “I believe that if, at the end of it all, according to our abilities, we have done something to make others a little happier, and something to make ourselves a little happier, that is about the best we can do.” As far as I can see from the documentary, Kim Jang-ha is a prime example of Ebert’s valuable standard of humanity, and I assure you that you will never forget this man after watching this little documentary.