Pandora

Pandora is a 2016 South Korean disaster film written and directed by Park Jung-woo, starring Kim Nam-gil. The film was released in South Korea on December 7, 2016. Plot Jae-hyeok is a young man who works at the local nuclear power plant, which is the only thing providing the town with energy, and also provides most of the jobs. Jae-hyeok lives with his mother, sister in law, and nephew Min-jae. Jae-hyeok, who lost both his father and brother to radiation in his early years, wishes to leave the town and the plant behind him and work on a fishing vessel to make money for his family, but is discouraged by everyone he knows. Pyeong-seok is a member of the plant, who tries to get the president to shut down the plant, but he dismisses the claims, saying nothing will happen. One night, the animals of the town mysteriously run into the water. Then, the next day, while Jae-hyeok is working, an earthquake suddenly strikes the town, causing one of the nuclear reactors to overheat. Attempts to cool it down are botched, as water does nothing to stop it, and that due to the reactor's age, coolant valves were too severely damaged to be fixed in time. Meanwhile, the president and his government debate allowing the reactor to vent radioactive particles into the air to relieve pressure from the core. The President insists on evacuating at least those closest to the reactor first. This backfires when the reactor stack explodes from the pressure as the workers were too late to try and vent steam into the air, leading to a full nuclear meltdown. As the workers attempted to flee, the whole basement caves in, killing or injuring most of the crew. Jae-hyeok is one of the few to get out, and continues to get people to safety, until he collapses from nuclear radiation.