Gang-Jae, a third-rate hoodlum with a tender heart, has a hard time intimidating debtors and sometimes even gets beaten up by younger hoodlums. One day he hears the news that Failan, a woman from China whom he married fraudulently, has died. Gang-Jae goes on a trip to find out more about this woman, who was an illegal alien living on the periphery of society. She thanked Gang-Jae for the marriage and secretly loved him. The trip gives him a sense of renewal and salvation, but he is unable to escape his tragic fate. <b>Failan</b> succeeds in elevating the level of the ′gangster′ genre by realistically depicting the lives of the lower-class hoodlums. The film also succeeds in avoiding the cliche solutions abundant in the genre of melodrama. (Joo You-Shin)