This toweringly accomplished film chronicles a crucial early battle of the Korean War, when a makeshift brigade of South Korean student soldiers was left as the first line of defense against North Korean forces. In director John H. Lee's hands, the youthful inexperience of the soldiers is made heartrendingly real, and battles are captured with a visceral precision made hyper-real in the editing room. But all visual trickery is in service of the message: War is hell—sometimes melodramatically so, sometimes in ways you never knew to fear. (Additional screenings June 3 and 10 in Seattle.) (Kirkland Performance Center, 350 Kirkland Ave, Kirkland, thestranger.com/siff, 8 pm, $11)