Talk about an all-star line-up: the new film Actresses [여배우들] features a whole slew of high-profile names, such as Queen Seon-deok’s Go Hyun-jung and Hallyu princess Choi Ji-woo, pictured above, in addition to Lee Mi-sook (East of Eden), Kim Min-hee (I Like It Hot), Kim Ok-bin (Thirst), and Yoon Yeo-jung (The World They Live In).

Here’s the official description, which I think sounds GREAT:

Actresses: Christmas Eve. For a fashion spread in Vogue magazine, six top actresses are brought in spanning ages from their twenties through sixties. As expected, these ladies who are used to receiving the spotlight alone engage in a battle of wills, and tension fills the studio. It’s an unwritten law in the fashion world to schedule shoots to avoid actress encounters, so this experiment was playing with fire from the outset. The psychological battle starts with wardrobe choices and ends with the scandalous scene of [Choi] Ji-woo storming out at [Go] Hyun-jung’s provocation. [Yoon] Yeo-jung suspects she was only called in at the last minute to substitute, and while [Kim] Min-hee enjoys the shoot, [Kim] Ok-bin feels the burden of being around sunbaes, wondering how far she has to go to treat them as elders. They endure an endless wait for the featured jewelry that doesn’t arrive. The staff is growing worried and the actresses are becoming more and more sensitive.

What events happened that night? What words were exchanged between these frank, bold women? Could they have really finished their shoot without incident?

(...)
Read the rest of Movie “Actresses” blurs line between fact and fiction (811 words)

© javabeans for Dramabeans, 2009. | Permalink | 50 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Choi Ji-woo, Go Hyun-jung, Kim Min-hee, Kim Ok-bin, Lee Mi-sook, press conferences, Yoon Yeo-jung

You know how at the prom, everyone goes for uber-glitz and black-tie formal, only it’s done through the filter of a 17-year-old fashion sense — or rather, what a 17-year-old would think was formal black-tie fashion sense? So the end result is a really weird mix of over-the-top gaudiness that may have been expensive but looks cheap?

That’s kind of the feel I get from looking at pictures from the 7th Annual Korea Film Awards.

Of course there are some standouts — Han Ye-seul glammed it up with the appropriate touch of class and sexiness — but there were also a lot of beautiful women in ugly dresses that looked more off-the-rack Jessica McClintock (hey, it’s fake prom!) than red-carpet awards ceremony.

So if we’re talking red-carpet wow factor, it was a decided step down from, say, last month’s lovely Blue Dragon Awards.

As for the awards themselves, no surprises if you’ve been watching the accolades accumulate all year long. The Chaser was the overwhelming winner, with The Good, The Bad, The Weird taking up (a distant) second place. A few notable exceptions from the rule were Kang Ji-hwan (A Movie Is a Movie) and Gong Hyo-jin (Crush and Blush), but you can check out the full list (and, of course, the fashions!) below the jump.

(...)
Read the rest of 7th Korea Film Awards (1,738 words)

© javabeans for Dramabeans, 2008. | Permalink | 33 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: awards, Eom Ki-joon, fashion, Gong Hyo-jin, Ha Jung-woo, Han Ji-hye, Han Ye-seul, Joo Ji-hoon, Kang Ji-hwan, Kim Min-hee, Kim Min-sun, Lee Mi-sook, Lee Soo-kyung, Oh Man-seok, Park Hee-soon, Shin Mina, Sohn Ye-jin, Song Kang-ho, Song Yoon-ah, Uhm Tae-woong

I knew Love & Marriage would end on a happy note, and that nothing totally unexpected would come in the last hour. But I was still pleasantly surprised with how well the drama wrapped up its romance — even managing to pull out a bit of cleverness to keep the inevitable from being totally predictable.

I’ll be the first to admit that Love & Marriage isn’t a perfect drama, or even a particularly noteworthy one. But what it did, it did well: happy romance that endeared its characters to those of us who don’t necessarily like our dramas traumatic. Also, I always want to give extra points to dramas whose finales manage to satisfy AND add a little something extra to the series, rather than ending on a disappointing note — or even just an adequate (but unexciting) one.

SONG OF THE DAY

Love & Marriage OST – “Come to Me” by J [ Download ]

(...)
Read the rest of Love & Marriage: Episode 16 (Final) (3,309 words)

© javabeans for Dramabeans, 2008. | Permalink | 60 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: episode recaps, Kim Ji-hoon, Kim Min-hee, Love & Marriage, Park Ki-woong, stuff I dig

Love & Marriage reminds me of the exchange in Clueless — Cher: “He said you gave him a toothache.” Tai: “How’d I do that?” Cher: “It’s an expression. It means he thought you were sweet.”

If this drama were a type of candy, all my teeth would have fallen out by now.

SONG OF THE DAY

Love & Marriage OST – “이젠 나를 붙잡아” (Hold onto me now) by Jung Jae-wook [ Download ]

(...)
Read the rest of Love & Marriage: Episode 15 (2,432 words)

© javabeans for Dramabeans, 2008. | Permalink | 33 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: episode recaps, Kim Ji-hoon, Kim Min-hee, Love & Marriage

This episode probably shouldn’t be taken with too much seriousness, because it felt like everyone regressed for a moment into adolescence and acted like a bunch of kids. It almost seemed like the actors were having a bit of fun — and while it wasn’t, uh, realistic, it was cute how they joked and played around more than usual. (Also, there are a lot of funny faces today.)

SONG OF THE DAY

Holladang – “Beat One” [ Download ]

(...)
Read the rest of Love & Marriage: Episode 14 (2,904 words)

© javabeans for Dramabeans, 2008. | Permalink | 33 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: episode recaps, Kim Ji-hoon, Kim Min-hee, Love & Marriage

LOL, and I mean that literally: this was a laugh-out-loud episode, with a number of unexpectedly quirky-funny moments.

A lot happened to move our stories along and close a few loops. I know that Conflict is at the heart of Drama, but I always cringe when my characters go through hell even though I know it’s necessary for story development. But there’s nothing wrong with the Love & Marriage school of thought, which is that conflict may include pain, but does not need to revel in it. You can have character development without Tragedy and OMG TEH HURTINGS.

SONG OF THE DAY

Brown Eyes – “가지마 가지마” (Don’t go, don’t go). You don’t even know how much this song made me burst into a giggle fit when it was used this episode. [ Download ]

(...)
Read the rest of Love & Marriage: Episode 13 (3,333 words)

© javabeans for Dramabeans, 2008. | Permalink | 19 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: episode recaps, Kim Ji-hoon, Kim Min-hee, Love & Marriage

(Don’t worry, it’s a faux-swoon.)

This was an interesting episode in that the tone was different, and the pacing too — and we finally got to see Hyun-soo sweat a little. It may seem mean to cheer at that, but: YAY!

SONG OF THE DAY

EZ Hyoung – “유성” (shooting star) [ Download ]

(...)
Read the rest of Love & Marriage: Episode 12 (2,981 words)

© javabeans for Dramabeans, 2008. | Permalink | 28 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: episode recaps, Kim Ji-hoon, Kim Min-hee, Love & Marriage