Actress Han Ji Hye returns to the big screen in the upcoming dramatic love story Humming as a mature, pure-hearted “romance queen” — the kind of woman with a deep love for “only one man” who must prepare for their separation.
Her recent projects have mostly been in television dramas — she’s currently in the KBS daily drama Ugly or Beautiful [Miuna, gouna] — and this’ll mark her first film since she acted with now-ex-boyfriend Lee Dong Gun in the 2005 romantic comedy My Boyfriend is Type B.
In Humming, she stars with Lee Chun Hee, as a devoted-in-love character, and describes the film as “a heart-breaking love story and a mysterious fantasy [that] are brought together in a fresh way to move hearts.”
The article — which reads like a press release — promises that “all of Korea’s women will sympathize with Han Ji Hye’s character, who falls deeply in love in this perfect romance.”
The movie opens in time for White Day on March 13 and, I dunno about you, but for me it contains every element I heartily dislike in a film. Overly earnest once-in-a-lifetime love story? Yep. Implied death by cancer or other tragically trite plot device? All signs point to yes. No plot to speak of (merely placeholder descriptors like “moving” and “deep” and “heartbreaking”)? Oh yeah.
I gave up watching KBS’s over-the-top melodrama Bad Love because from what I saw, it was horrible. And yet, part of me thinks it could’ve been a lot of fun to watch even despite — or because of — how ridiculously bad the series is. Alas I don’t have twenty hours to commit to unabashedly cheesy histrionics.
The viewers are also flagging for the Monday-Tuesday drama, which finds itself “unable to revive from its slump”; after its thirteenth episode, ratings are in the 7% range. What could be the reasons for its failure to catch on? A few possible reasons are offered up by Newsen:
First off, it’s behind the times:
Bad Love was planned with the ambitious goal to revive the languishing melodrama genre. The drama set sail aiming to become a new-generation melo, but has failed to capture viewer interest. …
The melodramas that swept the late ’90s and early 2000s have long since been on the downtrend. The “season” dramas [Autumn Love Story, Winter Sonata], quintessential melo series, ended in resounding failure and trampled pride with Summer Scent and Spring Waltz.
It’s because viewers have started becoming fed up with such tearjerkers. They aren’t entertained by these “Korean-style” melodramas with their obvious love triangles, or the lead characters with fatal diseases who die in the end.
It seems Bad Love has failed to captivate audiences because it has followed the footsteps and adopted the characteristics of these passé dramas.
Moreover, sources related to the broadcast station credit considerable audience distaste to the adulterous storylines used in the drama.
Secondly, the drama is unconvincing in its developments, and the characters are unable to convey emotion well:
Viewers by and large feel that Bad Love has lost believability. The four men and women’s lives connect and entangle in an excess of coincidences, and audiences find it difficult to focus on the story when its sense of reality is lost. …
They also point to the matter of the characters’ emotions. Kwon Sang Woo, Lee Yo Won and the other actors display their acting talents in strong performances, but that is insufficient to allow the viewers to connect with their characters’ emotions. The characters struggle, love, and break up, but some viewers still say, “It’s difficult to understand their actions.”
The article mentions that Bad Love was supposedly the dark horse, facing off against large-scale sageuk dramas like Yi San and King and I, but I think that point is overly generous — when you’ve got such outstanding flaws within the drama itself, you don’t really need to go looking at the competition for more reasons for its failure.
With only six more episodes remaining, Newsen wonders, “Will it be able to revive itself in its remaining episodes? Will Bad Love end up as Bad Ratings or Kind Ratings? The answers can only be given by the series itself.”
In more casting news, actor Kim Ah Joong has finally decided upon her first project after she skyrocketed to fame after her 2006 film 200 Pound Beauty became a sleeper hit. She’s in early planning stages to appear in director Song Hae Sung’s upcoming fantasy film Melos (meaning “song” in Greek), produced by Crayon Pictures and DRM Entertainment. The director’s former projects include Our Happy Time and Failan.
In the year following her rise to stardom, Kim Ah Joong’s become one of the most sought-after new actresses, and rumors flew that she’d been approached to appear in Oldboy director Park Chan Wook’s next film Bat, Choi Ho’s Go Go 70, and others, but those projects did not materialize.
About Melos:
Melos is a different kind of melodrama that depicts the love between an insurance agent whose wife committed suicide and a visually handicapped woman who’s spent one year in a vegetative state. Communicating via the two characters’ fantasies, they develop a mutual sympathy and understanding. Kim Ah Joong displays deep, sensitive acting as the prickly, visually handicapped character in her first melodramatic role since her acting debut. Top male stars are currently being considered for the lead role opposite Kim, and the film plans to start shooting sometime from late January 2008 to early February. The fantasy elements will require much post-production special-effects and CG work, and the film will release around Chuseok time.
The role sounds like… um… kind of a drastic shift, doesn’t it? Well, give the girl props for not trying to “ease into” her next role after playing a character who wasn’t too much of a stretch in 200 Pound Beauty. Don’t get me wrong, she was good in 200 Pound Beauty — sweet and likable, which is key for a light-hearted romantic movie like that. But I’m interested to see how that translates in playing a damaged and difficult personality in the new project.
I know I cannot be the only person to have noticed the similarities.
When I first started seeing ads for the new Hilary Swank movie P.S. I Love You, I was struck with the storyline and figured it must be another case, as with Il Mare and My Sassy Girl, of Hollywood adapting a popular, well-received Korean film. Because the story of P.S. I Love You — what I can glean from commercials and online searches, that is — seems almost a direct retelling of the 1997 Korean film The Letter, starring one of the top Korean actresses of all time, Choi Jin Shil, and an actor I’ve only JUST realized is Park Shin Yang.
In fact, it was so similar that I was totally sure it was a remake — but looking online reveals no connection. The Hollywood movie is apparently based on a 2004 novel of the same name, written by first-time novelist Cecelia Ahern, according to Wikipedia.
Huh. I suppose it could be a case of two people coming up with the same idea independently, but it’s an awfully big coincidence.
SONG OF THE DAY
Kim Gun Mo - “이별없는 사랑” (A love without farewell). I’ve just rediscovered all my old Kim Gun Mo albums (thanks to holidays spent back at the family home), and remembered why he was one of the few pop singer-songwriters who’s lasted through the ever-changing kpop scene. You can’t really call him “kpop” although he is Korean and writes/sings pop music in the strict sense of the term. [ zShare download ]
Kwon Sang Woo returns to television after three years in the upcoming KBS Monday-Tuesday drama (starting December 3) Wretched Love (a more apt but slangy translation could be “Screwed-up Love”), which is described as being different from “normal trendy dramas.”
(Frankly, it seems like everything is being described as “different” these days, which I think is more just an indication that the staples that made Hallyu famous are shifting in a new direction. I don’t think we’ll be seeing many more “standard” trendy dramas anytime soon, since everyone’s tastes have been whetted for deviations from the cliches.)
But Wretched Love is different because it’s not “soft” (connotation: sissy) and “romantic” (the writer uses those words like they’re insults), but rather, in keeping with its title, the melodrama depicts love that’s so effed-up it can ruin a life. The love triangle wears down its participants so much that it makes a person want to shout, “Love’s a bitch.” Sounds like a charmer!
Producers are counting on fellow masochists to watch this lovely-sounding scenario unfold and sigh along, “Ah, I’d like to love like that once too.” Sure, and I say life’s not complete until we all drive ice picks through various bodily appendages. The pain means you’re alive! (For now.)
After showing his tearful acting in such weepies as Sad Story and Stairway to Heaven, Kwon Sang Woo shows his “manly” and “intense” side in his new project (who else thinks the reporter’s being awfully chauvinistic merely from his/her word choice?). Cuz real men don’t cry about love, they ruin it, apparently.
As for his romantic (or should I say “wretched” and “miserable” instead, since romance doesn’t seem to be the order of the day) female lead, auditions are being held to cast the lucky lady who gets to be wrecked by tragic love. Can’t wait!
