Hwang Jung-Min 황정민 [Upcoming Movies: “12.12: The Day”, “Mission Cross”, “Veteran 2”, “Hope”]

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May 17, 2010

Weekend Box Office: May 14-16

Reporter.Lucia Hong

South Korea's box office estimates for the weekend of May 14-16, 2010

[Korean Box Office Information System (KOBIS)]

Reporter : Lucia Hong luciahong@ <ⓒ10Asia All rights reserved> 10.asiae.co.kr

"Housemaid" makes successful debut as No.1 film

Reporter.Lucia Hong Editor.Jessica Kim

Official movie poster of Korean erotic thriller "Housemaid" [sidus F&H]

Much-hyped Korean erotic thriller "The Housemaid" made a successful debut atop the local box office over the weekend, pulling down former winner "Iron Man 2" from the top spot.

Estimates by the Korean Box Office System (KOBIS) released on Monday indicated that "Housemaid," released on May 13, sold 655,681 tickets during the weekend of May 14 to 16.

"Housemaid" is a remake of the Korean classic of the same name by the late director Kim Ki-young. The modern adaptation, helmed by Im Sang-soo starring Jeon Do-youn, Lee Jung-jae and Yoon Yeo-jung, is about a young maid who is hired as a housemaid for a wealthy couple and starts having an affair with the husband.

Newly released Hollywood action flick "Robin Hood," starring Russell Crowe and Cate Blanchett, claimed second place on the chart with 471,609 admits, while previous winner "Iron Man 2" dropped two spots to round out the top three movies selling 324,198 tickets this week.

Meanwhile, Korean drama "Blades of Blood" brought in 97,022 admissions to rank in fourth, followed sequentially by "Korea 1%" with 35,155 tickets sold.

Other movies on the top 10 include "Poetry," "A Long Visit," "Sergeant Keroro The Super Duper Movie 5: Adventure in Space Time Island" and "The Blind Side."

Reporter : Lucia Hong luciahong@ Editor : Jessica Kim jesskim@ <ⓒ10Asia All rights reserved> 10.asiae.co.kr

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May 18, 2010

"Blades of Blood" sells to 9 countries at Cannes film market

Reporter.Lynn Kim Editor.Jessica Kim

Official poster for film "Blades of Blood" [Cinus]

Korean film "Blades of Blood" has been sold to nine countries including the U.K., Thailand, Iran and Indonesia at an ongoing film market in France.

According to a press release by the film's marketing firm Ziness, the action flick received much praise and sold for "an unprecedented price" at the Cannes Film Market, where movie industry officials buy and sell their movies during the annual Cannes Film Festival.

M Line, which handles overseas sales for "Blood," had announced last week that four European countries including Germany, Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg had bought the film even before the market opened.

After seeing the film at the screening last Thursday morning, U.K. movie distribution firm Metrodome, who had previously bought Korean hit film "The Chaser," as well as Thailand's J-Bics, Iran's IRIB and Indonesia's Camila Internusa requested to buy the film. "Asian traditional dramas are usually not very popular in Europe," one French buyer was quoted as saying. "But I think 'Blades of Blood' will be a huge hit in the European market because it has many appealing characters that viewers can relate to regardless of nationality and time."

An executive at German firm Splendid also expressed his satisfaction for the pic, saying "With the never-ending, high-quality action scenes throughout the film, I don't think it will let down Asian movie fans in Germany. I am happy to have put in an advance sales order."

"Blood," directed by Lee Joon-ik of 2005 hit film "The King and the Clown", opened in Korea on April 28 and has attracted over 1.2 million viewers to date.

Reporter : Lynn Kim lynn2878@ Editor : Jessica Kim jesskim@ <ⓒ10Asia All rights reserved> 10.asiae.co.kr

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May 21, 2010

Manhwa industry declines, but movies are hits

Characters in the manhwa “Blades of Blood” by cartoonist Park Heung-yong

and the actors who play them in the movie are, from left: Power-thirsty swordsman

Lee Mong-hak is played by actor Cha Seung-won and the blind swordsman

Hwang Jung-hak is played by actor Hwang Jung-min.

Provided by Achim Distribution Company

Over the years, Korean manhwa has served as the inspiration for numerous films, television dramas and musicals, many of which have gone on to critical and financial success. This provided a critical boost to an entertainment industry that was facing increased competition from foreign imports.

But the nation’s once-thriving manhwa industry - which encompasses comic books, graphic novels and animated cartoons - is in the midst of a crisis because of rampant illegal downloads and a shrinking market.

The latest film to borrow from manhwa is Lee Joon-ik’s “Blades of Blood,” based on the Korean comic of the same name. Meanwhile, Bong Joon-ho, of “Mother” (2009) and “The Host” (2006), is planning a film adaptation of the French comic book “Le Transperceneige.” Television drama series like “A Man Called God” (2010), “Boys Over Flowers” (2009) and “Masters of the Art of Study” (2009) all incorporate comic book story lines, as does the forthcoming drama “Buddy Buddy.”

But their success doesn’t necessarily guarantee that the manhwa on which they are based will be successful, too. “If certain comics are made into films or TV dramas, sales of those comics rise. But it’s not the same for the entire manhwa industry,” said Shin Kyung-soon, secretary general of the Korea Cartoonists Association.

When Huh Young-man’s manhwa “Tazza” was made into the film “The War of Flowers” in September 2006, it attracted about 6.8 million moviegoers, and a year later, it was made into a TV drama series. Sales of the comic book itself, however, were lower than expected. “When a comic is made into a film, it sells very well,” said Kim Jin-young at Random House Korea. “[Tazza] was even made into a drama. But for some reason its sales were lower than expected.” She declined to share the sales figures for the comic.

Even successful manhwa artists find it is hard to make ends meet. Yang Jae-hyun is well known for his legendary manhwa series “The Ruler of the Land,” which started in 1994. Since then, 51 volumes have been printed and more than 4 million copies have been sold, which is rare in the Korean manhwa market. “I have about three comic books published a year and each volume sells about 4,000 copies,” Yang wrote on his fan site in early March. “But I earn about 2 million won [$1,818] per month,” Yang wrote.

That may sound like a comfortable salary, but it’s not, Yang says. “I also work with two or three assistants,” he wrote. “In addition to paying them, I have an electric bill of 300,000 won per month because we draw the comics with computers. After paying all of that, there is nothing left.” Yang says that the nation’s comic book industry is on the brink of collapse, largely because so many comics are downloaded illegally from the Internet.

The widespread perception that comics can be downloaded from the Net for free via peer-to-peer sites has also contributed to the industry’s woes, said Shin of the KCA. According to a 2006 report on the nation’s manhwa industry by the Korea Manhwa Contents Agency, the manhwa market was estimated at 32.2 billion won that year, which was a 9.5 percent decrease from the previous year.

The industry’s decline has led many comic book artists to stop publishing books. Instead they are transforming their work into Webtoons, or comic books serialized on the Web. One of these artists is Yoon Tae-ho. “The market outlook is dim, but manhwa artists are trying to survive in other ways such as with Webtoons,” said Shin of the KCA.

And there is hope that they can make the transition. Yoon’s Webtoon “The Moss” is scheduled to be made into a film by director Kang Woo-suk, who directed “Two Cops” (1993) and “Silmido” (2003).

By Sung So-young [so@joongang.co.kr] joongangdaily.joins.com

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May 24, 2010

Weekend Box Office: May 21-23

Reporter.Lucia Hong

South Korea's box office estimates for the weekend of May 21-23, 2010 [Korean Box Office Information System (KOBIS)]

Reporter : Lucia Hong luciahong@ <ⓒ10Asia All rights reserved> 10.asiae.co.kr

"Dragon" soars to the top of box office

Reporter.Lucia Hong Editor.Jessica Kim

Hollywood animated picture "How To Train Your Dragon" bowed into first place on the local box office over the weekend, pushing former winner "The Housemaid" off the top spot.

Figures by the Korean Box Office System (KOBIS) released on Monday revealed that the latest DreamWorks film, which opened in theaters on May 20, attracted 759,590 moviegoers during the weekend of May 21 to 23. "Dragon," based on the novel by Cressida Cowell, is about a young Viking boy who wants to become a dragon hunter but instead becomes friends with one of the creatures. The animated movie is voiced by actors Jay Baruchel, Gerard Butler and Craig Ferguson.

Meanwhile, Korean erotic thriller "The Housemaid," starring Jeon Do-youn and Lee Jung-jae, dropped a spot to second place with 476,057 admits, while action movie "Robin Hood" also fell one slot to round out the top three movies with 456,973 tickets sold. Hollywood sequel "Iron Man 2" followed behind at No. 4 selling 237,832 tickets and newly released Korean romantic comedy "My Dear Desperado" entered the box office charts in fifth place with 226,737 admissions.

Other movies on the top 10 include "A Nightmare on Elm Street," "Korea 1%" "Poetry," "Blades of Blood" and "Bestseller."

Reporter : Lucia Hong luciahong@ Editor : Jessica Kim jesskim@ <ⓒ10Asia All rights reserved> 10.asiae.co.kr

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Lee Joon (MBLAQ) watching A Bittersweet Life, captures from GBW cafe daum 5938

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June 7, 2010

'CGV LA' to Open in Hollywood

A movie theater screening Korean films exclusively will open in Hollywood in the U.S. city of Los Angeles.

CJ CGV, the largest theater chain in South Korea, said Monday that “CGV LA” will open in Los Angeles on Friday. The theater will have the capacity to accommodate 600 moviegoers. Ahead of its opening, CGV LA will hold this week a special preview of Korean films new to local theaters including “Like the Moon Escaping from the Clouds” and “Secret Reunion.” CGV plans to align its screening of Korean films with the films’ screening in South Korea and will introduce various new Korean short films.

CGV is hoping that CGV LA will help Korean films penetrate the U.S. market.

Source: KBS World

June 9, 2010

Korean Cinema to Open in Los Angeles

The first cinema dedicated to Korean films will open in Los Angeles this Friday. Located at the Madang Courtyard in Koreatown, CGV LA has a seating capacity of 600 and three screens, with at least one of them to show Korean films all the time. To mark its opening, CGV LA invited Hollywood insiders to a preview of a selection of Korean films, including "Blades of Blood," "The Servant," "Blood Brother" and "Take Off."

The multiplex cinema will select a roster of Korean films, which will be screened with English subtitles. Non-Korean films will be shown with Korean subtitles. The facility will also be used for events such as independent film screenings and music showcases.

CGV LA expects the cinema to help more Korean films make inroads into the U.S. With nearly 95 percent of the market currently dominated by Hollywood movies, CGV sees potential for Korean films there. "Rather than focusing on immediate profitability, we’ll make efforts to introduce Korean films and contents," CGV said.

Source: englishnews@chosun.com

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June 23, 2010

2010 Action-thrillers

Lee Byunghun-Choi Minsik 'I Saw the Devil' No.1 Most Anticipated Acting Showdown

1. I Saw the Devil (Choi Min Sik, Lee Byung Hun, Dir. Kim Ji Woon) 52%

2. Unfair Trading (Hwang Jung Min, Ryu Seung Beom) 23%

3. Troubleshooter (Sul Kyung Gyu, Lee Jung Jin)13%

4. Mujeokja (Song Seung Hun, Joo Jin Mo) 11%

Source: nate.news.com

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July 15, 2010

Puchon International Fantastic Film Festival kicks off today

Jessica Kim

Official poster for the Puchon International Fantastic Film Festival [PiFan]

The Puchon International Fantastic Fim Festival (PiFan), one of Asia's main genre film festivals, will start today, offering 193 shorts and features from 42 countries around the world during its 11-day run.

Held under the theme of "Love, Fantasy and Adventure," the fest will kick off with an opening ceremony whose red carpet will be graced by some of the biggest names in filmmaking such Korean directors Lim Kwon-taek, Yoon Jae-kyun, Kim Dae-seung and Min Kyu-dong.

Scores of actors, new to veteran, are also set to show up at the evening's festivity, including Kong Hyung-jin and Choi Jung-won who will emcee the opening ceremony, Hwang Jung-eum, this year's PiFan Lady, and actress Ye Ji-won who will serve as a member of the jury in the competition for features.

South Korea's top movie stars, namely Ryu Seung-beom, Ko Soo, Jo Yeo-jung, Lee Duk-hwa, Kang Soo-yeon, Hwang Jung-min and Oh Ji-ho, are also slated to walk the red carpet.

After the hour-long introductory event, the opening ceremony will officially commence, headlined by "The Experiment" by director Paul Scheuring, best known as the executive producer and head writer of television series "Prison Break."

Starring Adrien Brody and Forrest Whitaker, "The Experiment" is a remake of a German production from 2001 which explores into human nature by testing 26 individuals selected as test subjects for a psychology experiment while enclosed in a temporary prison.

A total of 12 films will compete in the feature category and another dozen in shorts. They will be judged by an international panel composed of film experts with a variety of experiences including Max Tessier, a film critic who writes for well-known magazines such as Jeune Cinema and Le Monde and Patrick Frater, formerly with the Variety and the Screen International while currently the founder of Film Business Asia.

The festival will also feature a wide range of programs such as Strange Homage which pays tribute to various genre masters and retrospectives on British director Terry Gilliam and Korean action film director Lee Doo-yong.

The Network of Asian Fantastic Films (NAFF), an emerging industry-oriented program for Asian fantasy films, will run for five days from July 18. Fifteen projects which have been chosen to compete at the "It Project," NAFF's project market for genre films, where the winner will be provided investment and co-production opportunities.

The PiFan, into its fourteenth year, will wrap on on July 25 with Korean film "Death Bell 2: Bloody Camp" by director You Sun-dong.

Jessica Kim jesskim@ <ⓒ10Asia All rights reserved> 10Asia

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July 20, 2010

Fantasia presents 14 Korean features

Montreal’s Fantasia International Film Festival, running July 8 – 28 in Canada’s second-largest city, presents a total of 14 Korean features this year. The festival which highlights fantasy and strong genre-oriented films from Asia will screen the Canadian premiere of Lee Yong-joo’s debut feature Possessed – a new Korean horror that has drawn much attention already at fantastic fests in Amsterdam, Brussels and Gérardmer.

Fantasia 2010 will also play a large number of large scale films and Korean blockbusters. This includes Choi Dong-hoon’s Korean superhero blockbuster Woochi, the period action drama Blades of Blood (2010), love-triangle period drama A Frozen Flower (2008), Jang Hun’s Secret Reunion (2010) starring Song Gang-ho and Kang Dong-won, Korea’s most successful comedy Scandal Makers (2009) and the ironic Castaway on the Moon (2009) about a man trapped on an island in the Han River in the middle of Seoul. Also of note is What is Not Romance (2009) which uses the colour and creativity of animation to focus on the banality of a Korean family.

Blood and comedy come together in The Neighbor Zombie (2009). The movie goes back in time to plot the path of various characters before they succumb to the world wide epidemic that slowly takes over their bodies. Death is also the major theme of The Executioner (2009) the drama which asks what if executions, which have been put on hold since 1997, were to be reintroduced back into the Korean legal system. The film directed by first time feature director Choi Jin-ho film looks at how executions affect not only those who are hung but those who are involved in the practice.

Source: Fantasia2010 via KOFIC

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30th July 2010

Blades of Blood (2010)

<Written for the August edition of Asiana Entertainment. That magazine has now been published and I am now able to post the article here. Asiana Entertainment is available for free >

In 1592, Korea, then known as Joseon, stood at the brink of the Imjin War against neighboring Japan. It was a war that Korea eventually won due to superior naval strength that successfully cut of supply ships from Japan. On land, however, the Japanese army was much more successful thanks to superior weaponry and strong leadership. At the start of the war, the Emperor of Joseon was besieged by ministers with differing opinions on how to engage Japan and the ruler’s indecisiveness gave the Japanese forces an early advantage.

Lee Mong-hak (Cha Seung-won) was anything but indecisive. He realized that Korea had to fight and he had a plan. However, that plan included making himself king and he is willing to kill anyone who opposes him. One of those people who earns Mong-hak’s wrath is the father of Gyeon-ja.

Although ostracized from his family, Gyeon-ja (Baek Seong-hyeon) does not hesitate to rush to his father’s defense when Mong-hak comes to slaughter his family. For all his impassioned efforts, he is quickly subdued and left for dead. He is rescued by an eccentric, blind acupuncturist whom he learns is also an accomplished swordsman despite his lack of vision. Gyeon-ja begs his savior to train him in the art of fighting to gain vengeance for the death of his father. His unseeing benefactor, Hwang Jeong-hak (Hwang Jeong-min), eventually agrees.

Even though this film is set at the start of a war, it is neither a war movie nor a political thriller. This is an action movie that shares quite a bit with the Hong Kong action movies of the 1970s whose plots often revolved around revenge. However, unlike the movies from decades earlier, this story has the multiple layers that we have come to expect from director Lee Joon-ik. Director Lee is perhaps best known for his 2005 hit, The King and the Clown, which went on to win many awards domestically and internationally. In Blades of Blood, Lee creates situation where there are no easy answers. Take, for example, the character of Lee Mong-hak. Although what he is doing is certainly treasonous, his motives were not necessarily evil. And while he is extremely ruthless on the road to make his dream a reality, he is also tender and charismatic, winning the heart of the lovely Baek Ji (Han Ji-hye) with his passions and dreams.

Deserving praise for his role of the blind swordsman is Hwang Jeong-min. His acting is flawless in this film and his interactions with his young ward are both funny and touching. Whenever he is onscreen, he steals the scene with either his dynamic fighting or his witty responses.

Blades of Blood is one of those rare films where history comes alive in an interesting and exciting way while not forgetting the stories of individuals caught up in the events. Watching this movie allows you to learn something about the ancient history of Korea but, more importantly, it will keep you entertained throughout its running time.

Source: Seen in Jeonju

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August 6, 2010

Two Korean film prize at Fantasia

Korean films captured 2 prizes in the main competition section of the Fantasia International Film Festival which took place July 8 – 28, 2010 in Montreal, Canada. Winning the second-place Special Jury Prize was LEE Hae-jun’s comedy Castaway on the Moon. The Best Director prize went to noted helmer LEE Joon-ik for his Chosun period swashbuckler Blades of Blood. The top award for Best Feature went to Sawako Decides by Japan’s ISHII Yuya.

Castaway on the Moon also picked up a third place Bronze prize under the Audience Awards: Best Asian Film category. Another South Korean film, The Executioner, directed by CHOI Jin-ho, was given an honorable mention by the jury of the AQCC Prize, with first place going to Japanese director KORE-EDA Hirokazu for Air Doll, starring Korean actress BAE Doo-na.

Fantasia is a genre-oriented film festival which highlights fantasy and horror films worldwide and has a special devotion to Asian cinema. The festival runs at various venues throughout Montreal.

Credits: Nigel D’Sa (KOFIC)

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Synopsis:

On the verge of the Japanese invasion, the Chosun Dynasty is thrown into chaos. Lee Mong-hak, an ambitious descendant of the royal family, betrays... On the verge of the Japanese invasion, the Chosun Dynasty is thrown into chaos. Lee Mong-hak, an ambitious descendant of the royal family, betrays friends including his old lover to organize a coup. His old friend Hwang Jeong-hak, an uncanny blind swordsman, seeks the help of a vengeful young man to stop him.

Blades Of Blood (2010) Review

"Blades of Blood" is an adaptation of the popular Korean manga "Like the Moon Escaping from the Clouds", which follows the quest of a blind swordsman from the Chosun Dynasty to seek vengeance against a former ally-turned-greedy politician. Korean director Lee Joon-lk definitely has an eye for detail and it showed - his latest fictional martial art epic "Blades of Blood" was gorgeously-photographed and its cinematography was nothing short of stunning, but it suffered from unintriguing, hard-to-fallow plot and unimpressive swordplay sequences. The story wasn't at all that interesting, and I really was struggling to pay enough attention to the screen. The uneven pacing and the unfocused story, made it hard to stay engaged. Thankfully, the visuals were captivating enough, and they were film's saving grace. The relationship between the two main characters, Hwang and Gyeon-ja, was beautifully-handled. Their chemistry was really strong, and thanks to that, their frendship felt really believable. The performances were decent, with Hwang Jeong-min, the blind man with extraordinary sword-handling skills, being the standout. His character was amusing, a bit quirky, but always fun to watch. Baek Seong-hyeon was also quite good in the role, but the script just didn't allow him to show more. The action scenes were well-shot, but I thought the fight choreography was uninspired and lacking in creativity. Furthermore, the use slow motion, during the fights was way too much and actually not as cool, as it intended to be. Overall, "Blades of Blood" offers spectacular visuals and some decent action sequences, but nothing much else.

Source: http://southwallpaper.blogspot.com/2010/08/blades-of-blood-2010-review-starring.html

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Movie Review from koreanfilm.org

Blades of Blood

Even though my day job is teaching history, I am not a stickler for historical accuracy in a motion picture. Filmmakers do have rights to exercise their "dramatic license" when called for, as certainly have the artists working in other art-forms. Having said this, the liberties filmmakers take on the "real" history can range anywhere from seriously misguided (Mississippi Burning's treatment of FBI agents as heroes uncovering racist conspiracies during the civil rights movement, a choice nonetheless famously defended by Roger Ebert) to nakedly propagandistic (Oliver Stone's JFK, not to deny that it is a piece of virtuoso filmmaking) to perversely creative (Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds, in which Adolf Hitler finally gets what was coming to him). Sometimes the filmmakers sanitize or romanticize what in history appear to be rather sordid or at least troubling affairs (multiple cinematic versions of Mayerling come to mind) but occasionally their painstaking efforts to recreate the past manage to surpass those of professional historians and journalists in their insights. After watching, say, Ang Lee's Ride with the Devil, any big Hollywood Civil War movie focusing on the larger-than-life Southern generals nobly suffering while grey-uniformed soldiers fall down like autumn leaves around them may appear positively cartoonish.

Setting an extravagant martial-arts action movie in the Joseon dynasty Korea inevitably concedes a certain level of historical distortion, given the firmly civilian nature of the Joseon court and its society, but that should not mean that genre considerations sometimes cannot be given primacy over reality. After all, the real gunfight at the OK corral was, as one historian put it, closer to a '90s drive-by shooting than a Western duel, and the majority of the late Tokugawa samurai were paper-pushers who probably had troubling chopping radishes with their swords, much less cutting down opponents in a single stroke.

Blades of Blood, based on a well-known 1994 graphic novel by Park Heung-yong, is set immediately before and during the first wave of Hideyoshi's invasion of Korea in 1592. Director Lee Jun-ik messes with the time-line even more radically than the original comic, forcing the 1596 revolt led by illegitimate rebel Lee Mong-hak (Cha Seung-won) to take place four years earlier, almost reversing the causal relationship between the Hideyoshi's invasion and the revolt. Lee and the screenwriter team Jo Cheol-hyun, (Possessed) Choi Seok-hwan (Sunny) and O Seung-hyun clearly wanted to argue that the Joseon dynasty court pretty much invited the Japanese invasion, and portray King Seon-jo (played by the rocker-singer Kim Chang-wan), who in real life was a substantial scholar of philology, capable of debating academic points with some of the greatest Confucian scholars of Korean history including Yi Yi, as an idiot full of hot air surrounded by equally venal yangban ministers. Indeed, the filmmakers consciously buck the current trend of making the dialogues in period pieces more elaborate and authentic, and make the characters, including the king, speak in short bursts of contemporary colloquialisms. It's not quite Hamlet intoning, "Yo, Horatio, there be things in uptown and downtown y' know nuthin' about, man," but is still a pretty poor choice. Instead of giving the character's voices immediacy, this strategy tends to make most of them sound vaguely constipated.

Cha Seung-won and Hwang Jeong-min are such great actors that the thespian sparks generated by them more than compensate for director Lee's weak choices in depicting the swordfights, relying on boring slow motions and sudden zooms. Still, Cha and Baek Seong-hyun (Jo Seung-woo's brother in Marathon) are dragged down by the heavily allegorical roles they are stuck with, the latter's revenge campaign against the former taking on the metaphor of the post-'80s-born Korean young struggling under the thumb of the sanctimonious "386" generation. Only Hwang's blind swordsman Jeong-hak is able to slash through the embarrassingly arch dialogues and schematic characterization and draw the viewers into his charismatic performance. Lee's idea of a "progressive" woman character, here Mong-hak's courtesan lover Baek-ji (Han Ji-hye), is to make her speak in cherry-pit-spitting monosyllables: otherwise she might as well be a set decoration, having zero chemistry with either Kyun-ja or Mong-hak.

Technically, Blades of Blood is satisfactory if not startlingly original: Kang Seung-yong's production design makes good use of real locations, while Kim Sang-beom and Kim Jae-beom's editing effectively wrangles crowded action scenes.

Like other recent Lee Jun-ik films, Blades of Blood is competently made but lacks true inspiration. The patented Lee strategy of "contemporization" of the period piece might have worked in King and the Clown and most notably Once Upon a Time in a Battlefield (which may still be Lee's best feature) because they were genuine satires. As soon as Lee begins to take his politics seriously, however, we realize that his approach is basically not that different from that of the old period piece dramas we used to see in TV, shoving their holier-than-thou political and moral lessons down the viewer's throat at the expense of respecting the integrity of the actual past lives. Blades of Blood is not much fun, but it also has little to tell us about the 16th-century Korea, other than that Korea's early modern past is still likely to be seen through the shallow prism of "political relevance" from today's artists. (Kyu Hyun Kim)

Source: http://koreanfilm.org/kfilm10.html#gureumeul

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August 31, 2010

Hwang Jungmin-ssi at the 'Troubleshooter' VIP Premiere

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Anyone with more info, clips or captures to share on this?

Copied from GBW cafe.daum 6275

Good downloader CF campaign with actors Ahn Sung Ki, Park Jung Hun, Lee Byung Hun, Hwang Jung Min, Kim Yun Jin and Son Ye Jin

One Voice, 6 stars with 6 colors

A couple more caps courtesy Forever LeeByungHun fan-blog, thanks to ylin at EverythingLBH

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Thanks to ylin at EverythingLBH for sharing these

Here's 2 more screen caps which I have did and also the short clip from KBS news

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September 6, 2010

Korea goes 'Barefoot' for Oscar nominee

Kim Tae-kyun film beats out Lee's 'Poetry'

By Park Soo-mee

SEOUL – “A Barefoot Dream” by the director Kim Tae-kyun will compete in 83rd Academy Awards' Best Foreign Language Film category, set for February 27, 2011, at the Kodak Theatre.

The film, which was selected out of six contenders, is based on a true story is about a South Korean football coach who leads a youth team in East Timor.

Other contenders were Im Sang-soo’s “The Housemaid”; Lee Chang-dong’s “Poetry"; Lee Jae-han’s “71-Into the Fire"; Lee Joon-ik’s “Like the Moon Escaping from the Clouds”; and Jeon Yong-taek’s “Potato Symphony.”

“Given that the film will compete with 60 other films from all over the world, the juries decided that the Korean entry must be a film that the Oscar committee members could appreciate without knowing the Korean context,” the jury statement read. “The juries carefully juggled between ‘Barefoot’ and ‘Poetry’ until the last minute, and while they unanimously agreed that ‘Poetry is an outstanding work, they came to a conclusion that the film was too long and could easily lose the audiences' concentration."

No Korean film has ever been a finalist in the Best Foreign Language Film category.

Source: hollywoodreporter.com

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September 13, 2010

Star Supporters join 'Good Downloader' Campaign

Source: news.nate.com 1 l 2 l 3 l 4

The Good Downloader feature on CINE21 thanks to the fan-sharing at GBW cafe.daum 6288 with bigger, actual scans.

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August 26, 2010

Gosh.. I totally missed this.. Hwang Jung Min-ssi and Jin Goo in a movie.. together?! And perhaps... Kim Min Hee, too. COOL!!! Love the catchy title.. oops.. it's automatically censored in soompi..

Moby D i c k (2011)

A hot-blooded journalist (Hwang Jeong-Min) attempts to uncover the truth behind a mysterious bomb case. A soldier (Jin Ku) knows the truth behind the bomb case, but he flees from the army and is chased by powerful politicians ...

Source: http://asianmediawiki.com/Moby_Dick_(2011-Korean_Movie)

Source: news.nate.com