믿기엔 너무 아파 내 눈이 본 게 아파
Hello! Uhh long time without posting orz. Sometimes I do that, I just don't have enough crap accumulated that I think it warrants a journal post. But I've come up with a few things so \o/ Yeah!
First of all, I got my visa! Last week the consulate sent my passport back to me and in it was my nice new shiny Korean visa. It's great to have that shit back in my possession after all the headache and stress of waiting for incompetent people to do things (coughLMUcough), so now all the stuff I have to worry about is sort of superficial-well, not really superficial, but it won't impact my ability to enter the country at least. Stuff like bank accounts and cell phones. Yeah.
The other day I downloaded like a metric fuckton of Korean indie and rap albums, all of which will be going up at HEADPHONECLASH hopefully within the next couple of days. I'm through the R's already, so I just have to upload albums S-Z and then I can start focusing on more relevant things like newly released songs, etc.
Also I've watched hella movies/dramas lately so I have some reviews as well, who's surprised. Under the cut: Mr. Idol, Silenced and Shut Up Flower Boy Band (but no spoilers!).
All right so first of all, Mr. Idol. I bought the DVD of it and watched it when it arrived, and was disappointed to find that both Jay Park and Ji Hyunwoo were shirtless much less often than the cover implied. :|
I don't really know what I was expecting from this drama. I hadn't heard a whole lot about it besides that it had Jay in it, but honestly it wasn't all that impressive. It was fun! There was a lot of singing and sort of subtle jokes about the entertainment industry, and UKISS was in it as a cameo (playing a boy group called the Wonder Boys), so it wasn't exactly a waste.
The gist is that music producer Goojoo (Park Yejin) leaves Korea after a tragedy within the last band she managed, Mr. Children, and the and disbands. Three years later she comes back and wants to get them back together, for reasons that are never really specified, and ends up finding an indie band singer named Yujin (Ji Hyunwoo) to fill the open frontman spot. She then has to train them and get them ready to perform at the year-end Gayo Daejun festival, despite many obstacles and scandals that pop up in between.
There were a couple issues for me. Firstly, it's never really clear who the protagonists are-whether we're supposed to care about Goojoo or about Yujin, and for what reason. Their motivations are never really explained-why did Goojoo come back to Korea? Why does she want to get Mr. Children back together? Yujin has a strained relationship with his father, but why? Why does he have three part-time jobs? There are a lot of questions that, if they had been answered, would have made the story infinitely more compelling, but since they were never addressed it kind of made things fall flat for me. Secondly, a lot of the secondary characters end up feeling really flat, because they don't get a lot of fleshing-out-for instance, the other members of Mr. Children, Ricky (Kim Randy), Jio (Jay Park) and Hyun-yi (Jang Seo-won) have sort of half-developed storylines, but they never really go anywhere, so I ended up not really caring about their struggles and development except insofar as I like Jay Park.
All in all I wasn't terribly impressed. Like I said I don't think it was a waste, but it could have been done better. /kanyeshrug
The second movie I watched is Silenced (or in Korean, "도가니"/"The Crucible"). I've been waiting for subs to be released for this movie for like ten million years, ever since it was released last year. I've heard a lot of really good things about it so my anticipation was high, and I definitely wasn't let down.
This movie was based on the true story of years of physical and sexual abuse that took place at a school for the deaf in the South Korean countryside. I admit I was a little worried, because movies as a whole have a tendency to create melodrama out of tragedies like this, and I hoped that this movie wouldn't-they were real kids, I mean, it was a real horrifying event that took place. I don't know how precise the movie is, i.e. how true to the actual events, but as far as I know it was relatively close.
The movie follows Kang In-ho (Gong Yoo), who has just been appointed as a teacher at a school for hearing-impaired children in Mujin City, Korea. When he discovers the kinds of abuses that the kids are suffering at the hands of the headmasters, he and his friend Yoojin (Jung Yu-mi) who works for the Mujin Human Rights Center attempt to bring the perpetrators to justice.
So you can see how this movie has a lot of potential for melodrama, but I think it was really well-done. I mean, it's not perfect-for instance I think there were a lot of metaphors that got heavy-handed sometimes, such as the opening scene where In-ho's car striking a rabbit parallels a train striking a child-but all in all, this movie was really well-done. It was truly unnerving and heartbreaking, to the point where it actually brought me to tears a couple of times. And the scenes of abuse were so horrifically real, I... kind of hope that they used CGI or a dummy or something because oh man.
One thing I'd heard about this movie is that after its release, it sparked enough public outrage in Korea that the police in Gwangju (which is the location in which these events actually took place-Mujin is a fictional city, and the school was actually called Gwangju Inhwa School) re-opened the sexual abuse case and booked 14 teachers and administrators on sexual abuse charges. The school has since been shut down by the Gwangju education office, and a thorough investigation is being (or has been) conducted into the charges brought against it. Additionally, a collection of former students who attended the school filed damages just this past month seeking compensation from the teachers who assaulted them, as well as from the school foundation itself for failing to protect the students it was meant to protect.
So, I guess even though the years-and I mean like, 10 or 12 years-of systematic abuse are utterly horrifying and tragic, something good has come out of this. Increased attention to sexual abuse cases in a country where rape and sexual abuse victims rarely win their cases... well, I hope it turns out to be a good thing.
READ MORE:
* Film rekindles rage over Inhwa School case, 2011-09-29 @ The Korea Herald
* SKorea: New abuse cases emerge at Gwangju Inhwa School, 2011-10-10 @ AsianCorrespondent
* 'Dogani' school to be shut down, 2011-10-31 @ HanCinema
* Sexual abuse victims file for damages against Gwangju school teachers, 2012-01-18 @ Yonhap News Agency
And finally, I've been watching a new drama (because my drama attention span is like five minutes long): Shut Up Flower Boy Band ("닥치고 꽃미남밴드"), a tvN drama starring Sung Joon (as Jihyuk), Lee Hyun-jae (as Do-il), Kim Myungsoo (INFINITE'S L, as Hyunsoo), Yoo Min-kyu (as Hajin) and Kim Min-suk (as Kyungjong). I was a little unsure about watching it because I had a serious plot point spoiled for me, but I decided to give it a shot anyway and I'm really glad I did!
At this point I think the basic idea is that there are these five guys in a band who are trying to prove their worth to themselves and to the people around them (they're kind of thugs/gangsters who everyone thinks will just fail out of school and become hobos or whatever) by performing in and winning a local high school battle of the bands. There are some lovelines too but the major focus is on the music and the friendship (so far, anyway) which I like a lot-a drama about music that is actually about music! Wow!
Only 4 episodes have been subbed so far (watch at DramaCrazy), but I'm really enjoying it. Even more surprisingly, I'm finding that I like Myungsoo's performance as an actor, and not just because I like him as a member of INFINITE-he's actually getting to be a pretty excellent actor, moreso because the character he plays in this drama is really different than his onstage persona (which in turns is different from his real personality, I know, but still). It's a good drama! I hope it continues to be as impressive as the episodes wear on.
I have a couple of movies to watch (Shi/Poetry and Ogamdo/Five Senses of Eros) and a book to finish (House of Leaves) so... yeah. Until next time! o7
this came from dreamwidth follow me there yeaaaaah
First of all, I got my visa! Last week the consulate sent my passport back to me and in it was my nice new shiny Korean visa. It's great to have that shit back in my possession after all the headache and stress of waiting for incompetent people to do things (coughLMUcough), so now all the stuff I have to worry about is sort of superficial-well, not really superficial, but it won't impact my ability to enter the country at least. Stuff like bank accounts and cell phones. Yeah.
The other day I downloaded like a metric fuckton of Korean indie and rap albums, all of which will be going up at HEADPHONECLASH hopefully within the next couple of days. I'm through the R's already, so I just have to upload albums S-Z and then I can start focusing on more relevant things like newly released songs, etc.
Also I've watched hella movies/dramas lately so I have some reviews as well, who's surprised. Under the cut: Mr. Idol, Silenced and Shut Up Flower Boy Band (but no spoilers!).
All right so first of all, Mr. Idol. I bought the DVD of it and watched it when it arrived, and was disappointed to find that both Jay Park and Ji Hyunwoo were shirtless much less often than the cover implied. :|
I don't really know what I was expecting from this drama. I hadn't heard a whole lot about it besides that it had Jay in it, but honestly it wasn't all that impressive. It was fun! There was a lot of singing and sort of subtle jokes about the entertainment industry, and UKISS was in it as a cameo (playing a boy group called the Wonder Boys), so it wasn't exactly a waste.
The gist is that music producer Goojoo (Park Yejin) leaves Korea after a tragedy within the last band she managed, Mr. Children, and the and disbands. Three years later she comes back and wants to get them back together, for reasons that are never really specified, and ends up finding an indie band singer named Yujin (Ji Hyunwoo) to fill the open frontman spot. She then has to train them and get them ready to perform at the year-end Gayo Daejun festival, despite many obstacles and scandals that pop up in between.
There were a couple issues for me. Firstly, it's never really clear who the protagonists are-whether we're supposed to care about Goojoo or about Yujin, and for what reason. Their motivations are never really explained-why did Goojoo come back to Korea? Why does she want to get Mr. Children back together? Yujin has a strained relationship with his father, but why? Why does he have three part-time jobs? There are a lot of questions that, if they had been answered, would have made the story infinitely more compelling, but since they were never addressed it kind of made things fall flat for me. Secondly, a lot of the secondary characters end up feeling really flat, because they don't get a lot of fleshing-out-for instance, the other members of Mr. Children, Ricky (Kim Randy), Jio (Jay Park) and Hyun-yi (Jang Seo-won) have sort of half-developed storylines, but they never really go anywhere, so I ended up not really caring about their struggles and development except insofar as I like Jay Park.
All in all I wasn't terribly impressed. Like I said I don't think it was a waste, but it could have been done better. /kanyeshrug
The second movie I watched is Silenced (or in Korean, "도가니"/"The Crucible"). I've been waiting for subs to be released for this movie for like ten million years, ever since it was released last year. I've heard a lot of really good things about it so my anticipation was high, and I definitely wasn't let down.
This movie was based on the true story of years of physical and sexual abuse that took place at a school for the deaf in the South Korean countryside. I admit I was a little worried, because movies as a whole have a tendency to create melodrama out of tragedies like this, and I hoped that this movie wouldn't-they were real kids, I mean, it was a real horrifying event that took place. I don't know how precise the movie is, i.e. how true to the actual events, but as far as I know it was relatively close.
The movie follows Kang In-ho (Gong Yoo), who has just been appointed as a teacher at a school for hearing-impaired children in Mujin City, Korea. When he discovers the kinds of abuses that the kids are suffering at the hands of the headmasters, he and his friend Yoojin (Jung Yu-mi) who works for the Mujin Human Rights Center attempt to bring the perpetrators to justice.
So you can see how this movie has a lot of potential for melodrama, but I think it was really well-done. I mean, it's not perfect-for instance I think there were a lot of metaphors that got heavy-handed sometimes, such as the opening scene where In-ho's car striking a rabbit parallels a train striking a child-but all in all, this movie was really well-done. It was truly unnerving and heartbreaking, to the point where it actually brought me to tears a couple of times. And the scenes of abuse were so horrifically real, I... kind of hope that they used CGI or a dummy or something because oh man.
One thing I'd heard about this movie is that after its release, it sparked enough public outrage in Korea that the police in Gwangju (which is the location in which these events actually took place-Mujin is a fictional city, and the school was actually called Gwangju Inhwa School) re-opened the sexual abuse case and booked 14 teachers and administrators on sexual abuse charges. The school has since been shut down by the Gwangju education office, and a thorough investigation is being (or has been) conducted into the charges brought against it. Additionally, a collection of former students who attended the school filed damages just this past month seeking compensation from the teachers who assaulted them, as well as from the school foundation itself for failing to protect the students it was meant to protect.
So, I guess even though the years-and I mean like, 10 or 12 years-of systematic abuse are utterly horrifying and tragic, something good has come out of this. Increased attention to sexual abuse cases in a country where rape and sexual abuse victims rarely win their cases... well, I hope it turns out to be a good thing.
READ MORE:
* Film rekindles rage over Inhwa School case, 2011-09-29 @ The Korea Herald
* SKorea: New abuse cases emerge at Gwangju Inhwa School, 2011-10-10 @ AsianCorrespondent
* 'Dogani' school to be shut down, 2011-10-31 @ HanCinema
* Sexual abuse victims file for damages against Gwangju school teachers, 2012-01-18 @ Yonhap News Agency
And finally, I've been watching a new drama (because my drama attention span is like five minutes long): Shut Up Flower Boy Band ("닥치고 꽃미남밴드"), a tvN drama starring Sung Joon (as Jihyuk), Lee Hyun-jae (as Do-il), Kim Myungsoo (INFINITE'S L, as Hyunsoo), Yoo Min-kyu (as Hajin) and Kim Min-suk (as Kyungjong). I was a little unsure about watching it because I had a serious plot point spoiled for me, but I decided to give it a shot anyway and I'm really glad I did!
At this point I think the basic idea is that there are these five guys in a band who are trying to prove their worth to themselves and to the people around them (they're kind of thugs/gangsters who everyone thinks will just fail out of school and become hobos or whatever) by performing in and winning a local high school battle of the bands. There are some lovelines too but the major focus is on the music and the friendship (so far, anyway) which I like a lot-a drama about music that is actually about music! Wow!
Only 4 episodes have been subbed so far (watch at DramaCrazy), but I'm really enjoying it. Even more surprisingly, I'm finding that I like Myungsoo's performance as an actor, and not just because I like him as a member of INFINITE-he's actually getting to be a pretty excellent actor, moreso because the character he plays in this drama is really different than his onstage persona (which in turns is different from his real personality, I know, but still). It's a good drama! I hope it continues to be as impressive as the episodes wear on.
I have a couple of movies to watch (Shi/Poetry and Ogamdo/Five Senses of Eros) and a book to finish (House of Leaves) so... yeah. Until next time! o7
this came from dreamwidth follow me there yeaaaaah