[K-Movie Night] New 12 months Blues » Dramabeans Kdrama

[K-Movie Night] New 12 months Blues

by Dramaddictally

Welcome to Okay-Film Night time — a once-a-month function the place we microwave some popcorn, placed on a face masks, and get cozy with a Korean film from yesteryear. With so many movies lastly streaming (with subs!), now could be the time to get caught up on all these films we missed that includes our favourite drama actors.

Every month, we’ll decide a flick, write a evaluate, and meet you again right here to debate whether or not or not it’s value a watch. Tremendous easy. All you need to do is kick up your ft and be part of us within the feedback!

 
MOVIE REVIEW

We’re ending the yr with a lighthearted rom-com that’s set to a Christmas backdrop and likewise pulls collectively so most of the drama actors that lit up our screens in 2023. In the event you’ve been maintaining with our 12 months in Evaluation actions, you’ll acknowledge a lot of the faces on this ensemble forged as a stunning little recap of our yr in dramas.

We began and ended 2023 with Yoo Yeon-seok in The Curiosity of Love and A Bloody Fortunate Day, and sandwiched in between we noticed the likes of Yoo Teo (Like to Hate You), Yoo Inna (Bora! Deborah), Lee Yeon-hee (Race), and Sooyoung (Not Others), amongst many others on this feel-good movie. There’s nothing artsy right here and no awards to say, it’s only a celebration of one other drama-watching yr passed by and a hopeful anticipation of all of the goodness 2024 would possibly deliver us.

Stuffed with clichés however straightforward to look at and chill out into, the film introduces us to 4 {couples} whose tales loosely intersect within the remaining week of the yr. Arrange as a seven-day countdown to New 12 months’s Eve, we open with a proposal, a breakup, an engagement, and a divorce. Whereas we actually want greater than every week for all these struggles to unfold, the film’s fast chopping between storylines makes up for it, permitting us to take a seat again, flip off our considering minds, and soak up all of the romance that’s burgeoning and breaking down.

What’s attention-grabbing within the setup is that we now have two {couples} seemingly on their option to happiness — one with a shiny new ring and the opposite blissfully engaged and transferring on to wedding ceremony plans — however these are the 2 that may finally face the larger struggles in love. On the other aspect, the 2 ladies who begin out in dissolving relationships will go on to type the guts of the sparky love tales. So, by the top, we don’t simply see divorce, but additionally transferring on from it. And we don’t simply see marriage proposals, but additionally the problem of truly forming a union.

We open on a snowy mountaintop for the World Para Snowboard Championships, the place RAE-HWAN (Yoo Teo) is about to take first place. He races to the end line, hops over the fence in the direction of his followers, and pops the large query to his girlfriend, OH-WOL (Sooyoung). It’s all yeses and smiles, and our overjoyed couple appears to be on their option to a stunning life, till the issue of expectations rears its ugly head.

We be taught that Rae-hwan misplaced his leg from the knee down on the age of 4, moved to Germany along with his household, and got here again to Korea as an grownup to coach as a nationwide athlete. Now, despite the fact that he’s acing world competitions for snowboarders with bodily impairments, he has no sponsorship and faces discrimination each as an athlete and an individual who grew up overseas.

Oh-wol is pleased with their relationship, however Rae-hwan desires to provide her extra. “I really feel small being subsequent to you,” he tells her at an costly dinner he’s paying for however can’t actually afford. Oh-wol — who’s simply witnessed his new company utilizing her “normalness” as a option to market him to the plenty — will get up from the desk and leaves. “You don’t have any concept what I actually need,” she says. And we instantly have a really actual relationship dynamic on our fingers.

Our second story follows JIN-AH (Lee Yeon-hee) as she’s coldly dumped by her boyfriend of six years (cameo by Choi Siwon because the grating and comedically terrible breaker-upper). Jin-ah feels herself reeling and wishes a reset on life, and so, she picks the primary and furthest place she will discover: Buenos Aires, Argentina.

There, she meets the expat winery employee and wine supply man, JAE-HUN (Yoo Yeon-seok), who has his personal harrowing story for why he left Korea. The 2 begin off on the unsuitable foot, however quickly discover themselves roaming the road markets of San Telmo and taking a highway journey to Iguazu Falls — the place they scream out all their anger on the world into the crashing water.

As the 2 get to know one another, spending every week collectively within the South American summer season, Jin-ah witnesses how Jae-hun constructed a brand new life overseas and will get a style of what the world could be like if she simply lets herself open up. On the identical time, Jae-hun considers what he might be lacking out on again residence.

Couple quantity three comprises but a 3rd intercultural dynamic with a Korean tour operator, YONG-CHAN (Lee Dong-hwi), engaged to a Chinese language lady, YAO-LIN (Chen Duling), who speaks no Korean. The preliminary drawback is that Yong-chan’s noona (Yeom Hye-ran) is making an attempt onerous to carry all of it collectively as the top of their household, however suffers horrible anxiousness about not with the ability to talk with Yao-lin, because the three stay in the identical home.

Watching the 2 ladies be taught to speak despite the fact that they don’t converse the identical language is the heartwarming a part of this thread. However watching the couple deteriorate as Yong-chan hides essential details about a current monetary fraud that’s toppled his enterprise is infuriating, if all too rooted in actuality. “What am I to you?” Yao-lin shouts when she learns the reality. Yikes. She’s already an outsider within the nation, and now he’s made her an outsider of their relationship.

Our remaining couple (which in some way ended up being my favourite) meets when the lady, HYO-YOUNG (Yoo In-na), is in search of a restraining order in opposition to her husband throughout their divorce. JI-HO (Kim Kang-woo) is the cop assigned to guard her, and as he follows her by way of her day by day actions, the 2 begin to make one another smile.

Once we meet Ji-ho he’s residing alone in a small house, hooked on his work, and 4 years post-divorce. In a scene that resonated a little bit too properly, he’s residence alone on Christmas when he receives a textual content. Oh, who might be wishing him a Merry Christmas? It’s House Mart, hoping he’s having a effective time along with his household and family members. It’s probably not humorous, but it surely’s proper on the cash. With that form of loneliness, the journey from exasperated at work to exasperated in love feels all of the extra satisfying.

After the setup, the movie follows all its sophisticated {couples} in the direction of their relationship resolutions. However the second half develops a wonky tempo because it strikes previous the preliminary fixes and onto prolonged (and principally trite) endings. It’s loads to absorb with so many tales in such a short while, leaving every thing a bit too superficial to supply any actual feels. Nonetheless, whereas it’s not probably the most memorable, and I didn’t chuckle out loud, it’s a feel-good romance that positively had me smiling with its gentle tone and upbeat lifestyle.

The cultural themes additionally reverberate, despite the fact that they’re principally unexplored, because the characters evaluate life in Korea to Germany, China, and Argentina, laying out the hardships of discrimination, working situations, and intercultural relationships. The highlights for me have been the scenes in Buenos Aires (even when the storyline there is likely to be probably the most cringey) and watching Yoo Yeon-seok play a tango-dancing, Spanish-speaking native. Listening to him swear in Spanish when he’s chasing down a pickpocket just about made my evening.

Plus, the sundown tango on a rooftop that winds up touchdown our couple in a really Okay-drama-esque fall into an almost-kiss, leads us to this gem: “I believed I used to be having a low level in my life, however I used to be simply having a siesta.” The takeaway? “Subsequent yr, let’s be happier than this yr.”

Be part of us in January for the following Okay-Film Night time and let’s make a celebration of it! We’ll be watching Juror 8 (2019) and posting the evaluate over the past week of the month.

Need to take part within the feedback when it posts? You’ve obtained 3 weeks to look at! Relatively anticipate the evaluate earlier than you resolve to stream it? We’ve obtained you lined.

 
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