Lump sugar (2006) - 각설탕 (Kak-seol-tang)

Singer Kim Ji-hyeon, visits screen in seven years after "Summer Time"

2008/03/27 | Source | Permalink |

Kim Ji-hyeon, who used to be in the group Roo'ra, will visit the screen.

Juggling her solo singing career, acting, and personal business, she has finished filming independent film "Purple Rain".

Director Jang Dong-hyeon, who was the assistant director for "My Wife is a Gangster 2" and "Gohae", is directing "Purple Rain", the story of Yong-dae, a director of erotic videos, and Young-hee, a worker at a bar. The main characters are Choi Hak-rak, who has shown his acting in "Raybang" and "Lump Sugar", and Choi Eun-joo, who starred in "My Wife is a Gangster" and "The First Amendment". Kim Ji-hyeon plays the wife of Yong-dae.

More than anything else, the actors and staff were captivated by the perfect scenario and participated for no pay.

Those from the producing company said, "The actors including Kim Ji-hyeon saw the script and decided to participate with no salary out of their pure hearts rather than commercial profit".

Mid-last month, they finished filming the last scene w...| More

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A girl needs heartbreak to be a woman

2007/10/10 | Source | Permalink |

Perhaps Im Soo-jeong has bid farewell to her girl years. It's a disappointment, but the 27-year-old actress has made her choice. Now in her late 20s, she is only doing what is natural.
"Happiness" is a film about a young woman who falls in love with a bad boy (Hwang Jeong-min) she meets in a rural nursing home. It's a coming-of-age ritual for Im. In the movie one of her lines is, "I am older than I look".
"After starring in a movie about love between adults, rather than between teenagers", Im said, "I feel like I've grown up, like I've married someone".
With a baby face on a petite frame, Im has always taken the roles of precocious girls who suffer early tragedies.
In the hit KBS drama "Sorry, I Love You", she fell in love with an adoptee; in the film "Ing", she was a terminally ill high school girl who accepted her imminent death with grace.
But Im has never been an object of sexual desire for older men. Some of her characters even had the power to heal, such as the 30-kilog...| More

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France Buys Korean Film "The Restless"

2007/03/27 | Source | Permalink |

CJ Entertainment said Tuesday that it sold film "The Restless" to France at the 1st Asian Film Award recently held in Hong Kong.

A company staffer said that European nations tend to see fantasy movies like "The Restless" as works depicting typical Asian sentiment.

The film distributor also sold the joint Korean-Japanese film "Virgin Snow" to Vietnam, Malaysia and Thailand, "The Chief and The Governor" to Thailand, "My Tutor Friend Lesson II" to Malaysia, "The Wig" ("Scary Hair") to Latin America, and "My Scary Girl" and "Lump Sugar" to Taiwan....| More

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Actors pay makes it impossible to create good films

2007/03/01 | Source | Permalink |

The co-president of SidusFNH, Cha Seung-jae, 47, has been appointed chairman of the Korean Film Producers Association. Mr. Cha is considered one of the pioneers who inspired a renaissance in the local film industry. Mr. Cha has produced films that have widespread appeal and a challenging spirit. They include "Beat", "Christmas in August" and "Memories of Murder". SidusFNH was founded by Mr. Cha and its co-president Kim Mi-hee, two years ago and is now the biggest film production company in Korea. Last year, it released 12 films. Mr. Cha spoke about the challenges faced by local production companies.

Q. You have taken on great responsibility at a difficult time.
A. The reduced status of producers is one problem and rising production costs are another. Five years ago, average production costs ranged from 1.5 billion won [$1.6 million] to 2 billion won per film but now they have increased to 3 billion won.
On top of that, an additional 2 billion won is spent on marketing, which means...| More

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Tale of a girl and her horse tastes stale

2006/12/20 | Source | Permalink |

Let's get the bad news out of the way first.
Lee Hwan-gyeong's "Lump Sugar", a story of a brave female jockey and her horse named "Thunder", leaves a stale aftertaste by encouraging conflicts between classic dualities of good and evil, whether it's a bad guy versus a brave girl or a loyal Korean horse (it even runs out to the racetrack from an operating table, despite being sick) versus an American horse with the cheesy name of "King Flesh".
Also, like a horse race, the film leads its audience to anticipate who will win the day. Perhaps the idea of "race" refers to more than just a horse race in this film, which was funded by the Korea Racing Association.
It's also a race for Si-eun (Im Soo-jeong) against the idiotic male riders and sponsors of her riding school, who constantly jeer at her gender.
The film is also the heroine's race against the depravity and corruption prevalent at the racetrack. It's also the fierce race of the Korean horse against the American steed.
Yet in "Lum...|