Oh. My. GOD

OMG! This will not make sense to anyone who hasn't seen Delightful Girl Chun-Hyang but OMG OMG OMG he's just found her notebook!

I am crying.

I am jetlagged and with too little sleep and I am bawling.

But she has all the articles about him and she wrote on the side over and over 'Mong Ryong, Mong Ryong, I love you, I love you' and it's as if she's never been able to tell him but she finally must somewhere and OMG OMG OMG...

And he starts crying a little, and whispers 'silly girl' and OMG OMG OMG OMG

OMG.

Gosh, my DGCH write-up when I do one is going to be huge!

Oh. My. GOD

OMG! This will not make sense to anyone who hasn't seen Delightful Girl Chun-Hyang but OMG OMG OMG he's just found her notebook!

I am crying.

I am jetlagged and with too little sleep and I am bawling.

But she has all the articles about him and she wrote on the side over and over 'Mong Ryong, Mong Ryong, I love you, I love you' and it's as if she's never been able to tell him but she finally must somewhere and OMG OMG OMG...

And he starts crying a little, and whispers 'silly girl' and OMG OMG OMG OMG

OMG.

Gosh, my DGCH write-up when I do one is going to be huge!

Oh. My. GOD

OMG! This will not make sense to anyone who hasn't seen Delightful Girl Chun-Hyang but OMG OMG OMG he's just found her notebook!

I am crying.

I am jetlagged and with too little sleep and I am bawling.

But she has all the articles about him and she wrote on the side over and over 'Mong Ryong, Mong Ryong, I love you, I love you' and it's as if she's never been able to tell him but she finally must somewhere and OMG OMG OMG...

And he starts crying a little, and whispers 'silly girl' and OMG OMG OMG OMG

OMG.

Gosh, my DGCH write-up when I do one is going to be huge!

For once about North Korea...

In the annals of craziness? I bought a wonderful book on art in North Korea while in the British Museum. The art part is interesting enough, but the description of North Korean lifestyle was by far the most interesting part: it sounded completely horrific. Besides the shortages, regimentation etc etc, men are in the army for eight or so years, nobody but the healthiest and most loyal are allowed to live in the capital, women don’t even ride bycicles and are still subservient, the class stricture is as rigid as during the royal times (only the extensive background records are about your family’s class and loyalty under different criteria) and men can’t marry until 29 or women until 25. Entertainment consists of public classes/readings of works of the leaders, done publically, so family life is almost non-existent. It reads scarily like 1984. (I also went and found The Aquariums of Pyongyang: Ten Years in the North Korean Gulag by by Kang Chol-Hwan, a child prisoner who eventually escaped to South Korea. It reminds me of those books i read about Soviet Gulags. Really chilling.)

And the deceased Kim Il-Sung is viewed as some sort of Jesus-type being, because not only do New Year’s gifts come from him, but apparently his death had supernatural omens etc etc.

Even better? His son, Kim Jong-Il. According to wikipedia: The official biography also holds that his birth at Mount Paektu was foretold by a swallow, and heralded by the appearance of a double rainbow over the mountain and a new star in the heavens.

Moreover according to wikipedia, a Russian emissary who traveled with Kim across Russia by train, told reporters that Kim had live lobsters air-lifted to the train every day which he ate with silver chopsticks - historically used in the Chinese Imperial Palace to detect poison. Kim has a reputation for expensive taste. His annual purchases of Hennessy cognac reportedly total to $700,000, while the average North Korean earns the rough estimate equivalent of $900 per year.

Creepy.

Also, apparently, in 1978, on the orders of Kim, South Korean film director Shin Sang-ok and his actress wife Choe Eun-hui were kidnapped in order to build a North Korean film industry.

Here is a BBC article about it. ( It is behind the cut )

For once about North Korea...

In the annals of craziness? I bought a wonderful book on art in North Korea while in the British Museum. The art part is interesting enough, but the description of North Korean lifestyle was by far the most interesting part: it sounded completely horrific. Besides the shortages, regimentation etc etc, men are in the army for eight or so years, nobody but the healthiest and most loyal are allowed to live in the capital, women don’t even ride bycicles and are still subservient, the class stricture is as rigid as during the royal times (only the extensive background records are about your family’s class and loyalty under different criteria) and men can’t marry until 29 or women until 25. Entertainment consists of public classes/readings of works of the leaders, done publically, so family life is almost non-existent. It reads scarily like 1984. (I also went and found The Aquariums of Pyongyang: Ten Years in the North Korean Gulag by by Kang Chol-Hwan, a child prisoner who eventually escaped to South Korea. It reminds me of those books i read about Soviet Gulags. Really chilling.)

And the deceased Kim Il-Sung is viewed as some sort of Jesus-type being, because not only do New Year’s gifts come from him, but apparently his death had supernatural omens etc etc.

Even better? His son, Kim Jong-Il. According to wikipedia: The official biography also holds that his birth at Mount Paektu was foretold by a swallow, and heralded by the appearance of a double rainbow over the mountain and a new star in the heavens.

Moreover according to wikipedia, a Russian emissary who traveled with Kim across Russia by train, told reporters that Kim had live lobsters air-lifted to the train every day which he ate with silver chopsticks - historically used in the Chinese Imperial Palace to detect poison. Kim has a reputation for expensive taste. His annual purchases of Hennessy cognac reportedly total to $700,000, while the average North Korean earns the rough estimate equivalent of $900 per year.

Creepy.

Also, apparently, in 1978, on the orders of Kim, South Korean film director Shin Sang-ok and his actress wife Choe Eun-hui were kidnapped in order to build a North Korean film industry.

Here is a BBC article about it. ( It is behind the cut )

For once about North Korea...

In the annals of craziness? I bought a wonderful book on art in North Korea while in the British Museum. The art part is interesting enough, but the description of North Korean lifestyle was by far the most interesting part: it sounded completely horrific. Besides the shortages, regimentation etc etc, men are in the army for eight or so years, nobody but the healthiest and most loyal are allowed to live in the capital, women don’t even ride bycicles and are still subservient, the class stricture is as rigid as during the royal times (only the extensive background records are about your family’s class and loyalty under different criteria) and men can’t marry until 29 or women until 25. Entertainment consists of public classes/readings of works of the leaders, done publically, so family life is almost non-existent. It reads scarily like 1984. (I also went and found The Aquariums of Pyongyang: Ten Years in the North Korean Gulag by by Kang Chol-Hwan, a child prisoner who eventually escaped to South Korea. It reminds me of those books i read about Soviet Gulags. Really chilling.)

And the deceased Kim Il-Sung is viewed as some sort of Jesus-type being, because not only do New Year’s gifts come from him, but apparently his death had supernatural omens etc etc.

Even better? His son, Kim Jong-Il. According to wikipedia: The official biography also holds that his birth at Mount Paektu was foretold by a swallow, and heralded by the appearance of a double rainbow over the mountain and a new star in the heavens.

Moreover according to wikipedia, a Russian emissary who traveled with Kim across Russia by train, told reporters that Kim had live lobsters air-lifted to the train every day which he ate with silver chopsticks - historically used in the Chinese Imperial Palace to detect poison. Kim has a reputation for expensive taste. His annual purchases of Hennessy cognac reportedly total to $700,000, while the average North Korean earns the rough estimate equivalent of $900 per year.

Creepy.

Also, apparently, in 1978, on the orders of Kim, South Korean film director Shin Sang-ok and his actress wife Choe Eun-hui were kidnapped in order to build a North Korean film industry.

Here is a BBC article about it. ( It is behind the cut )

Because my movie taste is really random: movies from Korea, Kazakhstan and Thailand

Jae-Hee!!!!! After finishing DGCH, I now crave more Jae Hee. So, on catdecember’s recommendation, I got my hands on 3-Iron, a Korean movie in which he stars (btw, if like me, you get the R1 DVD, don’t read the back. I think it gives away most of the plot which is…). It sounds wonderful. Also, oooooh, art house ;). And apparently, there is almost no dialogue, just silence.



Plot: A young drifter enters strangers' houses - and lives - while owners are away. He spends a night or a day squatting in, repaying their unwitting hospitality by doing laundry or small repairs. His life changes when he runs into a beautiful woman in an affluent mansion who is ready to escape her unhappy, abusive marriage.

It is by the director of the gorgeous Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter and Spring. Here is an unspoilery, short professional review.

( Some photographs. It looks gorgeous and slightly surreal )

And I also want to find and watch Art of Fighting which is a movie he did in 2006, about a bullied student who learns to fight to strike back. No love story though, hmmmm. It sounds really good, if not as good as 3-Iron. It’s rather interesting that in both of them he seems to play a quiet, introverted loner. Very different from Chun-Hyang.

In other movie news, on March 30, there is a movie opening which I am extremely amused by the concept of. It is Kazakhstan’s Nomad. I love period battle epics and eeee, sounds fun, even if in part it’s because the head of government Nazarbayev was supposed to be really into this film and because the putative Kazakh heroes are played by Hispanic actors.

Plot (from a review): The mystic Kazakh warrior Oraz (a stalwart Jason Scott Lee) tells a sultan that his newborn son has been "chosen by the stars to unite all Kazakhs" and thereby overthrow the oppressive rule of the invader Jungars. To that end, Oraz raises the son, Mansur (Mexican actor Kuno Becker), and another boy, Erali (Jay Hernandez), as brothers, along with a youth from each of the tribes, to become superb warriors capable of defeating the despotic Jungar ruler (Doskhan Zholhzhaxynov). The close bond between Mansur and Oraz finds them falling in love with the same girl (Ayanat Yesmagambetova) and caught in a particularly cruel twist.

Heh. Pics:



( More Pics )

And then there is the Thai Tears of the Black Tiger which is part Western (set in Thailand!!!), part star-crossed romance. Heee.

Because my movie taste is really random: movies from Korea, Kazakhstan and Thailand

Jae-Hee!!!!! After finishing DGCH, I now crave more Jae Hee. So, on catdecember’s recommendation, I got my hands on 3-Iron, a Korean movie in which he stars (btw, if like me, you get the R1 DVD, don’t read the back. I think it gives away most of the plot which is…). It sounds wonderful. Also, oooooh, art house ;). And apparently, there is almost no dialogue, just silence.



Plot: A young drifter enters strangers' houses - and lives - while owners are away. He spends a night or a day squatting in, repaying their unwitting hospitality by doing laundry or small repairs. His life changes when he runs into a beautiful woman in an affluent mansion who is ready to escape her unhappy, abusive marriage.

It is by the director of the gorgeous Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter and Spring. Here is an unspoilery, short professional review.

( Some photographs. It looks gorgeous and slightly surreal )

And I also want to find and watch Art of Fighting which is a movie he did in 2006, about a bullied student who learns to fight to strike back. No love story though, hmmmm. It sounds really good, if not as good as 3-Iron. It’s rather interesting that in both of them he seems to play a quiet, introverted loner. Very different from Chun-Hyang.

In other movie news, on March 30, there is a movie opening which I am extremely amused by the concept of. It is Kazakhstan’s Nomad. I love period battle epics and eeee, sounds fun, even if in part it’s because the head of government Nazarbayev was supposed to be really into this film and because the putative Kazakh heroes are played by Hispanic actors.

Plot (from a review): The mystic Kazakh warrior Oraz (a stalwart Jason Scott Lee) tells a sultan that his newborn son has been "chosen by the stars to unite all Kazakhs" and thereby overthrow the oppressive rule of the invader Jungars. To that end, Oraz raises the son, Mansur (Mexican actor Kuno Becker), and another boy, Erali (Jay Hernandez), as brothers, along with a youth from each of the tribes, to become superb warriors capable of defeating the despotic Jungar ruler (Doskhan Zholhzhaxynov). The close bond between Mansur and Oraz finds them falling in love with the same girl (Ayanat Yesmagambetova) and caught in a particularly cruel twist.

Heh. Pics:



( More Pics )

And then there is the Thai Tears of the Black Tiger which is part Western (set in Thailand!!!), part star-crossed romance. Heee.

Because my movie taste is really random: movies from Korea, Kazakhstan and Thailand

Jae-Hee!!!!! After finishing DGCH, I now crave more Jae Hee. So, on catdecember’s recommendation, I got my hands on 3-Iron, a Korean movie in which he stars (btw, if like me, you get the R1 DVD, don’t read the back. I think it gives away most of the plot which is…). It sounds wonderful. Also, oooooh, art house ;). And apparently, there is almost no dialogue, just silence.



Plot: A young drifter enters strangers' houses - and lives - while owners are away. He spends a night or a day squatting in, repaying their unwitting hospitality by doing laundry or small repairs. His life changes when he runs into a beautiful woman in an affluent mansion who is ready to escape her unhappy, abusive marriage.

It is by the director of the gorgeous Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter and Spring. Here is an unspoilery, short professional review.

( Some photographs. It looks gorgeous and slightly surreal )

And I also want to find and watch Art of Fighting which is a movie he did in 2006, about a bullied student who learns to fight to strike back. No love story though, hmmmm. It sounds really good, if not as good as 3-Iron. It’s rather interesting that in both of them he seems to play a quiet, introverted loner. Very different from Chun-Hyang.

In other movie news, on March 30, there is a movie opening which I am extremely amused by the concept of. It is Kazakhstan’s Nomad. I love period battle epics and eeee, sounds fun, even if in part it’s because the head of government Nazarbayev was supposed to be really into this film and because the putative Kazakh heroes are played by Hispanic actors.

Plot (from a review): The mystic Kazakh warrior Oraz (a stalwart Jason Scott Lee) tells a sultan that his newborn son has been "chosen by the stars to unite all Kazakhs" and thereby overthrow the oppressive rule of the invader Jungars. To that end, Oraz raises the son, Mansur (Mexican actor Kuno Becker), and another boy, Erali (Jay Hernandez), as brothers, along with a youth from each of the tribes, to become superb warriors capable of defeating the despotic Jungar ruler (Doskhan Zholhzhaxynov). The close bond between Mansur and Oraz finds them falling in love with the same girl (Ayanat Yesmagambetova) and caught in a particularly cruel twist.

Heh. Pics:



( More Pics )

And then there is the Thai Tears of the Black Tiger which is part Western (set in Thailand!!!), part star-crossed romance. Heee.

Delightful Girl Chun-Hyang: giddy incoherence. And some Snow Queen

Oh my.

I finished Delightful Girl Chun-Hyang, grinning from ear to ear. I haven’t marathonned like that for a while. The write-up is going to be spoilery, a bit incoherent and very long, as I am going to babble about 10 (!!!) eps.

Interesting, as I know this drama was written by the same team which wrote my adored My Girl. You can notice some similarities (other than the fact that the perfect cameo at the end of My Girl is even more perfect now. I just might rewatch just that part): both feature intelligent, strong-willed heroines with less than ideal background and heroes who are laid-back good guys who love them precisely for their cleverness and strength, but who are no weaklings themselves. And they are all relatively un-messed up. There are time jumps, men pursuing when the woman tries to push them away to save them. And the hero and heroine are friends before they fall in love. And airport scenes that make me bawl and drama parodies that make me die laughing.

But that is about it. The stories themselves feel very different, fresh, fun.

Non-spoilery summary of the very lengthy write-up behind cut: if you are looking for a fast-paced, charming drama that is a perfect mix of funniness and angst, and a strong heroine and hero, and some awesome chemistry between the leads, DGCH is the drama for you!

( Very lengthy meta )

Oh, and I finished ep 8 of Snow Queen and now that I am home, will continue with it.

( Some scattered thoughts )

Delightful Girl Chun-Hyang: giddy incoherence. And some Snow Queen

Oh my.

I finished Delightful Girl Chun-Hyang, grinning from ear to ear. I haven’t marathonned like that for a while. The write-up is going to be spoilery, a bit incoherent and very long, as I am going to babble about 10 (!!!) eps.

Interesting, as I know this drama was written by the same team which wrote my adored My Girl. You can notice some similarities (other than the fact that the perfect cameo at the end of My Girl is even more perfect now. I just might rewatch just that part): both feature intelligent, strong-willed heroines with less than ideal background and heroes who are laid-back good guys who love them precisely for their cleverness and strength, but who are no weaklings themselves. And they are all relatively un-messed up. There are time jumps, men pursuing when the woman tries to push them away to save them. And the hero and heroine are friends before they fall in love. And airport scenes that make me bawl and drama parodies that make me die laughing.

But that is about it. The stories themselves feel very different, fresh, fun.

Non-spoilery summary of the very lengthy write-up behind cut: if you are looking for a fast-paced, charming drama that is a perfect mix of funniness and angst, and a strong heroine and hero, and some awesome chemistry between the leads, DGCH is the drama for you!

( Very lengthy meta )

Oh, and I finished ep 8 of Snow Queen and now that I am home, will continue with it.

( Some scattered thoughts )

Delightful Girl Chun-Hyang: giddy incoherence. And some Snow Queen

Oh my.

I finished Delightful Girl Chun-Hyang, grinning from ear to ear. I haven’t marathonned like that for a while. The write-up is going to be spoilery, a bit incoherent and very long, as I am going to babble about 10 (!!!) eps.

Interesting, as I know this drama was written by the same team which wrote my adored My Girl. You can notice some similarities (other than the fact that the perfect cameo at the end of My Girl is even more perfect now. I just might rewatch just that part): both feature intelligent, strong-willed heroines with less than ideal background and heroes who are laid-back good guys who love them precisely for their cleverness and strength, but who are no weaklings themselves. And they are all relatively un-messed up. There are time jumps, men pursuing when the woman tries to push them away to save them. And the hero and heroine are friends before they fall in love. And airport scenes that make me bawl and drama parodies that make me die laughing.

But that is about it. The stories themselves feel very different, fresh, fun.

Non-spoilery summary of the very lengthy write-up behind cut: if you are looking for a fast-paced, charming drama that is a perfect mix of funniness and angst, and a strong heroine and hero, and some awesome chemistry between the leads, DGCH is the drama for you!

( Very lengthy meta )

Oh, and I finished ep 8 of Snow Queen and now that I am home, will continue with it.

( Some scattered thoughts )