A CLOSE-UP ON THE KOREAN GENRE

TITLE: SPEED SCANDAL (SCANDAL MAKERS)

DIRECTOR:   Kang Hyeong-cheol (강형철)

Screenplay: Kang Hyeong-cheol (강형철)

FILM GENRE:Comedy •Drama •Family   Film Category: Asian (Korean Movie)

Critique: Donna Grace I. Cotejo

                                                108min | Release date in South Korea : 2008/12/03

You don't choose your family.  They are God's gift to you, as you are to them.  ~Desmond Tutu

The Speedy Scandal assumes the genre-based theory of film for the following characteristic traits based on definitions provided.

The word genre comes from the French (and originally Latin) word for 'kind' or 'class'. The term is widely used in rhetoric, literary theory, media theory, and more recently linguistics, to refer to a distinctive type of 'text'*.

Gledhill (60) says that Genres are not discrete systems, consisting of a fixed number of listable items. It is difficult to make clear cut distinctions between one genre and another: genres overlap, and there are 'mixed genres' (such as comedy-thrillers).

Abercrombie (45) notes that since 'television comes at the audience as a flow of programmes, all with different generic conventions, means that it is more difficult to sustain the purity of the genre in the viewing experience.

          Northrop Frye (1957) presented certain universal genres and modes as the key to organizing the entire literary corpus. Contemporary media genres tend to relate more to specific forms than to the universals of tragedy and comedy. Nowadays, films are routinely classified (e.g. in television listings magazines) as 'thrillers', 'westerns' and so on - genres with which every adult in modern society is familiar.

            Speedy Scandal (Scandal Makers) was released in South Korea on 3 December 2008, and topped the box office on its opening weekend with 473,725 admissions. It continued to chart well finishing with over 8 million tickets sold becoming the highest grossing Korean film of 2008. The movie “Speed Scandal” (also known as Scandal Makers) turned into a huge sleeper hit that would go on to become South Korea’s top box office draw of 2008. What made its success is even more surprising is that the movie doesn’t have any big names. Although, it is more comparable to “200 pounds beauty”, it does feature Tae-hyun Cha from “My Sassy Girl” in the lead role, but Cha hasn’t had a whole lot of success since Sassy Girl. It is also comparable to the Western film starring The Rock entitled Game Plan which has a same recurring theme. So what’s the attraction of “Scandal Makers” you ask? Well, the movie cleverly adopts the obvious traits of a genre theory –based film. This is a budget-based (blockbuster).

          In “Scandal Makers,” former teen pop star now in his early 30’s Hyeon-su (Tae-hyun Cha) attempts to resurrect his entertainment career. He currently holds a low profile job as a radio talk show host, but thinks he is a popular personality who hopes to have a good scandal.  One day, Hyeon-su receives a knock on his door and is surprised to find a teenage girl standing on his doorsteps. The girl named Jeong-nam (Bo-yeong Park) claims to be his daughter and also has with her a young boy who she claims to be his grandchild. Hyeon-su not wanting to believe any of this, asks the mother and son to leave, but Jeong-nam’s threat to go to the media makes Hyeon-su forced to let them live in his house for a while. Hyeon-su then allows Jeong-nam and her son to stay in his apartment as he devices a plan to quietly rid himself of them. Things become more complicated when Hyeon-su and Jeong-nam are spotted in public by Jeong Nam’s former childhood sweetheart and took a picture of them and assumed to be living in together.

           Hyeon-su and Bo-Yeong Park’s dynamism of character will catch your eyes as the father and daughter played negative roles at first until the more dramatic scenes progress later in the film. The development of their physical aspects from tacky or nerdy to trendy outfits adds beauty to the story. The character of the child is a natural attention catcher. Every child likes him. Their sense of humor is intrinsic.

          The uniqueness of its cinematography appears when the “black and white” effects of the screen dominate intentionally to match the musicale of the movie. It is only seldom that to appear “black and white” screen in a comedy movie but it never defeats its purpose. It adds color instead. There is a close scrutiny of the editing to captures the scenes like when the child actor falls in love with the child actress, there was the picture and the children sound – his grandfather falls in love with the woman principal too there was a back to back picture with an adult sound and the way the pictures were exchanged were a powerful scene. The musical soundtrack also features plenty of nostalgic Korean pop tracks to bring smiles to those familiar with those songs. 

          After watching “Scandal Makers” it’s easy to understand why the film became such a huge hit in Korea. It appeals to the general audience. It tries to convey that fame is futile when family is put in a great turmoil. The one hundred percent (100%) comedic elements found in the first half of the film works well & the touch of dramatic elements in the second half doesn’t feel unnaturally forced. In addition to that, the blast of emotions from watching the movie seems to stick to you in its whole duration. For those who love the music, this is a perfect genre of comedy-music without sounding like a MUSICALE. Make no doubt it, I recommend you to watch and be healed with this comedy, SPEED SCANDAL also known as SCANDAL MAKERS.  Two thumbs up.