Ha Jung-woo directs new feature co-starring Ha Ji-won
by javabeans
With the number of films Ha Jung-woo has done, he’d be perfect to use as the basis for a Chungmuro-style “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon” game, though as with anything Korean, Three Degrees would probably be more appropriate. Hot on the heels of news announcing potential project Assassination (with Jeon Ji-hyun and Lee Jung-jae), he has now announced his second directorial feature, Chronicle of a Blood Merchant.
The film is based on a Chinese novel of the same name, written by Yu Hua, and tells the story of a man who sells blood to earn money. The original story was set in China from the 1950s through ’80s, while this adaptation will relocate to modern Korea. Ha Jung-woo’s directorial debut came in last year’s comedy Roller Coaster (aka Fasten Your Seatbelt), which starred Jung Kyung-ho. Unlike last time, he will also star in this film; Ha Ji-won has signed on to play his wife, the village beauty who is won over by his devotion.
The new movie is also chock-full of stellar veterans in the supporting cast, including Kim Young-ae, Sung Dong-il, Kim Sung-kyun, and Jung Man-shik. Sung Dong-il will play the hero’s blood-selling colleague, whose best friend will be played by Kim Sung-kyun. Aww, that’s gonna bring back lots of Answer Me 1994 memories, isn’t it? Jung Man-shik is the hero’s friend who also sometimes gives him a hard time, and Kim Young-ae will play the mother who gives the hero advice on how to be a good husband.
Chronicle of a Blood Merchant will complete casting and wrap up work on the screenplay soon, and will enter filming in the first half of the year.
Kim Young-ae, Sung Dong-il, Kim Sung-kyun, Jung Man-shik
Via TV Report
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Tags: Ha Ji-won, Ha Jung-woo, Kim Sung-kyun, Sung Dong-il
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1 chane
February 4, 2014 at 2:24 PM
Aww, Appa and Samcheonpo <3 I miss you two!
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2 Quiet Thought
February 4, 2014 at 2:27 PM
Sounds like a weirdly trivial plot point to base a novel on. Students and homeless people sell their blood in the United States. It's no big deal. I assume the novel is about poverty and hardship.
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unsavoryplatypus
February 4, 2014 at 2:33 PM
The blood selling is an important metaphor in the novel. It's about poverty and the Cultural Revolution.
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Museofmanymasks
February 4, 2014 at 4:12 PM
It says he sells blood, as in not necessarily his own. And the triviality or lack thereof would be based on who's buying and for what purpose. At least I assume so.
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3 müge
February 4, 2014 at 2:39 PM
this first thing came to my mind is not the project. I imagined how wonderful would be if my fav actor&actress would be lover in real life <3 <3 <3
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4 vanillasalt
February 4, 2014 at 2:41 PM
Ha Ji Won sure is a busy woman
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alexis
February 4, 2014 at 4:40 PM
This woman has to be the hardest working person in K showbiz, for which I'm so grateful because I <3 her and her projects. I read somewhere that they picked her up from the set of Haeundae and drove her straight to the set of Secret Garden. *jaw drops*
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tieuyeunu
March 1, 2014 at 7:06 AM
They picked her up from the set of Sector 7, she washed then started straight on Secret Garden apparently.
How is she still looking healthy I don't have a clue since she doesn't seem to stop working.
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5 Joy
February 4, 2014 at 2:57 PM
anything with Ha Ji Won in it? count me in!
and omg Reply 1994 reunion <333
also this is off topic but have you guys been playing around with the mobile layout for Dramabeans? I've seen it change at least three times for the past week or so.
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6 Mawiie
February 4, 2014 at 3:01 PM
Awww yay for the AM1994 reunion! And didn't HJW stated in the past that she wanted to work with Ha Jung Woo? Good for her!
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nancy
February 4, 2014 at 3:11 PM
Ha Jung Woo said the same too in the past that he hoped to work with Ha Ji Won.
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tiny
February 4, 2014 at 4:03 PM
yes yes i remember! i think having her own agency, Ha Ji Won is able to pick projects more personally.
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kanz
February 4, 2014 at 7:14 PM
Yes, I remember Ha Ji Won said in an interview she wanted to work with Ha Jung Woo. Her dream's comes true... Good for her since Ha Jung Woo is awesome actor
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7 fab
February 4, 2014 at 3:19 PM
Ha Jung Woo Ha Ji Won, their names match so much LOL. The movie sounds awesome.
So happy that Kim Sung-kyun keeps getting cast, he was good in Covertly, Grandly.
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PeepsLeAwesomePotato
February 4, 2014 at 7:33 PM
Heh, you re right. They even have the same initials. But Ha JiWon is only her stage name (it's the name of her first manager's first love, psssh. The guy recommended it because he wanted his first love's name to ring far and wide... Seriously, dude...) I'm not too sure about Ha JungWoo though.
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fab
February 5, 2014 at 3:52 AM
LOL what?! That manager is sure a smart guy it worked out just like he wished, her name is heard very far and probably for a long time.
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PeepsLeAwesomePotato
February 5, 2014 at 6:35 AM
Oh, I messed up a bit. It wasn't her manager but her first agency's president.
Still... Dude....
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fab
February 5, 2014 at 8:53 AM
Yep still wth... Of course no wonder she has her own agency now.
topper
February 5, 2014 at 10:36 AM
Ha Jung Woo is a stage name too.
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Joy
February 4, 2014 at 10:12 PM
Which remind me that it's going to be a Ha-Ha loveteam :)
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8 tiny
February 4, 2014 at 3:42 PM
i must have saved a planet before to see sooooo many of my dream pairings come true.
this was another one.
how about Ha Jung Woo and Won Bin next?
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9 Appletea
February 4, 2014 at 3:58 PM
After seeing him in reply 1994, i really see Kim Sung Kyun as a great actor. I even sincerely fall for him there just like how I fall for Trash.
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10 wannabean
February 4, 2014 at 4:00 PM
yayy kim sung kyun and sung dong il~
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11 Quiet Thought
February 4, 2014 at 4:48 PM
Why exactly is it that neither Vikii or Dramafever is doing Empress Ki? The sites that have it are irritating.
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jomo143
February 5, 2014 at 5:09 AM
Hulu has it. Maybe a licensing bidding thing?
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12 neyrie
February 4, 2014 at 6:33 PM
this movie is full of actors I love from to my super duper love Ha Jungwoo, to Sung Dong Il to Jung Man Shik, Ha Jiwon and Kim Sung Kyun.
his would be the third movie that Ha JungWoo and Kim Sungkyun will be in together, right? First was Nameless Gangster, then KSK was also in Ha JungWoo's directorial debut movie Fasten your seatbelt, then in the saguek movie Kundo that will be out this jjune and lastly this one which is just tgreat... This 2 are really working together so many times.. want some interview on KSK and Ha jungwoo...!!!
I ust know that this is gonna be awesome with Ha Jungwoo making and playing in it but when you add all these great actors and actresses, this is gonna be just EPIC!
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13 kanz
February 4, 2014 at 7:18 PM
Casts full of amazing actors... Hope the story will be good! Now organ selling and/or donor become a hit story
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14 readlead
February 4, 2014 at 8:29 PM
finally, ha jung woo get to co-sar with the actress he wanted the most then ha ji won too, finally get to work with the actor she wants the most!
both are lucky, ha jung woo is one of best actor ever and ha ji won is one of best actress too, I even loved her back years ago... but... there is other actresses that I want you to co-star with... :(
ah my fangirl heart... somehow I feel sad hearing this news... ENVY? JEALOUS? bian ha jung woo oppa, never mind, wish all the best for this movie, absolutely, will watch it later!
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15 Kim Yoonmi
February 4, 2014 at 10:00 PM
The original book is about a man under Mao's reign who works in a silk mill, but has to sell his blood to support his wife and three sons. However, he finds out one of his sons is not his which causes problems for the family as the wife's reputation plummets.
The film will most likely be very makjang (wangjang makjang<--a title like that in Korea would draw big audiences. *poking fun at my own country*) and cover poverty.
It's not my favorite type of story out of Asia, and to be expected, there is a translation in English (Because the English-speaking LOVES proving it's superior to everyone else by importing books about disease, war and poverty. It justifies that I-word that ends in ism.)
You can find the book on amazon. I'm not quite sure how the movie will be able to portray the themes of the book, which I tend to think are more important than the play-by-play event structure.
Anyway, makjang allergies rule over me and as I love the actors and I don't mind the director, this is a firm skip. I do get, though, that this is definitely putting the "han" in hanguk saram. (The cultural concept. Wikipedia has an article.)
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Quiet Thought
February 5, 2014 at 4:21 AM
"Because the English-speaking LOVES proving it's superior to everyone else by importing books about disease, war and poverty. It justifies that I-word that ends in ism"
Actually, most of OUR modern novels are just as downbeat. At least the serious ones. Don't take it personally.
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Quiet Thought
February 5, 2014 at 4:26 AM
. . . And if there are people in the American publishing business for Serious Novels who are interested in justifying Imperialism they are being very, very quiet. That's a right-wing political thing.
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Kim Yoonmi
February 5, 2014 at 6:59 AM
Try it: Look on amazon.com for Korean novels. Try to find a novel that's not about the Korean War, Japanese occupation, coming to the US or how Korea is permanently poor. Try it.
Now look at hanbooks [dot] com and look through the book selection. Some of the books are like that, but some of the books aren't like that. The ones that are funny, uplifting, don't fit the mold of what the US thinks of South Korea aren't there.
Now try again with African American lit: eliminate all of the books that talk about slavery, the movement, the ghetto, and try to find something about a middle class person and up in America that's surviving. People from within that community are expressing their frustration as writers.
You can play this trick with other countries--list their stereotypes, and then see if the book fits it. I guarantee you there are books within the country that don't fit to just those steretotypes.
My observation is talking as a Korean American that had to live through the 1980's to present, waiting for books that never came. I wanted the books from South Korea that didn't paint the whole country as a desolate poverty-stricken, communist victim, with only people who wanted to come to the United States. In both fiction and non-fiction. I waited and waited. But it turns out that the majority of the books that are imported, are never the rom coms, the contemporary books and even some of the brighter core literature. Because I think the truth is that the US, and the publishing industry itself really likes the idea that foreign countries don't produce those things. It justifies the "other". (And to say it was only recently. Ha. recently is some 100's of years of importation of literature? From the downright racism to present preoccupation with Asians commit suicide?)
We, as a nation produce a wide variety of literature, from comedy, down to melodrama, to thoughtful, but that same range is not reflected in the foreign literature that we import. And I've faced the racism and prejudice of the publishing industry--people are trying to make that change. I've read the American mileu... but somehow the imported foreign lit is one note and I truly think that's a shame.
I said those comments out of someone who loves writing, the publishing industry and I'm truly sad to see that the US is unwilling to import those books--it took years before the US was willing to import anything in manga from an older age group that wasn't science fiction. (I've been watching it.) Many of those titles are still not being imported.
So, yeah, I take it personally, because it's part of my pride being a part of the industry and wishing it to change has been a long-held dream of mine. It makes me sad as a citizen of the US and it makes me sad, as someone Korean-born (I'll have a dual citizenship as soon as I go to Korea again). It also makes me sad from the anthropology side and how much people within the industry, from the writer and bookstore and librarian side want a change, but the publishers are slow to recognize it.
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Quiet Thought
February 5, 2014 at 7:51 AM
Very well put. However, I suspect it has less to do with politics than sheer indifference, and, in the case of a lot of the reading elite, the same patronizing attitude they unfortunately take towards working class Americans.
The number of people who read novels in the United States, outside of genre fiction, is not that large. And most of them are well-educated, moderate to liberal politically, and wouldn't know an Imperialist thought if it smacked them in the back of the head with a shovel.
From your story, however, it looks like the people in the industry could definitely use some whacks with that shovel.
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16 damianna
February 5, 2014 at 4:23 AM
Oh, Ha Ji Won must be over the moon. There's one interview I watched where she said she wants to act alongside Ha Jung Woo the most (which actress does not wish so?).
Ha Jung Woo is charismatic. Ha Ji Won is my forever fave.
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17 Leslie
February 5, 2014 at 7:28 AM
I don't like her plastic face now. I loved her during her damo/duelist days but the more I see her the more she looks plastic
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Quiet Thought
February 5, 2014 at 9:34 AM
I'm sure she's change her make-up for the new drama.
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18 urumqie
February 6, 2014 at 6:31 AM
i was surprise that her latest movie don't do so well in k box office movie, lost it place to Miss Granny....
i think the storyline and the casts are also important not just her name...
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