Stream Classics to Latest K-Movies & Shows at OnDemandKorea

[HanCinema's Digest] Culture Corner

"Let's Dance" tackles a tough cultural issue on screen, the BBC looks at South Korea as a cultural superpower, webcomics are an exciting new aspect of the K-wave, and watch Park Heung-sik's new film "Loves, Lies" for insight into the origins of K-pop.

Advertisement

""Let's Dance" Addresses Issues of Abortion in South Korea"

Films are a powerful way to express a country's culture and help raise a nation's consciousness around specific issues that concern it. Recently, it was Cho Jung-rae's "Spirits' Homecoming" that impressed locals critics with its timely tale of Korea "comfort women" used by the Japanese during the beginning of the last century (the film was also released around International Women's Day). Jo Se-young's 2014 documentary, "Let's Dance", is another relatively recent film that brings tough social issues to light: "... It lacks a political agenda and brings the issue into the concrete world rather than the hypothetical and abstract moral debates that usually surround abortion. It showcases the lives of normal women who lived through a horrible experience and want to share their stories".

...READ ON THE WESLEYAN ARGUS

"South Korea: The Silent Cultural Superpower"

The BBC's Rana Mitter explores South Korean culture as a growing world 'superpower': "From movies and TV to K-Pop, South Korean culture manages to punch far above its weight - across East Asia, and beyond. But how did this happen, and why is it so important to Koreans?"

...LISTEN ON BBC

"Webtoon culture on its way to becoming global hit"

It's truly incredible how South Korean cultural trends and ideas have a habit of going global. Webtoons, for example of the latest, are quickly becoming an important part of the country's cultural export as artists and storytellers work and play on the borderlands between local and global; case in point, the recent Star Wars webcomic produced in Korea that is expect to be well received by a massive immerging market.

...WATCH ON KRDO

"South Korean Director Park Heung-sik Says His New Movie "Loves, Lies" Portrays The Time Period 'When The Early-Stage Of K-Pop Was Born'"

In Park Heung-sik's "Loves, Lies" (starring Han Hyo-joo, Yoo Yeon-seok, and Chun Woo-hee) we once again see how films run parallel to the prevailing zeitgeist. In addition to presenting a new narrative on Korean women and their struggle, director Park says his new film goes back to a time when the first seeds of K-pop were sown. That's really interesting, and follows of K-pop culture will be interested to see how the modern phenomenon came to be, on screen.

...READ ON KOREA PORTAL

❎ Try Ad-free