Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with AICN's own Albert Lanier over in beautiful Hawaii. He's got the goods on a Korean flick shown at the Hawaii International Film Festival's sub-fest called K-Fest. The flick is called DANCE WITH THE WIND and it sounds like a STRICTLY BALLROOM or SHALL WE DANCE? (the original... never saw the Richard Gere remake) type. Enjoy the review!
MINI-KOREAN FILM FEST DRAWS SELL-OUT CROWDS IN HONOLULU
by Albert Lanier
I have often heard it said that Hawaii is unlike any other place on earth and after watching several features during the Hawaii International Film Festival's K-Fest held in Honolulu at the Doris Duke theater at the Academy of Arts from Friday August 19th to Sunday August 21st, I sure as hell believe it now.
Case in point: Korean Television dramas are so hot here in Hawaii that HIFF's President Jeff Chung, General Manager of the Korean TV station KBFD, writes K-Drama columns for both local dailies here.
Hawaii residents also seem to love their Korean cinema thus the K-Fest, a three day film festival which screened 7 South Korean feature films including two premieres: SHE'S ON DUTY which had its U.S. Premiere on Friday night and INNOCENT STEPS which had its International Premiere (Whatever the hell that means) on Sunday night.
This year's K-Fest is a first for HIFF and it seems to have paid off handsomely for the festival-6 out of 7 films were sell outs with virtually packed houses for almost every film at the 200 plus seat Doris Duke Theater.
Besides SHE'S ON DUTY and INNOCENT STEPS, local filmgoers got to see DANCE WITH THE WIND, MY BROTHER, R-POINT, SOMEONE SPECIAL,and THE TWINS
I got to see 6 out of 7 during the K-Fest (I missed SHE'S ON DUTY on opening night). Unfortunately, there were no excellent or outstanding entries and the film screened were largely run of the mill crowd pleasers with maybe a couple of exceptions (I think HIFF is holding off on some of the good stuff until their 25th anniversary bash in October).
DANCE WITH THE WIND was my first film of the K-Fest and it screened on Saturday. The films stars Korean TV Star Park Sol-mi as Song Yeonhwa, a female cop who ordered by her superior officer to go undercover as a accident victim in a hospital to catch a dancer/con artist who has ostensibly fleeced thousands of Won from the wife of a police Chief.
All Yeonhwa needs to do is get Park Poongshik, the criminal in question, to confess his crimes on tape (secretly hidden of course) and her work is done.
However Poongshik (played with charm and poise by Lee Sung Jae) moves with grace and possesses a courtly manner and inner confidence that combined with his looks causes female hearts to beat faster.
Poongshik and Yeonhwa run into each other at the hospital when Yeonhwa ends up being cheated out of cup of coffee by a malfunctioning vending.
The two wind up going to Poongshik's hospital room which looks more like an apartment due to the profusion of books, shelves and personal items.
Poongshik then starts to talk to Yeonwha about his past and it is from this point that DANCE WITH THE MIND really begins to unravel with its first of several flashbacks.
Several years ago, Poongshik was married man with a family working in a small business run by his brother-in-law. In the opening scene of the first flashback, Poongshik is looking out a window in a rather detached, dopey fashion.
Into his life comes Song Man-Soo (played by Kim Soo-Ro) a rather silly, goofy but somewhat effective dancer/conman who was a former high school classmate of Poongshik.
Man-Soo wants to know if he can rent a back room of the ground floor office where Poongshik works to teach dance lessons to women.
Poongshik is immediately wary and hostile to Man-Soo, knowing that his old classmate is up to something and refuses at first to have anything to do with his scheme.
Still, Man-Soo does get his backroom and in no time at all, he's teaching at least a half dozen women at a time different ballroom dance moves and fleecing nice sums of money from them as well.
Overwhelmed by the demand, Man-Soo tries to bring Poongshik aboard to help the growing numbers of women to dance. Again, Poongshik wants nothing with this clearly dishonest scheme but Man-Soo manages to coax him into learning how to dance.
As soon as Poongshik takes his first dance step, a small gust of wind blows in his face signaling a new and exciting sensation.
Soon, Poongshik helps teach dance to Man-Soo's clients but he is already addicted to ballroom dancing.
In fact, he is so strung out on dance that Poongshik leaves his family and travels throughout South Korea first receiving major instruction from a seemingly wizened stooped old man (who in one of the film's funniest moments suddenly springs into action and dances with his granddaughter with the energy of a 20 year old).
When his first mentor then suddenly dies, Poongshik then heads the length and breadth of the land learning different dances from unlikely gurus-a miner, a Buddhist monk, a booze-buzzling homeless man-before finally returning home to his appropriately frazzled wife.
Yeonhwa finds herself attracted not only to Pooongshik's story to the man himself. More important, she soon finds herself drawn to ballroom dance.
So will Yeonhwa be able to execute her job as police officer and nab Poongshik? Is Poongshik's charming exterior just a mere facade for a clever con artist?
If DANCE WITH THE WIND merely answered these questions in an entertaining way, it would be no different most comedies made either in the U.S. or other countries.
However, DANCE WITH THE WIND is an odd film of sorts- an amalgam of crowd-pleasing humor and an intense undercurrent of obsession and devotion not only for ballroom dancing but the transformative power of dance on the lives of those it touches-that ends up neither fish nor fowl but still quite delicious cinematically speaking.
The first film of screenwriter Park Jung Woo, DANCE WITH THE WIND benefits from an interesting script by Park that never just settles for broad character and plot point strokes but paints fine lines and shapes.
Park's script is aided by some fine performances from the cast particularly Lee Sung Jae who pulls off a slightly tricky performance here. Lee not only nails the more obvious charming exterior of Poongshik but also captures the character's powerful determination and almost rigid obsession with dance.
Park Sol-Mi's work here also rests on a bit of a tight wire as she plays a cop known for her ability to effectively nail criminals while going undercover who winds up an addict to dance. Park-largely known for her work on Korean TV series such as WINTER SONATA- has to be convincing enough in both stages of her transformation and largely pulls it off.
Kim Soo-Ro also provides a bit of comic relief as the goofy self-proclaimed gigolo Man-Soo.
In addition to his script, Park Jung-Woo also does credible job of directing his first feature by working well with his editor Go Im-Pyo to keep the overall pace as well as the pace of flashbacks moving along at a nice clip.
Park also has a nice visual touch here especially in the framing and composition of several scenes including a montage of Poongshik dance with his various dance teachers at various Korean locales (including a stretch of lush green country hills and fields and the grounds of a Buddhist temple). These distinctive visuals are aided by the work of the film's DP Jun Dae-Sung.
By the time the film's credits roll, DANCE WITH THE WIND turns out to be a film of sweeping romance but the romance is not that of a man and woman in love with each other but of their love for ballroom dance.
Who knew that one dance step could change lives?
