Monday, June 29, 2009

Frivolous Wife


Frivolous Wife (날나리 종부전/Nal-na-ri Jong-boo-jeon) [HanCinema, cHinKy], otherwise known as "A Naughty Daughter-In-Law Story" and "The Taming of the Shrew," is a 2008 Korean movie of the romantic comedy genre. It stars Park Jeong Ah and Park Jin Woo. The summary is as follows:

Inspired by Shakespeare's classic of the same name. Yeon-su is a beautiful but naughty young woman whose family became millionaires overnight. All men fall in love with her at first sight, but Jeong-do, the only son of a respected family, has no regard for her. Yet despite this, the two fall in love and get married. However, their conflicting families shake up their wedded bliss.

I found this pretty interesting since the main female character is usually either a 'nice girl' of the girl-next-door variety or a tom boy of some sort. In this movie, she was one of those 'tempting' women whose sole purpose seems to be a permanent ornament, hanging off of various men with the favorite destination being a club and I'm used to seeing them off to the side; or at least I haven't encountered many dramas/films that have them at the center of attention. I thought the movie was rather thorough in a sense, giving us an idea of how the girl was, then how she met this guy who seemed to be her complete opposite. (This was not a surprising aspect, though.) What the summary doesn't tell you is that this guy lives in the countryside and it seems like you step back in time - way back in time.

I find it sort of entertaining as a materialistic girl, used to luxury and modern-day conveniences, is thrown into a world that seems to be running under a feudalistic society. In the end, everything works out. It just makes me wonder if the Korean countryside is really how it was portrayed in this film, or was it just made like this for pure fictional entertainment. I would also like to point out how that guy has the most adorable smile and it was obvious that they were all actors - how could they have such perfect skin, working outside and doing manual labor all the time?? :)

All in all, I enjoyed the movie quite a bit, though there was some slightly exaggerated (and slightly ridiculous) moments, but that's nothing new.

You can watch it here.

2 comments:

Sparks of Ember said...

I really love your reviews. So many interesting movies that I'm going to have to watch now.

Have you heard of the drama "The Vineyard Man"? It's one of my favorites (starring Yoon Eun Hye - one of my favorite actresses) & she's a city girl who ends up in the countryside, learning to work a vineyard. Very funny, too - the first episode had this one scene that had me laughing out loud so hard.

Sirhin said...

lol... less like reviews, I think. I mean, most of my comments include "it's cute" or something along the lines of that. ;) I do this mainly to keep track of what I've watched and have a general idea of my opinions on it and what it was about. But I'm glad it helps!

I love Yoon Eun Hye as well! ^_^ I think I've come across that name, but I haven't watched it yet. It sounds pretty interesting though - I'll look it up!