Our Movie: Disney+ K-drama with Namkoong Min, Jeon Yeo-been shows filmmaking's tender side
Lead cast: Namkoong Min, Jeon Yeo-been
Latest Nielsen rating: 3 per cent
Following Netflix's
Melo Movie earlier this year, a filmmaker once again hesitates to follow in their father's footsteps in the quiet and introspective drama Our Movie, starring Namkoong Min as the director and
Jeon Yeo-been as an actress with a terminal illness.
Last seen in the sweeping period romance My Dearest two years ago, Namkoong plays Lee Je-ha, a filmmaker struggling to create a follow-up to his hugely successful debut.
Play
His first film was an acclaimed melodrama that launched the career of its actress, Chae Seo-young (Lee Seol, Between Him and Her), was screened at major international film festivals and sold 5 million tickets at home.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
South China Morning Post
3 hours ago
- South China Morning Post
All about K-pop superstars BTS as last member finishes up mandatory military service
It is official – almost. Soon, all seven members of the massively popular K-pop group BTS will have completed South Korea's mandatory military service. Rapper Suga will be the last of the bandmates to be released, on Saturday, after fulfilling his duty as a social service agent, an alternative to serving in the military that he reportedly chose because of a shoulder injury. BTS' entertainment agency said no events are planned for Suga's release out of concern for overcrowding. The six others – RM, V, Jimin, Jungkook, Jin and J-Hope – served in the army. Four of them – RM, V, Jimin and Jungkook – were discharged earlier this month. Jin, the eldest BTS member, was discharged in June 2024, as was J-Hope in October. Play BTS are expected to reunite later this year. Ahead of that highly anticipated homecoming, here is what you need to know about the group.
South China Morning Post
12 hours ago
- South China Morning Post
Russian pianist Mikhail Pletnev plays subdued Beethoven and colourful Grieg in Hong Kong
The secret to a good story is, as they say, in the telling. Legendary Russian pianist Mikhail Pletnev wasted no time telling his tale to a packed audience in Hong Kong on June 17, launching into the Shigeru Kawai grand piano the very second he sat down. His recital was made up of two clearly opposed halves. The first saw his subdued yet thoughtful expressions of pathos and beauty in two of Beethoven's pillar sonatas, while a vivid depiction of Nordic nostalgia in a selection of Grieg's Lyric Pieces came after the intermission. The multifaceted musician-composer, whose distinguished international career began when he won first prize in the 1978 Tchaikovsky Competition, showed he had some real doozies up his sleeves despite exercising considerable emotional restraint in the first piece, Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 8, the 'Pathétique'. Indeed, those expecting more outward expressions of the dramatic, agitated aspects of the music may have felt like they showed up at the wrong wedding. Expressions of pathos in the Grave introduction were more introspective in his hands, and any showy displays in the ensuing Allegro di molto con brio were equally shunned.
South China Morning Post
13 hours ago
- South China Morning Post
‘I'll keep writing': Chinese novelist Mai Jia will not be outdone by AI
At this year's Beijing International Book Fair, a forum on writers' perceptions of artificial intelligence (AI) saw Chinese author Mai Jia make a gentle but firm stand. Dressed in a light beige jacket, the celebrated novelist sat alongside three other panellists as he offered an unusually personal and philosophical take on AI and human creativity. A recipient of the prestigious Mao Dun Literature Prize, Mai Jia is best known for his espionage fiction. His reflections touched on a deeper unease shared by writers and artists around the world: where human creativity stands in a time when machines are learning to imitate – and even threatening to outpace – human imagination. 'I've never really used AI,' the novelist said. 'But I've played with it. And I played with the intent of proving it's not worth playing with.' His remarks drew laughter, but it was evident he was serious about the mindset behind his experiment. Amid AI threat, Hong Kong artists say they must hone what makes art uniquely human 'I approached it with distrust. I hoped to mock it. And to a certain extent, I succeeded in doing that, so I never really used it.' Reports that Mai Jia had somehow contributed to the development of AI-generated fiction in his style were, in his own words, 'pure rumour'. 'I never demonstrated anything. I never helped build such a thing,' he said plainly. For the novelist, the rise of AI is not just a question about the future – it's a reckoning with the past. 'When we talk about AI, we think we're talking about the future. But that's not the wise thing to do,' he said. 'AI has a surging, even violent vitality. It's coming at us like a monster, like a giant we can't stop, and we have no idea where it's going or what it will become.' The 31st Beijing International Book Fair opened on Wednesday, displaying around 220,000 books from China and abroad. Photo: AFP He suggested that rather than speculate about the future of AI, people should examine its roots and view it as the culmination of a long 'digital revolution'. In his view, this revolution began when numbers first entered the human language roughly 5,000 years ago. 'When early writing systems emerged, numbers were a part of them. But numbers were never content to remain just a part of writing. They've always wanted to rebel.' The writer traces the first major turning point back to 1837, with the invention of Morse code – 'a great technology created by a great man,' he said – which allowed a message to be transmitted across oceans using only digits. This marked the first true success of the digital revolution for Mai Jia. But it came at a cost. 'Digital encoding brought us immense convenience. A message could travel from China to Europe or the United States [in one] morning. But it also introduced trouble,' he said. 'It brought cryptography. It dissolved language. It turned language into a puzzle, an obstacle.' British musicians protest government's AI plans with an 'almost' silent album Later came the second wave – computers, developed in the mid-20th century through the foundational work of figures like John von Neumann and Alan Turing. 'Instead of converting writing into ten digits, they reduced it to just two: zero and one,' he said. This, he argued, was a more complete digitisation than Morse code ever achieved. The benefits were vast – 'an entire library can now fit in a screen, a single phone' – but so were the downsides. 'When that screen is in your hand, yes, it holds endless text. But it also drains your time, digs into your greed, and pulls you downward,' he said. 'It disintegrates your attention. It exaggerates your desire to sink.' The third wave, the novelist believes, is AI. And it's the most transformative yet. 'For the first time, we are talking not just about reading or attention but about writing itself. Before, no one imagined that technology could replace the human mind in creating.' He said that today's AI revolution has created something new: a creative anxiety disorder. Over 1,700 exhibitors from 80 countries and regions took part in the fair, with Malaysia as this year's guest country of honour. Photo: Xinhua 'I don't know how this revolution will evolve. But here's what I do know: Even if AI defeats me, even if every word it writes is better than mine, I will still write,' he said. 'Not because I want to compete with it. But because writing is how I survive. If I don't read, if I don't write, I don't know how to live.' He ended with a quiet but firm conviction: 'If AI writes better than me, I'll write. If I write better than it – of course, I'll write.'
