Actress Song talks about working with director Wong

Actress Song Hye-gyo on Sunday downplayed rumors of her quarrel with Wong Kar-Wai, but admitted there had been “some difficulty” with the Chinese director, Hong Kong media reported.Song said there was “a bit of friction and misunderstanding” with Wong while filming his recent flick, adding that the difficulties helped her mature. “It has not been easy. For me, it was the first time working with Wong. Since their (movie makers in Hong Kong) way of filming was different from that of Koreans, there

July 2, 2013

Korean director wins award at Moscow film fest

Korean filmmaker Jung Young-heon won the best director award at the Moscow International Film Festival for his movie “Lebanon Emotion” on Saturday.The film was among 16 movies that received awards at the 35th edition of the festival, which started in 1959 as the biggest movie festival in Eastern Europe. “Lebanon Emotion” depicts the complex emotional changes of a man and a woman in both urban and rural settings. Despite its title, the film features no scenes based in Lebanon. The movie won the C

July 1, 2013

R-rated coming-of-age musical to get Korean premiere

Korea may not be the most gay-friendly country in the world, but the cast of adult-themed Broadway musical “Avenue Q,” which deals with homosexuality along with racism and pornography, says they are regardless very excited to premiere the show in Seoul. “I think what we know is that some of the subject matters will certainly push the envelope and be somewhat challenging (for the local audience),” Paul Warwick Griffin, the upcoming show’s associate producer, said during a press meeting last week

June 30, 2013

Box office: Side Effects, Cold Eyes, White House Down

Side EffectsOpening July 11Thriller. Crime. Drama. Directed by Steven SoderberghEmily Taylor (Rooney Mara), despite having recently reunited with her husband Martin Taylor (Channing Tatum) after his release from prison, is severely depressed. To treat her condition, her psychiatrist, Jonathan Banks (Jude Law), prescribes an unconfirmed new medication called Ablixa. But Emily’s world turns upside down when the side effects of the drug lead her to kill her husband while sleepwalking. In a plea bar

June 28, 2013

Bullock and McCarthy bull their way to laughs in ‘The Heat’

Give it up for Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy. You’ll never see them work harder at comedy than in “The Heat,” a stumbling, aggressively loud and profane cop buddy picture where they struggle to wring “funny” out of a script that isn’t.Plot? It’s more a collection of scenes that force the stars to riff and riff until something coarse and amusing comes out, topped by something else coarser and more amusing. Instructions must have read, “Sandy and Melissa go to a dance club, where Melissa hac

June 28, 2013

Operas make switch to the movie screen

Opera halls have always been a little distant to those who are unfamiliar with either opera or the venue. Cinemas are now moving to bring people closer to opera as video footage is made available by the world’s top opera companies, armed with state-of-the-art video and audio technologies to convey an equal level of emotion to the audience. Megabox, the country’s second-largest cinema chain, will screen Verdi’s opera “Un Ballo in Maschera” from June 29 and “La Traviata” from July 6 at its COEX, C

June 27, 2013

‘Secretly, Greatly’ to get overseas release

Korean film “Secretly, Greatly” will be released overseas, according to the movie’s producer Showbox/Mediaplex.The film, starring national heartthrob Kim Soo-hyun in the lead, tells the story of three young and attractive North Korean spies who disguise themselves as a rock musician, a high school student, and an intellectually challenged young man, in South Korea. It is based on the popular 2010 webtoon series “Convertness” by artist HUN.The movie will be released in the U.S. and Singapore on J

June 27, 2013

BoA’s film trailer released

  The official trailer of BoA’s Hollywood debut dance film “Make Your Move 3D,” formerly called COBU 3D, was released on Tuesday on YouTube. The video features a love scene between BoA and Derek Hough.BoA previously performed with Hough, a four-time champion of “Dancing with the Stars,” on an American Latin dance competition program. The movie is directed by Duane Adler, who wrote the screenplay for “Step Up” (2006).Adler began to shoot “Make Your Move 3D” in 2011, and the film will be released

June 26, 2013

‘Monsters’ beats zombies, Superman at box office

LOS ANGELES (AP) ― Turns out zombies and Superman are no match for monsters.Disney’s “Monsters University’’ is the weekend box-office winner, according to studio estimates released Sunday. The animated family film, which reunites stars Billy Crystal and John Goodman and their characters from the 2001 hit “Monsters, Inc.,’’ debuted in first place with $82 million, beating out swarming zombies in “World War Z’’ and Superman himself in “Man of Steel.’’“The diversity of this weekend is part of what

June 24, 2013

Lee Byung-hun, Jeon Do-yeon to star in ‘Hyeopnyeo’

Korean film stars Lee Byung-hun and Jeon Do-yeon will appear in a historical drama that will mark their first onscreen appearance together in 14 years, it was reported Monday. According to local news outlet TV Report, Lee recently decided to accept a leading role in “Hyeopnyeo,” which will be directed by Park Heung-shik, whose previous films include “Bravo, My Life!,” “I Wish I Had a Wife” and “My Mother, The Mermaid.”  Jeon, who has long been friends with Park and starred with Lee in the 1999

June 24, 2013

Film about N.K. defectors to be shown in Toronto

“The Defector,” a documentary film directed and produced by a Canadian-Korean director, will have a free screening in Toronto next month, Radio Free Asia (RFA) reported Saturday.The film by award-winning director Ann Shin will be screened at Innis Town Hall of the University of Toronto on July 4, the Washington-based radio station said.The film takes the Toronto-based director on an arduous journey with two North Korean defectors, who have high hopes of gaining a better life in South Korea, from

June 23, 2013

Box Office: Cold Eyes, White House Down, World War Z

Cold Eyes, Opening July 4Crime. Action. Directed by Joh Ui-seok and Kim Byeong-seo. In a remake of the 2007 Hong Kong film “Eye in the Sky,” rookie detective Ha Yoon-ju (Han Hyo-joo) joins a special crime unit within the police department that specializes in surveillance of high profile criminals. Soon, a bank is robbed by armed men. Detective Ha teams up with Hwang Won-jin (Sol Kyung-gu), the veteran leader of the unit, and tries to track down the criminal organization led by cold-hearted leade

June 21, 2013

Billy Crystal’s new ‘Monster’ project

It’s been a dozen years since the release of Pixar’s “Monsters, Inc.,” but it didn’t take much for Billy Crystal to get back into the spirit to voice Mike Wazowski for the follow-up film “Monsters University.” He’s seen “Monsters, Inc.” many times with his grandchildren. What was important to him was that he wanted to do a movie suitable for all grandchildren.Crystal’s sad there aren’t a lot of movies in theaters that he considers true family films.“We are seeing the disintegration of the family

June 21, 2013

Tony Soprano more than a memorable TV character

NEW YORK (AP) ― James Gandolfini’s portrayal of Tony Soprano represented more than just a memorable TV character. He changed the medium, making fellow antiheroes like Walter White and Dexter Morgan possible and shifting the balance in quality drama away from broadcast television.The passage of time since “The Sopranos” ended in 2007 brought all of that into sharp relief even before Gandolfini’s death of a heart attack while vacationing in Italy on Wednesday.Television characters certainly weren’

June 21, 2013