The King and the Clown

Characters

Woo-seong Kam as Jang-sang
Jin-yeong Jeong as King Yeonsan
Jun-gi Lee as Gong-gil
Seong-Yeon Kang as Nok-su Jang (as Sung-Yeon Kang)
Hang-Seon Jang as Cheo-sun
Hae-jin Yu as Yuk-gab
Seok-yong Jeong as Chil-duk
Seung-hun Lee as Pal-bok

Brief Synopsis

Jang-sang and Gong-gil are two clown/entertainers that ran away from their troupe to Seoul. They were joined by three other entertainers and together they acted out a scene which mocks the relationship between the King and his favourite concubine Nok-su Jang. This resulted in their arrest.

In order to escape punishment, they were to perform the act in front of the King and if he were to laugh, they will not be punished. They ended up being told to stay in the palace and the King started asking for Gong-gil often.

Thoughts

Main Characters

Woo-seong Kam as Jang-sang

Woo-seong does well in portraying a typical rough brute but is protective of Gong-gil. He is willing to get hurt or even die for Gong-gil which aided in accentuating the unspoken emotions he has for Gong-gil.

Jin-yeong Jeong as King Yeonsan

Acted well as the crazy king; I find his crazy eyes made me believe that the king is really out of his mind and this got me more engrossed with the character.

Jun-gi Lee as Gong-gil

What can I say? Jun-gi Lee is a very beautiful man! He acts as Gong-gil so well that I can understand why the main characters are attracted to him. I must say that the actor is very daring to accept acting such a controversial character.

General (SPOILERS)

I heard that this was a very highly acclaimed movie (ex. Wikipedia states that it's the highest grossing Korean film in history), so much so that it was able to be so popular without any big scale advertisements and marketing (lack of advertisements probably due to its exceptional theme). After watching it, I can see why; the scenes are amazing, the storyline is amazing, the dialogues are amazing, the acting is amazing and the costumes are amazing!

The plays within the movie are all very intriguing; plays that the group acted out and puppet shows that Gong-gil performed for the king. From the start, the show has me glued to my seat. Every scene, every act, every gesture by the actors and actress (seems like there's only one main actress) are precise, intricate, exclusive and unique. I feel that all the Korean movies I had watched seem to be really different from Hollywood or Hong Kong movies, just like how this movie absorbs my attention fully with its brilliant and mind-boggling dialogues (some of which are so rude that they made me blush).

Due to its implied homosexuality theme, it reminded me of "Brokeback Mountain", but this is much better than that. Jang-sang and Gong-gil's feelings for each other are very subtle. Not once did they say anything to each other about it, but the audience can feel their emotions, filled with sadness and helplessness. The ending gave the conclusive confirmation of their true feelings for each other. Notice how they did not say anything about their relationship outright; throughout the show their emotions for each other are implied either from their conversations, gestures or sacrifices. The only thing I am unhappy with is the main characters die in the end and because of that, I'm giving it a 4.5 stars.

If you are homophobic, don't worry, there's no explicit scenes in this show that will scare you away. I watched it for its dialogues, visuals, acting and intricate storyline and I recommend that everyone should too!