King And The Clown

DATABASE
Archive

Archive

DATABASE

King And The Clown

Nov 28, 2016

Writer by KIM Hyun-jung
View2277

2005｜119 MIN | Drama

DIRECTOR LEE Joon-ik

CAST KARM Woo-sung, LEE Joon-gi, JUNG Jin-young, YOO Hae-jin

RELEASE DATE December 29, 2005

CONTACT CJ Entertainment

Tel: +82 2 371 8147

Fax: +82 2 371 6340

Email: filmsales@cj.net

Tightrope walker Jang-saeng (KARM Woo-sung) runs away to Hanyang, the capital of Joseon, with beautiful Gong-gil (LEE Joon-gi) against their manager who forces Gong-gil to prostitute himself to rich customers. Two clowns encounter other street performers including Yook-gab (YOO Hae-jin), and they play a skit mocking of some members of the royal court including the King Yeon-san (JUNG Jin-young) and his concubine Nok-su (KANG Sung-yeon), using their bad scandals.

Eunuch Cheo-seon (JANG Hang-seon), one of the king’s consultants, observes their fearless skit. He asks Jang-saeng’s group to play a farce ridiculing the corrupt council members in order to get rid of flattering ministers. However, when the king lays his eyes on Gong-gil, the political intrigue turns into tragedy that three men’s hearts and souls hurt. Jang-saeng finds that they are just puppets, and suggests Gong-gil to leave, but Gong-gil hesitates because he sympathizes with the king.

King And The Clown (2005) is a political and historical drama about a tyrant Yeon-san and his favorite concubine Nok-su in the Joseon Dynasty with some fiction. King Yeon-san was finally deposed because he indulged booze and women picking hundreds of women as court maids from the whole country and killed people mercilessly.

Director LEE Joon-ik used to be good at satire period dramas such as Once Upon A Time In A Battlefield (2003) and Battlefield Heroes (2011). In this film, he depicts three men’s love and obsession as they crash to death along with criticism of the power. And probably, it might be the first mainstream movie focused on homosexual love even in implicit ways.

Another good thing about the film is to show traditional Korean performances. Traditional stages like mask dances, tightrope walking and puppet shows appeared to the drama naturally, while they are taking vital parts in the film. Meanwhile, King And The Clown came in the 12th place in the all-time domestic box office, attracting more than 10 million viewers.

Any copying, republication or redistribution of KOFIC's content is prohibited without prior consent of KOFIC.

Related People