A Man Who Was Superman

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A Man Who Was Superman

Dec 27, 2016

Writer by Pierce Conran
View1473

2008｜102 MIN | Drama, Comedy

DIRECTOR CHUNG Yoon-chul

CAST HWANG Jung-min, Gianna JUN

RELEASE DATE January 31, 2008

CONTACT CJ Entertainment

Tel: +82 2 371 8147

Fax: +82 2 371 6340

Email: filmsales@cj.net

Lead characters in Korean cinema are prone to past traumas that dictate their current behavior and these are often revealed through flashback. In A Man Who Was Superman, the third film from Marathon (2005) director CHUNG Yoon-chul, the main character is similarly afflicted and his past comes to light in the third act. It’s a well-worn trope and here the man’s pain is what drives the narrative forward, yet through an endearing use of magical realism, the film manages to set itself apart from the usual crop.

A TV producer has begun to lose her patience with her outfit and decides to walk out one day and hopscotch to Africa, taking a camera along with her as restitution for lack of payment. She falls on the sleep on the subway and wakes up to see a thief walk away with her expensive hardware. She chases the man on foot and is saved from incoming traffic by a stranger who also chases down the fleeing hoodlum. This perpetually smiling oddball believes himself to be superman and after briefly following his strange antics, she recognizes that she’s found her inspiration for a hit show.

Over a decade into his career, actor HWANG Jung-min was just beginning to come into his own as a lead actor and his role as the wannabe Superman afforded him an opportunity to show off his natural charm and humanism and the role still stands as one of his most empathic. Following a streak of hit romantic roles JEON Ji-hyun (before she took on her English moniker Gianna JUN), plays the part of the gutsy yet jaded reporter. While her character isn’t fleshed out nearly as much as HWANG’s, she puts in a spirited performance as always.

Director CHUNG leans heavily on recognizable elements from the Superman series to create a contrast between the colorful narrative of a neighborhood superhero and the bleaker picture of a deeply disturbed individual who masks his pain with a fantasy. The balance is important and despite the presence of its predictable melodramatic notes it succeeds from start to finish.

After the popularity of Marathon, CHUNG misfired both with Skeletons In The Closet (2007) and A Man Who Was Superman, which received a mix response at the time of its release. Almost ten years later, he will finally return with the period action drama The Proxy Soldiers. The fifth fully financed Korean picture by Warner Brothers, it stars LEE Jung-jae and YEO Jin-gu.

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