Film on chaebol strikes nerve in South Korea
Source: Agencies |
June 14, 2012, Thursday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
A wealthy and powerful company chairman swings open the steel door of his family bank vault, revealing tottering heaps of money to the dazzled eyes of his male secretary.
From that beginning, the raw and gritty "The Taste of Money," which was in competition at the recent Cannes Film Festival, offers up an unusually dark take on South Korea's chaebol, the powerful family-run conglomerates whose products dominate domestic life and are known around the world.
It comes at a sensitive time for the chaebol, which include names such as Samsung and Hyundai and have ties to everything from smartphones to cars, restaurants and the film industry and are the focus of strong, unwelcome public attention in the run-up to the December presidential election.
As a result, the film, with its premise that wealth is a main determinant of power in South Korea and entrenched corruption is a way of life, almost didn't make it onto the screen at all, said director Im Sang-soo.
"I thought I might not be able to make this movie, but eventually I did. That's a good sign," Im told Reuters, recalling an affiliate of one of the chaebol that withdrew its funds from the movie less than a day after pledging to back it.
But in a sign of how extensively the conglomerates reach, Lotte Entertainment, part of the retail giant Lotte Group, is the film's distributor and some of the funds used to film it came from chaebol-linked firms.
Though the chaebol are usually portrayed in film and television as powerful and elegant, under Im's lens the executives live luxurious but corrupt and morally bankrupt lives.
"The Taste of Money" centers on the character Joo Young-jak, a secretary to chaebol head Yoon. Joo is an idealist who tries to fight the deceit and corruption around him but is soon lured into the chaebol's schemes, becoming an unwitting henchman.
Starkly shot and laced with profanity, the film shows members of the chaebol family engaging in sex parties, bribing prosecutors and even committing murder.
Public opinion has chilled toward the business groups, which are seen as the main winners in a political compact that catapulted South Korea from poverty to rich nation in a generation.
From that beginning, the raw and gritty "The Taste of Money," which was in competition at the recent Cannes Film Festival, offers up an unusually dark take on South Korea's chaebol, the powerful family-run conglomerates whose products dominate domestic life and are known around the world.
It comes at a sensitive time for the chaebol, which include names such as Samsung and Hyundai and have ties to everything from smartphones to cars, restaurants and the film industry and are the focus of strong, unwelcome public attention in the run-up to the December presidential election.
As a result, the film, with its premise that wealth is a main determinant of power in South Korea and entrenched corruption is a way of life, almost didn't make it onto the screen at all, said director Im Sang-soo.
"I thought I might not be able to make this movie, but eventually I did. That's a good sign," Im told Reuters, recalling an affiliate of one of the chaebol that withdrew its funds from the movie less than a day after pledging to back it.
But in a sign of how extensively the conglomerates reach, Lotte Entertainment, part of the retail giant Lotte Group, is the film's distributor and some of the funds used to film it came from chaebol-linked firms.
Though the chaebol are usually portrayed in film and television as powerful and elegant, under Im's lens the executives live luxurious but corrupt and morally bankrupt lives.
"The Taste of Money" centers on the character Joo Young-jak, a secretary to chaebol head Yoon. Joo is an idealist who tries to fight the deceit and corruption around him but is soon lured into the chaebol's schemes, becoming an unwitting henchman.
Starkly shot and laced with profanity, the film shows members of the chaebol family engaging in sex parties, bribing prosecutors and even committing murder.
Public opinion has chilled toward the business groups, which are seen as the main winners in a political compact that catapulted South Korea from poverty to rich nation in a generation.
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