[MOVIE POP]“Salaryman” in Korean Cinema
Salaryman is Japlish which is infrequently used in English-speaking countries. It means paid white-collar workers, but generally means office workers who get paid average wage or less, except high-earned employees. They comprise a large proportion of population making up our society, but actually salaryman is not a remarkable occupation in domestic movies. It is difficult to find out cinematically ‘dramatic elements’ in their lives because they do repetitive tasks every day.
LEE Myung-se is one of filmmakers who cinematically caught salaryman’s life for the first time. He made
Affliction Of Man (1995) which depicted the new product development division of an electronics company. Actors appear with their own names in the movie, and main character
AHN Sung-ki is a desperate man between his boss pressing him and juniors clawing their way up. AHN’s character, a section chief forever, is a symbol of incapacity in local salarymen’s society. He is old but late for promotion, continually suffering from his company. The film goes on slapstick comedy and musical from start, but it unexpectedly shows death of AHN. Sudden death from overwork like this is a tragedy to salaryman, as well as one of the most deep-rooted problems of Korean society.
While AHN in
Affliction Of Man portraits sorrows of salaryman, the one in
The Age Of Success (1988) yearns desire for success. He plays KIM Pan-chok (panchok means sales in Korean) who tries hard only to succeed. He becomes an executive at his young age as a result of getting good records by any means necessary. However the end of extreme desire is to ruin, he died from a car accident on the country road.
Office (2015) depicts a dreary sight of salarymen’s world among the newest movies. In that film, workers’ supreme tasks are results. Forever a section chief KIM Byung-guk (BAE Sung-woo) kills his whole family on the day he was fired. The film brings horror conventions to killing spree, and an intern LEE Mi-rae (KO Asung) is at the center of it.
Lives of salarymen sometimes transform into genre films.
A Company Man (2012) injects a little action. An office looks common, but all salarymen working there are killers and their task is to kill their targets. The film demonstrates that the world is a battlefield and salarymen are warriors who can bleed to death. Films like
The Foul King (2000) by
KIM Jee-woon and
Dance With The Wind (2004) by
PARK Jung-woo dream of breaking away from the daily routine. Salarymen in these films are moving from tedious and repeated routine into the world of pro wrestling and dance.
Recent topic in salarymen’s world is conflicts between regular positions and contract workers.
10 Minutes (2014) is showing a man between the ways. Ho-chan (
BAEK Jong-hwan) works on a six-month contract. He is ambivalent between regular job and his dream job TV producer. Both are indomitable reality to him. Parachute practice (an appointment by orders from above or the top) by the powers under the table makes him more distressed. However vain hope is going on. Will he become a regular employee? Do dreams of youth in Korea disappear? The film faces the helpless reality.
Salaryman is Japlish which is infrequently used in English-speaking countries. It means paid white-collar workers, but generally means office workers who get paid average wage or less, except high-earned employees. They comprise a large proportion of population making up our society, but actually salaryman is not a remarkable occupation in domestic movies. It is difficult to find out cinematically ‘dramatic elements’ in their lives because they do repetitive tasks every day.LEE Myung-se is one of filmmakers who cinematically caught salaryman’s life for the first time. He made Affliction Of Man (1995) which depicted the new product development division of an electronics company. Actors appear with their own names in the movie, and main character AHN Sung-ki is a desperate man between his boss pressing him and juniors clawing their way up. AHN’s character, a section chief forever, is a symbol of incapacity in local salarymen’s society. He is old but late for promotion, continually suffering from his company. The film goes on slapstick comedy and musical from start, but it unexpectedly shows death of AHN. Sudden death from overwork like this is a tragedy to salaryman, as well as one of the most deep-rooted problems of Korean society.While AHN in Affliction Of Man portraits sorrows of salaryman, the one in The Age Of Success (1988) yearns desire for success. He plays KIM Pan-chok (panchok means sales in Korean) who tries hard only to succeed. He becomes an executive at his young age as a result of getting good records by any means necessary. However the end of extreme desire is to ruin, he died from a car accident on the country road.
