The Classic- Winter Sonata/ Winter Love Story

If you’re into Korean entertainment, you would know ‘Winter Sonata’…even if you’re not into the Korean wave, you would have heard of Bae Yong Joon. Of course, whether you like the drama and Bae Yong Joon or not is another matter.

Winter Sonata/ Winter Love Story

‘Winter Sonata’ sparked the huge interest in Korean drama, Korean artistes and generally, the Korean wave in Asia and possibly beyond in 2002/ 2003. Korean dramas were already popular in Taiwan and China then, but not to this extent. Of course, there are many many good dramas besides ‘Winter Sonata’ but I think none had the impact that it did on the Hallyu Wave and Korea tourism.

‘Winter Sonata’ was the second in the season series by PD Yoon, the first being ‘Autumn in my Heart’ – which made stars out of Song Seung Hun, Won Bin and Song Hye Gyo. PD Yoon had worked together with Bae Yong Joon in his first drama, ‘Love’s Greetings’. He was kind to the young, new actor and gave him many useful advise, so when the director asked him to act in Winter Sonata, he readily agreed. He was however, apprehensive about the first 2 episodes as he was required to act as a 18 years old student (he was already 28 then). He was afraid he would looked too old to be convincing. But PD Yoon persuaded him that it was important for the story that he should act both roles and he would be fine.

In addition, he was also nervous about having to dye his hair blond and being trendy (he’s really quite conservative). Hehe! That was the first and only time he’s dyed his hair. Don’t think he’s very comfortable with it, so I doubt he’ll do it again.

Both Bae Yong Joon’s ‘Hotelier’ and Choi Ji Woo’s ‘Beautiful Days’ were fighting for ratings in 2001, so it was a little ironical that they would both be in the same drama a year later. But this was not their first drama together, ‘First Love’ in 1997 was their first. Here’s an interesting blog about this great drama.

In ‘Winter Sonata’, Bae Yong Joon played 2 characters- Kang Joon Sang and Lee Min Hyung. As the 18 years old Kang Jun Sang, he went to his parents’ high school in Chun Cheon in search of his father. There he met and fell in love with Jung Yu Jin (Choi Ji Woo).. a happy, kind and fun girl.

Kim Sang Hyuk (Park Yong Ha) is the model student and has known Yu Jin since young. He is in love with her. Oh Chae Rin is a pretty, confident girl who pretty much gets the man she wants, except for Joon Sang.

Complications set in when Joon Sang first thought Sang Hyuk’s father was his own father. Then later, he mistakenly thought that he and Yu Jin may be half siblings… (actually, now that I’ve watched enough Korean dramas, this isn’t complicated at all…hahaha!). Anyway, on that Christmas eve, Joon Sang and Yu Jin had arranged to meet along the main Chun Cheon streeet, only that he never turned up. He had ‘died’ in an accident whilst on his way to meeting her.

Cut to 10 years later.. and Yu Jin and Sang Hyuk are about to get engaged. That day, after a nice visit to the hair stylist for her engagement party, Yu Jin saw ‘Joon Sang’ on the road and completely missed the engagement party. Later, Chae Rin brought her boyfriend, Lee Min Hyung to meet (or rather show off) her friends and surprise..surprise…he is the splitting image of Kang Joon Sang.

The rest of the story deals with the 2 main leads falling in love and the 2 supporting leads, family members and friends trying their hardest to stop them. Then Min Hyung found out that he’s actually Joon Sang but he’s lost his memories. More misunderstandings of whose son he is…

In other words, you have the classic content of a Korean drama- half siblings in love, loss of memory and terminal illness of some sort. Although this may be clique now, but it was new to me back then. And somehow, it touched a chord in me and many around the world.

For me.. this was my first full length Korean drama and I absolutely fell in love with the story and of course Bae Yong Joon. I’m not sure which exact moment it was.. I guess it must me this… when he was peeping at Yu Jin dancing away to ABBA’s Dancing Queen in the studio. Here’s the clip I’m talking about.

And for the first time, I cried buckets and my heart broke over a drama and I ended up with red, puffy eyes almost everyday for work. Not to mention that I was dead tired too as I would be watching up till 4 to 5 am every morning. I had to creep into bed just so that I wouldn’t wake my husband. ^^

This scene positively broke my heart… as Joon Sang/ Min Hyung threw all the mementos he had with Yu Jin before he ‘left’ her.

As in ‘Beautiful Days’, Bae Yong Joon was meant to die…but for the same reason, the fans’ protest resulted in him being blind instead of dead.

So just why do we love this drama so much? I think a large part is because it was just such a refreshing change from our usual diet of Japanese and Hong Kong dramas. The cast was wonderful and the chemistry between Bae Yong Joon and Choi Ji Woo was keenly felt (there was even a rumour that they were going out for awhile).

And the scenery, ahh…the scenery… winter never looked more beautiful and it captured just the right feel of the drama..first love, innocent love. For the first time, I realised that Korea was not just kimchi and LG. It made me want to go Korea. Me and thousands other fans. And I’ve been to Korea every year since 2003. ^^

Nami Island, Chun Cheon and Yong Pyong Resort became must visit places, which of course pleased the Korea Tourism Office greatly. For more information on the Winter Sonata filming sites, you can go to KNTO site

Park Sol Mi’s latest movie is ‘Paradise Murdered’ with Park Il Hae. Unfortunately, I seemed to read more reviews about him than her. Her last drama was ‘Golden Apple’ with Jung Chan.

Park Yong Ha discovered that he could sing after singing the theme song in ‘All In’ and is now a singer based mostly in Japan, releasing albums and singles there. Sigh… so many of them based in Japan now.

Ryu Seung Soo, the vet in the drama, acted with Bae Yong Joon again recently in the movie, ‘April Snow’. Boy, I almost couldn’t recognise him as he’s err… put on quite a few kilograms. But then, as he was supposed to be in a coma throughout the whole show, there wasn’t much chance to see him.

Choi Ji Woo has not had much success since ‘Stairways to Heaven’. Even her latest weepie, ‘Now and Forever’ with the hunk Jo Han Sun did not do too well. However, her latest drama, ‘Air City’ which started airing last weekend looks promising. Starring the very hot Lee Jung Jae and the ultra cute Lee Jin Wook, the plot is action packed so far. And for once (ok, maybe not once) she’s not a sweet, demure girl. She’s a professional and she looks like it too. Of course, she’s also more matured and I’m liking what I see so far. My only fear is that the writer will make her wail in the later episodes.

Bae Yong Joon’s latest drama, ‘Great King Four Gods’ will finally be aired on the 25th June on MBC. It’s been 5 years since ‘Winter Sonata’ and it’s taken almost 18 months for the drama to be ready. I’m really looking forward to it.

There are no end to the numerous clips on YouTube, so I’ll just select a few interesting ones here. If the streaming is bad, just let the clip run through once and it will be smooth the second time round.

MVs:
My Memory
Moment
Don’t Forget Me
From Beginning until Now
From Beginning until Now in…Vietnamese
Parody on Winter Sonata during the KBS Awards. Very, very funny. Haha! Must watch!
NG
BTS. This is about 9 minutes long and the commentary is in Japanese but it’s interesting.

And here’s a very interesting article on Why is Winter Sonata a big hit in Asia on the Koreanfilm board.

This sure bring back memories. And for me, this remains one of my top favourite drama. : )

*Edit- Just went on to bb’s blog and it seems she just blogged about Winter Sonata a few days ago too. Great minds think alike…hehe! Click here to read about it.

Related post:

Park Yong Ha