Radio Star (film)

Plot

Choi Gon had a big hit in 1988 with his song "The Rain and You" and became one of the top stars of the 1980s, but did not handle the fame very well, acquiring bad habits and quickly spending most of his money. In 2006, now past his prime, leather-jacket-and-jeans-wearing Gon resents that the spotlight has moved on to younger entertainers, but he still lives the life of a rock star, getting into drunk driving incidents and drug scandals. The only thing Gon has left is his longtime manager and friend, Park Min-soo, who has stood by him since the peak of his career. Min-soo still manages to find Gon small gigs in little coffee shops on the outskirts of Seoul and continues to look after him and keep him out of trouble, even if that means neglecting his own family.

One day Gon gets in a fight with a customer at a cafe and ends up in jail. Because of Gon's prior record, the bail is set so high that the desperate Min-soo sees no way to deal with it on his own, so he goes to a major radio station to call in old favors. The only thing he turns up is a job as a DJ at a local radio station in a small provincial town in the remote mountainous county of Yeongwol. The radio station itself is on its last legs and is close to shutting down.

Arriving in Yeongwol, nothing seems to suit Gon, despite all the efforts Min-soo makes to make his life there as comfortable as possible. Gon pretty much sabotages everything by being pessimistic and negative—even when he is on the air. But to everyone's surprise, his daily show Choi Gon's Midday Songs of Hope becomes a big hit in the small town, as he allows the locals to tell their own eccentric stories. Also, hard rock music, which was initially foreign to the townspeople, becomes the bridge between them and Gon. When his newfound fan club begins to put the recordings of his show on the internet, soon the big bosses in Seoul become aware of Gon's fame and want him to make a comeback—but without his manager.

Production

After making Korean cinematic history with his record-breaking hit period film King and the Clown (2005), director Lee Joon-ik wanted his follow-up to be a smaller-scaled, character-driven film. Like King and the Clown, Lee wanted his next film to also be about the lives of outsiders, saying, "I think the tragedy of capitalist society is that so many people endlessly struggle to become part of the mainstream. I want to keep showing that those outside the mainstream of society can also be happy." Screenwriter Choi Seok-hwan brought him a script he had been working on for years; Choi had collaborated with Lee on his previous films King and the Clown and Once Upon a Time in a Battlefield (2003). An early draft revolved around the character of a young, female manager, but Achim Pictures president Jung Seung-hye pointed Lee in a different narrative direction, and the film became a bittersweet dramedy about two older men.

Actor Park Joong-hoon (who once experienced the life of a KBS 2FM DJ in the 1990s) was cast first, and for the role opposite him, Park suggested his real-life longtime friend Ahn Sung-ki, with whom he had starred in three previous films, namely, Chilsu and Mansu (1988), Two Cops (1993) and Nowhere to Hide (1999). Ahn said, "If we did not sustain our 20-year friendship, we could not have done justice to the touching scenes in Radio Star. The film has a cunning resemblance to our ordinary life, and (while we were acting), we felt it firsthand." Park said the project appealed to him because the film industry rarely focused on characters in their forties and fifties (his and Ahn's age), and that as an actor for 21 years, he had had a similar career trajectory to Gon's, "Because we went through similar things in the same period, then it's an analogy that works perfectly. I mean, I've had plenty of ups and downs in my career: repeating the same comedies over and over brought me to a slump, I had to bridge the gap after coming back from the US, I had a little redemption... many things happened over the years." Park added that his friendship with Ahn "has gained depth, we're much more comfortable working together. We've known each other for 20 years, and Choi Gon and Park Min-soo in the film have been together for 20 years. The situation is a little different, but the fundamental relationship between us and the two characters is very similar. Sometimes we feel as if we're shooting a documentary, in a way. But hey, we're happy."

Members of real-life punk rock band No Brain appeared in supporting roles as a fictional band who helps the character Gon find enthusiasm for rock music again. They also contributed their songs to the soundtrack, which is a mix of old pop classics and modern rock.

Radio Star was a co-production between Achim Pictures and Lee's own production shingle Cineworld, was distributed locally by Cinema Service and sold internationally by co-investor CJ Entertainment. It was filmed on location in Yeongwol County, a remote area in the mountainous Gangwon Province. After three months of shooting, the film wrapped on July 8, 2006.

When asked about the film's themes, Lee said, "Before the advent of television, most people including myself learned a lot about life through radio. But these days we depend on visual media. If visual media is regarded as a channel for spreading fully constructed images, then the radio can be seen as one that encourages people to use their imagination. Success does not necessarily mean happiness, nor does failure mean unhappiness. Through this film, people will realize that there's more to life than winning or losing. What's important is that you live a happy life."

Reception

Radio Star was released in theaters on September 28, 2006, during the Chuseok holidays. Despite high expectations and positive reviews from critics, the film made a disappointing debut, drawing 150,684 viewers on its opening weekend. But it earned average ratings of 9.22 out of 10 in a poll of 7,749 netizens by the portal site Naver, and ticket sales surged exponentially over the following weeks, with strong word of mouth ultimately making the movie a success. It drew a total of 1,879,501 admissions, and grossed a decent US$12.5 million.

According to film critic Lee Sang-yong, part of the film's appeal was due to nostalgia, saying, "Radio Star attracted a big audience among middle-aged people who miss the songs of their times."

Park Joong-hoon and Ahn Sung-ki tied for Best Actor at the 2006 Blue Dragon Film Awards, and Ahn also won Best Actor at the 2006 Korean Association of Film Critics Awards and the 2007 Grand Bell Awards. Music director Bang Jun-seok received several nominations for his work on this film, winning Best Music at the 2006 Korean Association of Film Critics Awards and the 2007 Korean Film Awards.

Original soundtrack

1. 비와 당신 (The Rain and You) - Park Joong-hoon
2. 속앓이
3. 영월 가는 길
4. 배려
5. 오래된 방송국
6. 청소
7. 비와 당신 Movie Ver. (The Rain and You) - No Brain
8. 전단지
9. 영월의 밤
10. 시그널
11. 크게 라디오를 켜고 (Turn Up the Volume) - Sinawe
12. 오래된 친구
13. 미인 (Beautiful Woman) - Shin Jung-hyeon
14. 김양의 사연
15. 빗속의 여인 (Woman in the Rain) - Kim Choo-ja
16. 다방의 밤
17. 전화속 사연들
18. 넌 내게 반했어 Movie Ver. (You've Fallen for Me) - No Brain
19. 술오른 밤길
20. 기찻길에서 만난 동강
21. 아름다운 강산 (Beautiful Rivers and Mountains) - No Brain
22. 김밥집
23. 지하철김밥
24. 지울수 없는 너 (You Cannot Be Erased) - U&Me Blue
25. 빛을 받는 별
26. 미안함
27. 그대발길 머무는 곳에 (Wherever You Stay) - Cho Yong-pil
28. 우산속의 우정
29. 비와 당신 Acoustic Ver. (The Rain and You) - Park Joong-hoon
30. 넌 내게 반했어 Original Ver. (You've Fallen for Me) - No Brain

Musical theatre adaptation

In 2008, the film was adapted into a stage musical. The original run starred Jung Sung-hwa and Seo Beom-seok in the role of Park Min-soo, and Kim Da-hyun as Choi Gon, and was held at the Seoul Arts Center from January 26 to March 2, 2008.

Praised for its "refined" stage design, "appealing" music and a "well-developed plot that elicited laughter and tears from the audience," Radio Star won Best Musical at the 2009 Daegu Musical Awards, a ceremony that marked the end of the Daegu International Musical Festival. Seo Beom-seok also received the Best Actor award.

Jeong Jun-ha, Im Chang-jung and Kim Won-jun have also starred in later runs.