I just can not say enought how colorful and gorgeous the corean emperial cultures was,such as royal costumes and it's background settings and ect...in the film "King and the Clown"!! It was sooo different from either chinese or japanese imperial cultures. I was truly amazed and surprised by their colorful royal pass of early Corea!! Coreans should be proud of their recent boom and popularity of their films abroad!!
shareI think Korean imperial costumes and buildings were far more splendid and gorgeous in Koryo(Goryeo, 918-1392) period due to its luxurious Buddhist culture. (like ancient Thailand)
"King and the Clown" is set in Chosun(Joseon, 1392~1910) period when Buddhism was repressed and splended Buddhist relics were destroyed by Confucianists. The whole nation was newly built on Confucian ideology which warns people against extravagance.
That's one of the reasons why King Yeonsan, the 10th ruler of Chosun dynasty, was categorized as a tyrant in the Confucian order. If he had been a king of Koryo dynasty, he wouldn't have been deposed that way.
It took me little while but after movie I did little bit of research on passed corean historic royal culture,covering from the three kingdom era to all the way to chosun period and it was truly eye opening experince for me. During every corean royal dynastic era,it contained truly colorful and magnificent royal and noble culture in it unlike all dark and doom tragic corean past as we all have customed to believed,mainly due to a inaccurate american media coverage and their inaccurate portrayal on corean pass and culture which we all have been subject to at one time or another. I was truly amazed and learned more of corean colorful and luxurious side of history and their culture,which I never thought it exist before until now,than I ever did from u.s. text book and their inaccurate media coverage on everything regarding to corean. I hope many people too will soon discover more of colorful and luxurious side of corean pass and their culture the way I did from corean made movies like "King and the Jester" other than just sad 1950's corean war story we often heard from biased u.s. CNN or from u.s. based International History Channel.
shareJoseph1, if you are interested in Korean historical drama/movies, check this playlist on YouTube. ^_^;
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=825ABDC4539D24F0
Thankx for the tip! I will just do that!!
shareI added a new video clip to the playlist. It will be helpful for you to compare the imperial costumes between Koryo(Goryeo) and Chosun(Joseon) period.
"Shindon" (set in the 14th century Koryo)
More than 200 years before the "King and the Clown" (set in Chosun, 1506)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCmMPB6zemY
According to historical records, King Yeonsan (in the "King and the Clown") loved to see the portrait of Queen Noguk drawn by her husband, King Gongmin (in the "Shindon").
The two Korean kings had artistic talents : King Gongmin was a highly gifted painter, and King Yeonsan left 125 poems. Ironically, the two kings ended their lives in a similar way. King Gongmin went insane after losing his beloved wife, and got killed by his subjects. His love and death resulted in the fall of Koryo dynasty.
I didn't had a chance until now to say how much I appreciate your help on information regarding to such a beautiful and colorful corean royal history, thankx mirager-1!!
shareAs a Korean, I am very happy that the movie's imagery left a such lasting impression on you. I agree with Mirager, though, that the truly impressive cultural heritage was not so much from Chosun era, during which too much was influenced by China that held a great political control, but from Koryo, or even the three kingdoms before that.
On the side note, it seems that the makers of this movie could not elaborate the palace setting as much as they would've liked due to their low budget. Even though I don't watch many Korean dramas and movies, I think I've seen better, more colorful and glorious-looking palace scenes before.
Personally, I was more impressed with the movie's depiction of low-class people's costumes and habitat. The clothings of commoners were not the usual "han-bok" as one would expect but seemed more various in color and design, although not evident. Especially the look of the clowns as they perform in the streets was refreshing. I've seen the masks and costumes displayed in museums and occasionally seen the performance -- percussion music, mask dancing, etc. To see it not as the polished "theatre" performance, but as how it would've been back then, out in the streets, I felt a sort of nostalgia.