More Comments from the 웰컴 투 동막골 (Welcome To Dongmakgol) Cast

Another couple of interviews with Shin Ha-Gyun, Kang Hye-Jung and Jung Jae-Young. Park Gwang-Hyun's human dramedy set in the Korean War is receiving some of the best reviews of the year from Korean critics, and is generating great word of mouth, especially looking at various film-related blogs (enter the Korean title at the blog section of Naver, Daum or Yahoo Korea and you'll see). Some people are even betting this will compete neck to neck with Park Chan-Wook's 친절한 금자씨 (Sympathy For Lady Vengeance), which is quite a bold statement, especially in light of the film's success.

As always, edited to bring you the best parts, as free of spoilers as possible.

Kang Hye-Jung: Usually at the press screenings, right before the end of the film, the cast prepares for the questions, but today was different. We all sat there until the very end, and ended up running late with the post-screening interviews. I laughed, cried, laughed again...it was crazy. I thought to myself: "Did I really shoot this?
Of course at first I worried about what kind of acting tone I should have used. But the director just trusted me, and simply said to go out there, do this and that...whatever I wanted, so it was really comfortable acting in this film. I was able to give a lot of input and ideas throughout the shoot, and it was fun, really. I think this will show up in the final film as one of the positives."

Jung Jae-Young: "Anyway, If you look at Korean celebrities, there's a lot of people with unusually small faces...I'm not really on the "big" side, just average ... Back when we shot 킬러들의 수다 (Guns & Talks) it was a disaster. On one side all those naturally stylish guys [ed. Won Bin, Shin Hyun-Joon, Shin Ha-Gyun], and here comes this guy. I really had to work hard to avoid those "Who the hell is that?" situations....
It's an happy film. Happily shot, and with lots of nice people in it. Just like the many nice characters in the film, there was great chemistry and atmosphere between cast & crew, and I'm sure you'll feel it when watching the film.
The stage play was really really good, so the moment I got the proposal for the film, reading the scenario I felt there wasn't anything superflous, and it ended on a high note. Even better, it fit perfectly with my schedule, so there wasn't any reason to refuse the opportunity. The fact it was even more touching and "movie like" than the stage play, with the Popcorn Rain, the Bombing scene...it was perfect.
I worked with Jang Jin for so long, now I know his style, understand his comedy and can follow his timing. Actors have to fit the film's tone. Instead of changing the film around their acting style, they have to merge their acting tone with the tone of the film, for the sake of getting a good end result."

Shin Ha-Gyun: The more I act, the harder it feels. Since it's a film with a huge cast, I paid attention to establish my character's personality without upstaging the other characters ... I'm thankful the film's receiving good word of mouth, but if you want to talk about box office...that could be like opening a can of worms.
Because of its period setting, the soldiers et all, I could understand if you look at this as a very stoic, stiff as nails film. But more than showing the tragedy of war, it's more interested in uncovering those feelings buried underneath the tragedy of war."

Via Chosun Ilbo, Yonhap News and KyungHyang Sports