K-pop makes its way to Hollywood in 'K-pop: Lost in America'

K-pop

Published: 19 Apr. 2022, 15:45

K-pop makes its way to Hollywood in 'K-pop: Lost in America'

In Disney animated film “Turning Red” (2022), the five members of boy band 4*Town, which includes Korean member Tae Young, appear as protagonists. [WALT DISNEY COMPANY KOREA]

Director Yoon Je-kyun’s big-budget K-pop film tentatively titled “K-pop: Lost in America” is quickly becoming a much-anticipated film by the public.

Last August, CJ ENM announced that Yoon, perhaps best known for “Ode to My Father” (2014), which garnered over 10 million tickets sales — a milestone for the local box office — and producer Lynda Obst behind “Interstellar” (2014) and “Sleepless in Seattle” (1993) will collaborate on a crossover film about K-pop.

According to an industry insider, the narrative follows idol group ALL4U who is about to make their global debut in the United States. Fueled by their popularity in Korea, they get the opportunity to perform on their dream stage at Madison Square Garden in New York. But instead of arriving in New York, they somehow land in a small Texas country town. They only have two days until their performance in the Big Apple, so a road trip commences as the five boys head to New York — in a foreign country where they can’t speak the language and are flat-out broke.

Director Yoon Je-kyun [ILGAN SPORTS]

The film plans to cast K-pop stars and a string of Hollywood actors and singers. According to a press release distributed by CJ ENM last year, it emphasized that the film will be a “large-scale project” and predicted that it will become a “global talk-of-the-town,” hinting that it will be another big-budget film invested in by the company. The film with the highest production cost invested in by CJ ENM is “Snowpiercer” (2013) by director Bong Joon-ho, which cost $38.76 million.

CJ ENM singled out the key idea behind the film's production as being the “avid global interest in K-pop and Hallyu content and the trend of multiculturalism.” K-pop has made it into the mainstream global music market, frequently yo-yoing across Billboard charts. According to data from TikTok last November, views of K-pop videos have tripled over three years, having been streamed 97.87 million times from January to September last year — 92.8 percent of those views came from overseas.

Hollywood studios are also taking note of the global K-pop fever. Jessica Kam-Engle, the head of content and development at Walt Disney Company Asia Pacific, said in an online interview with the JoongAng Ilbo last month that the mere appearance of a K-pop star in a show can bring considerable market value to the program.

In Disney animated film “Turning Red,” released on the streaming service Disney+, five members of boy band 4*Town, which includes Korean member Tae Young, appear as protagonists. According to Disney, Chinese-American director Domee Shi said that the band was modeled after K-pop boy bands 2PM and Big Bang, both of which she was a huge fan of during her college days. Shi also made a separate animated choreography video of SHINee’s “Ring Ding Dong” (2009).

In “Spies in Disguise” (2020), another Disney animated film, the character Walter Beckett, voiced by Tom Holland, is a huge fan of anything Korean, and scenes from Korean drama series and K-pop references such as girl group Twice’s “Knock Knock” (2017) appear throughout the film. The scenes were influenced by co-directors Troy Quane and Nick Bruno’s personal tastes, as they are known to be fans of K-pop and Korean films.

In Dreamworks animated film “Trolls World Tour” (2020), members of girl group Red Velvet recorded the voices for the characters of the K-pop trolls. [UNIVERSAL PICTURES]

In Dreamworks animated film “Trolls World Tour” (2020), members of girl group Red Velvet recorded the voices for the characters of the K-pop trolls. In “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” (2021), the first-ever Marvel film to feature an Asian superhero, a cluster of Korean musicians such as Zion. T, DPR Live, DPR Ian, Bibi and Seori featured in the film’s soundtrack. This phenomenon is different from the past when specific K-pop songs would briefly play in Hollywood films, such as when boy band TVXQ’s “Rising Sun” (2005) featured in “Fast & Furious” (2009) and girl group Wonder Girls’ “Nobody” (2010) was parodied in Dreamworks animated film “Penguins of Madagascar” (2014). Local experts predict that the global popularity of K-pop will continue to expand.

In the film ″Justice League″ (2017), a music video by Blackpink plays in the background behind Batman (played by Ben Affleck). [WARNER BROS KOREA]

“Across the globe, interest in Korean culture is growing,” music critic Lee Dae-hwa said. “There is no particularly distinguished new wave in the foreign music scene. As a matter of fact, it's stagnant, and just when it needed a fresh stimulus, Korea's recognition is growing, giving us an opportunity.”

“There is a pattern in American culture in which over certain periods of time, one particular Asian country tends to represent the entirety of Asia,” another culture critic, Kim Young-dae, said. “In the past, elements of Chinese and Japanese culture were viewed as distinct and mystical, whereas K-pop is being accepted as something modern and hip. There are marketing strategies which reflect the current global trend.”

BY NA WON-JEONG [kjdculture@joongang.co.kr]