''Castaway on the Moon'' (; lit. "Kim's drifting experience": 표류: drifting; hanja: 金氏漂流記) is a 2009 South Korean

romantic comedy Romantic comedy (also known as romcom or rom-com) is a subgenre of comedy and slice of life fiction, focusing on lighthearted, humorous plot lines centered on romantic ideas, such as how true love is able to surmount most obstacles. In a typic ...

film written and directed by

Lee Hae-jun Lee Hae-jun (born August 18, 1973) is a South Korean film director and screenwriter. He wrote and directed '' Like a Virgin'' (2006), '' Castaway on the Moon'' (2009), and '' My Dictator'' (2014). Career As screenwriter Lee Hae-jun studied adve ...

. It is a love story between a suicidal man turned castaway on Bamseom in the Han River and a

Hikikomori , also known as acute social withdrawal, is total withdrawal from society and seeking extreme degrees of social isolation and confinement. ''Hikikomori'' refers to both the phenomenon in general and the recluses themselves. ''Hikikomori'' ha ...

woman who is addicted to

Cyworld Cyworld () is a South Korean social network service. Cyworld was originally part of SK communication, and became an independent company in 2014. Members cultivate relationships by forming ''Ilchon'' (, Hanja: ) or "friendships" with each other ...

Production

Title selection

Actor Jung Jae-young suggested the director, Lee Hae-Jun, to change the name of the film to "the drifting experience of the Jungs (정씨표류기)" to reference the fact that the actor and actress playing the lead roles are part of the Jung family, but the director insisted on keeping the name since he deliberately chose the family name Kim to suggest the universal nature of the characters.

Plot development

The two Kims in the film communicate with English since the director wanted to reflect that they are different from the mainstream society that they are part of which use Korean and the isolates would have their own symbols rather than language.

Casting and Filming

Actress

Jung Ryeo-won Jung Ryeo-won (born January 21, 1981) is a South Korean-born Korean Australian actress. She began her entertainment career as a singer in the now-defunct girl group Chakra, and first rose to fame in the hit television series '' My Name Is Kim S ...

said the favorite parts of the scenario were her character's scar on her forehead since she thought she would never do such makeup ever again on her career and the theme of hope. She also addressed the challenges while playing her character in the film because she felt lonely while filming most of her scenes alone. Actor Jung Jae-young had to lose 7kgs for three months and did not trim his fingernails and toe nails and cut his hair to portray the look of a person who drifted to an uninhabited island. The film was abled to only film the beach scenes in Bamseom since it was a nature reserve and the forest scenes were filmed in Chungju and Changwon. The film was the first to film in Bamseom and the filming was specially authorized by the Seoul authorities.

Props

The character Kim Seong-geun was originally going to wear a triangle underwear but was changed to square underwear because Jung Jae-young resisted to wear it.

Marketing

Jung Jae-young had a

jajangmyeon ''Jajangmyeon'' () or ''jjajangmyeon'' () is a Korean noodle dish topped with a thick sauce made of '' chunjang'', diced pork, and vegetables. Variants of the dish use seafood, or other meats. History ''Jajangmyeon'' was introduced in the la ...

party with movie audiences on May 27, 2009 at the

63 Building The 63 Building ( ko, 63빌딩), officially called 63 SQUARE (formerly Hanwha 63 City), is a skyscraper on Yeouido island, overlooking the Han River (Korea), Han River in Seoul, South Korea. At 249 meters (817 ft) high, it was the tallest b ...

Plot

Kim Seong-geun ( Jung Jae-young) is deep in debt and his life seems completely hopeless. He jumps off a bridge into the Han River and washes up on the shore of Bamseom, which lies directly below the bridge. After searching the island he finds it is filled mostly with vegetation and surrounded by the city, but too far to shout and he can't swim. He finds a duck-shaped paddle boat and begins to like living on the island—free of his debt and worries of city life—though it is not easy. As he learns to survive on the island, his cry for help scrawled in the sand is seen by Kim Jung-yeon (

), a hikikomori who spots him while engaging in her nightly habit of photographing the moon. They soon begin exchanging messages, with Jung-yeon venturing out of her house at night to throw bottled messages onto the island, and Seong-geun writing his replies in the sand. Seong-geun also manages to cultivate crops to prepare noodles for an instant noodles packet of ''

''. A torrential storm arrives, destroying Seong-geun's farm and sweeping away the possessions he has collected. He is found by a group of workers sent to clean up litter on the island and forced off. Seong-geun boards a bus in the city to jump off the

. After overcoming her anxiety and desperately running across the bridge to find Seong-geun, Jung-yeon manages to catch up to his bus after the civil defense drill stalls it. She boards and introduces herself to him.

Cast

* Jung Jae-young as Kim Seong-geun *

as Kim Jung-yeon *Park Young-seo as delivery man *

Yang Mi-kyung Yang Mi-kyung (born July 25, 1961) is a South Korean actress. She is best known for playing the role of palace lady-in-waiting Han Baek-young in the popular period drama series '' Dae Jang Geum'' (2003). Other activities Yang was also a visiti ...

as Jung-yeon's mother *

Koo Kyo-hwan Koo Kyo-hwan (born 14 December 1982) is a South Korean actor and film director known for his role in the films ''Jane'' (2016), ''Peninsula'' (2020), and '' Escape from Mogadishu'' (2021). He also attracted recognition for his performance in Ne ...

as utilities man #1 *Lee Sang-il as utilities man #2 *Min Kyeong-jin as apartment security guard *Jang Nam-yeol as bus driver *Lee Sang-hun as Seong-geun's father *

Jang So-yeon Jang So-yeon (Korean:장소연; born Seo Eun-jung on 28 January 1980) is a South Korean actress. She is alumni of Sookmyung Women's University, Department of English and Chinese. She made her acting debut in 2001, since then, she has appeared i ...

as Seong-geun's girlfriend

Awards and nominations

Remake

In 2011,

CJ Entertainment CJ Entertainment (Hangul: CJ 엔터테인먼트) is a South Korean film production and distribution company under CJ ENM. The company operates as a film production company, film publishing house, investment and exhibition. History During early 1 ...

announced an American remake, with

Mark Waters Mark Stephen Waters (born June 30, 1964) is an American filmmaker who directed the comedy films '' Freaky Friday'', ''Mean Girls ''Mean Girls'' is a 2004 American teen comedy film directed by Mark Waters and written by Tina Fey. The film ...

attached as director and Michael Goldbach as screenwriter.

Notes

References

External links

* * * − {{DEFAULTSORT:Castaway on the Moon 2009 films 2009 romantic comedy-drama films South Korean romantic comedy-drama films Films set in Seoul Films shot in Seoul Cinema Service films CJ Entertainment films 2000s Korean-language films 2009 comedy films 2009 drama films 2000s South Korean films