Daniel Henney as 'Mr. Perfect'

If you want to capture the heart of Daniel Henney (one of the hottest Korean-American actors who sets most female hearts aflutter in Korea), please laugh a lot. For Henney says he loves a woman when she laughs.

Another crucial tip to seduce the heartthrob: please learn some wrestling. Henney thinks a woman doing who can wrestle is "sexy."

The two tips are drawn from Henney's silver screen debut, "Seducing Mr. Perfect" (Mr. Robin Kkoshigi), a typical chick movie in which he is being seduced by Um Jung-hwa at a highly upscale M&A firm.

Henney plays Robin, an M&A specialist who graduated from Harvard Law School and also has an MBA under his belt. He is appointed as the head of the M&A firm in Seoul, and one of his (sexy) employees is none other than June played by Um Jung-hwa.

Neither of them knows the identity of each other, at least when they first encounter through a fender-bender. June pretends to have no knowledge of English when she is confronted by the fluent English of this gorgeous-looking Mr. Perfect who drives a luxurious Volvo sedan. But Robin is no fool; he takes a picture of June with his cell phone camera and snatches her phone to dial his own number to get her telephone number in a couple of seconds - thanks to the caller ID system.



It turns out that Robin is adept at snatching everything - a company as a merger wizard, and a woman's heart as a relationship expert. When they meet again in the office, June finally notices a new reality: she is the assistant of a Hollywood actor-like handsome boss who throws about snappy, pretentious remarks as if he's the smartest guy in the world.

June wants to get some advice from this wise boss. She has long been stuck with messy relationships. She tries to be kind and gentle, but her former boyfriends have dumped her because of her extremely nice character.

Robin offers a challenging game to her: seducing him and by doing so, learning a lesson or two about what men really want.

Of course, if it were a typical Hollywood film, his overly cartoonish offer might be taken as serious sexual harassment involving all sorts of lawsuits. But the film is certainly a Korean one, and characters do not care about such needless political correctness at all, even though "Seducing Mr. Perfect" is the first ever Korean movie whose lines are mostly in English (most foreign viewers will be able to understand the plot thanks to plenty of English conversations).

The film does not have any surprises as a romantic comedy. A predictable plot, all-too-familiar developments that produce a trite ending. But it does have some bonus scenes for female viewers. For instance, at a press preview on Monday, when Robin opens his hotel room door topless, many female reporters sighed out of pleasant surprise.

Many of the details capturing Robin's life - the designer suits, residential hotel rooms, jogging in a wet sports T-shirt in a park and much more - are designed to entertain female moviegoers who buy movie tickets to watch today's new "Mr. Perfect," known as Daniel Henney.

So, it's a bad idea if a couple watches this film together. The woman will love it, often oohing and aaing whenever Henney gives a cool pose or shows of his well built body. But the man is likely to get annoyed when he feels he's constantly compared to this guy with extremely good looks and an easy smile.

Director Kim Sang-woo said at a press conference that he wanted to tell a typical story in a typical way. But what about not-so-typical Mr. Perfect? On his first ever acting for a feature film, Henney said, "I'm not perfect. It was difficult to act, and difficult at times, but it came out OK."

In the film, Robin seems extremely cold in his talk and manner, and Henney said he modeled the character after his former high school basketball coach who always ranted in a stern manner. He also added that he found Um's wrestling scene quite "sexy."
So, if you are determined to conform to Mr. Perfect's ideal woman, please learn some wrestling (details are clearly demonstrated in the film) and also laugh a lot.

By Yang Sung-jin

2006.11.29

The Korea Herald
Link to original article.