Barbenheimer vs. Concrete Utopia
Hollywood Blockbusters versus Korean Dystopian Movie
안녕! It's Ari, your talkative Korean friend and weekend reminder 🎉 Today’s newsletter is about a mandu dish recipe, Korean box office, and movie vocabulary. Let’s start!
Instant Cold Mandu Soup
Today, I have a delightful instant food recipe to share with you - "냉만둣국," which translates to "cold mandu soup." This quick dish is crafted using ready-made ingredients, so you'll need to do some grocery shopping to whip it up. To start, grab some mandu, which are Korean-style dumplings 🥟 (vegetable or meat flavor recommended). These can be easily found as frozen options in grocery markets or on Amazon. Next, procure naengmyeon, or Korean cold noodles with soup base (we only need the soup base for this dish). Once you have these two components, you're ready to cook!
For a single serving:
Boil the desired amount of frozen mandus until they are fully cooked, then allow them to cool in the air.
Place the mandus in a bowl and pour the naengmyeon soup base over them.
Enhance the dish with chopped cucumber and/or leafy vegetables, and a sprinkle of sesame seeds.
For an extra refreshing experience, chill the naengmyeon base in the freezer for about 30 minutes prior to cooking. The naengmyeon soup boasts a refreshing blend of sweet and sour flavors, while the mandus make your stomach full :D
Barbenheimer vs. Concrete Utopia
I often read English news articles because I simply love reading anything in English. So I’m aware of the Babenheimer phenomenon, but I I feel a little bit of FOMO because I can’t experience the phenomenon here in Korea. Although it’s been a month since “Barbie” was released in the country, it has only generated an audience of 560K so far. “Oppenheimer” was released this week, so we’ll have to wait and see if only the half of the phenomenon works or not in Korea. (Update. It’s working! The movie attracted around 550K viewers on its first day of release.🤯)
While it’s believed that “Barbie” flopped due to cultural differences and wide-spread anti-feminism in the country, another possible reason is the bad timing. The movie was released when many Korean blockbusters, which had their releases delayed due to the pandemic, started hitting theaters. Among them, “Concrete Utopia,” 👆 a dystopian black comedy movie that amassed an audience of 2.1 million in the first 6 days of release, might be the biggest competitor of “Oppenheimer.” The Korean movie depicts Seoul where all buildings have collapsed due to a massive earthquake except for one apartment. The aprtment’s residents try to survive the disaster while fighting against outsiders who want to enter. I watched the movie last weekend, and I LOVED IT! If you feel that you live in a country that is already dystopian enough, even without the country-shattering natural disaster, you’ll relate to this movie like I did. 🫠
Can “Oppenheimer” blow out “Concrete Utopia”? Or will they become Concenheimer? I’ll let you know when the results come out!
Mini Korean Lesson: Movie Vocabulary
If you look at the Korean poster of “Oppenheimer,” 👆 above the movie title “오펜하이머,” it reads, “크리스토퍼 놀란 감독 작품,” which means “directed by Christopher Nolan.” No further promotion is really necessary, as Christopher Nolan's films have consistently been major successes in the country. This poster has motivated me to share some movie-related vocabulary for today’s lesson. Explore the list below and see how many you are familiar with!
Movie: 영화 /yeonghwa/
Director: 감독 /gamdok/
Actor: 배우 /baewoo/
Trailer: 예고편 /yegopyun/
Audience/viewer: 관객 /gwangaek/
Blockbuster: 블록버스터 /blokbeoseuteo/ or 대작 /daejak/
Sequel: 속편 /sokpyeon/
💎 This week’s extra lesson (member-only)
Fill in the Blanks in Conversations and Korean News! (Mini Quiz on Movie Vocabulary)
Thanks for reading! If you liked my newsletter, ❤️ buy me a coffee or join Annyeong Ari membership ❤️ to take the above extra Korean lesson and get access to a comprehensive recipe archive of all recipes covered in my newsletter. I’ll be back next week. 안녕!