Nestled within Gangnam, one of the wealthiest districts in Seoul, lies the ward of Apgujeong, one of the wealthiest neighbourhoods in all of South Korea. Filled with department stores, high-end shops, boutiques, cafes etc., the area is also most known for the many plastic surgery clinics spread all over. So many clinics exist in the neighborhood, in fact, that it would not be remiss to call Apgujeong the surgery capital of South Korea, the surgery capital of the world.
MEN OF PLASTIC is available on VOD/digital from June 6th
This area, sometime in the 2000s, is the playground of Kang Dae-guk. A native of the neighbourhood, Kang is well-known there, a hyung to all the men and an oppa to all the women who live or work there. Nobody knows exactly what business he does, but everyone knows him as a fixer of any issues and a solver of problems. In reality, Kang doesn't do much, using his contacts to help people and make a quick buck so that he can purchase the house of his childhood. Eventually he meets Ji-woo, the younger brother of an old friend and a plastic surgeon who has lost his license but is trying to hustle his way into becoming a legitimate doctor again. Ever resourceful, Dae-guk manages to get Ji-woo reinstated and proposes opening up a plastic surgery clinic of their own, with the help of an old gangster friend, which soon takes off. With success, however, also comes trouble and cracks start to form in the friendship between the two.
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South Korea as a country is fully aware of its obsession with plastic surgery, a fact that is also mirrored at times in their cinema. More often than not though, this obsession is played for the laughs in comedy features and Lim Jin-soon's new work, which he co-wrote with indie writer/director Shin Youn-shik, also follows a similar tone. The comedy here is of a lot subtler variety than laugh-out-loud, working largely due to the chemistry between its leading pairing of Ma Dong-seok and Jung Kyung-ho. Ma Dong-seok may be a box office magnet and an immensely popular star to boot, but it is no secret that he is usually typecast in films. “Men of Plastic” sees him slightly break out of it for a welcome change, with nary a slap and only one punch late on in sight. Instead, he gets to work his comedic muscles, of which he usually only see flashes here and there.
“Men of Plastic” never really ventures deeper beyond its humorous upper layer, which is a shame because the story certainly has scope to do so, particularly with Jung Kyung-ho's Ji-woo, a character whose inner struggles could have been implemented to explore the issues within the industry. This is no slight to the actor though, who does well and delivers what is expected of him in a role that feels almost an extension of his fun tv drama performances. Regardless, placing the proceedings in an unspecified time during the early days of the now-booming cosmetics surgery industry proves favorable, drawing a good guide on how the industry reached its zenith and particularly crediting the lead characters with the advent of the now-common plastic surgery tourism proving a nice touch.
The story threads around the lead pair; however it fails to create much substance, with the plot seemingly being generic and the majority of the characters amounting to mere “furniture” for the most part. This is true for Oh Na-ra's Mi-jung and Oh Yeon-seo's Kyu-ok, with only Choi Byung-mo's gangster-turned-businessman Jo Tae-cheon getting any form of exposition. But Lim's focus clearly is on his two leading men and the bond they share, and in that sense, “Men of Plastic” delivers in oodles. Shot almost as flamboyantly as the outfits Dae-suk wears throughout, it also paints a very appealing picture of the neighborhood of Apgujeong.
If you are looking for a fun comedy that doesn't really demand much from its audience and delivers in chuckles and an effective bromance, “Men of Plastic” is well worth your time. If, however, you are looking for a detailed, and a necessarily critiquing look at the cosmetic surgery industry in South Korea, you'd do better to look at something like “Beauty Water”, for example.
