Anyone familiar with Korean cinema will know that the romantic comedy genre is a staple of the industry, usually pitting an enviously good lucking guy and girl up against the odds to get together and live happily ever after. However in ‘Cyrano Agency’, this tried and tested method got given a refreshing and cynical twist, and came out all the better for it.
The movies unique concept is no doubt down to director and screenwriter Kim Hyeon-seok. ‘Cyrano Agency’ is his third, and at the time of writing latest movie, having not only directed but also wrote the screenplays for his previous efforts as well. Hyeon-seok is a versatile guy, and fans of Korean cinema will most likely have seen something he’s worked on one way or another. Weather it be as an actor in the movie ‘Chingu / 친구’, as the screenwriter for ‘JSA – Joint Security Area - 공동경비구역 JSA’, or as assistant director on ‘The Isle / 섬’. With ‘Cyrano Agency’, he transferred to screen a concept he first developed while still in film school, and it was certainly worth the wait to see it come to fruition.
To summarize the plot would be best done by imagining the ‘Mission: Impossible’ movies, only swap Tom Cruise for Eom Tae-woong, and swap scenarios such as trying to stop someone from trying to end the world, to trying to make a girl fall in love with the guy that’s hired them. Essentially Tae-woong and his team, played by Park Sin-hye, Park Cheol-min, and Jeon Ah-min, play a group of out of work actors who, from a run down old theater, operate an agency that specializes in making people fall in love. How do they do this? By writing carefully researched scripts, creating perfectly timed eye contact, and making that all important first kiss on a rainy evening (if it’s not raining enough, don’t worry there’s a rain machine overhead).
