Korean remake of 'The Intern' finds humor in generational tensions

The Korean remake of "The Intern" (2015) moves the story of an ambitious fashion startup CEO and her senior intern from a Brooklyn brownstone to the East Asian country. Choi Min-sik, who takes on the intern role played by Robert De Niro in the 2015 original, says the film stands on its own through its Korean cultural context, its treatment of generational conflict and its reworking of the characters — including his own, whom he describes as "chatty."

“I thought there was something different to be gained by portraying Koreans’ hardships, sense of solidarity and generational conflict through our own cultural lens," Choi said of his decision to play senior intern Ki-ho at a news conference in central Seoul on Monday.

He described one of Ki-ho’s defining traits as being a "cuckoo" — old-fashioned slang for someone who is witty and chatty, after the famously vocal bird.

"Older guys used to say it when I was in my 20s, and it just stuck with me. So I ended up using [the term] naturally in the film," the actor, whose career spans from 1981, said.

Choi plays a publishing industry veteran of 37 years who joins the fashion startup as an intern through a government-backed “silver intern” program that offers companies tax incentives for hiring older workers. Han So-hee co-stars as Seon-woo, the ambitious, hard-working executive who runs the fashion startup WOO22, pronounced "Woo two two."

The original 2015 workplace comedy was a box office success worldwide, bringing in 3.6 million moviegoers in Korea alone.

Choi asked audiences to give the remake a chance, saying the cast and crew made a conscious effort to carve out their own version of the story.

“When the cast and crew met, we said, ‘Let’s forget the original,’” Choi said. 

“We didn’t approach [the remake] with an obsession to be better or different from the original,” he added. “We made it with one thought in mind: to show audiences our own version.”

Director Kim Do-young added that both characters are more "grounded" than their counterparts in the original, with "flaws and a sense of loneliness" that she believes will make them more relatable to audiences. 

"Rather than characters in an ideal comedy, they feel more like real people with their feet firmly on the ground," Kim said.

Han said she prepared for the role by meeting startup chief executives around her age and thinking about "the tension between the responsibilities Seon-woo carries [as a professional] and [the character's] personal anxieties."

“The answer I found was that I had to approach her as someone who genuinely loves WOO22 and what she does,” Han said. Rather than trying to replicate Hathaway’s character, she added, she focused on shaping Seon-woo in a way that meshed with her own personality.

"It was lonely" on set, Han said of having to play Seon-woo because the character had to sit in her own office separated from Ki-ho and the other employees' workspace. 

“Throughout filming, there were moments when I felt envious and lonely, but because Seon-woo had to maintain the weight and composure of being a CEO, I tried to keep those emotions in check,” Han said.

"The Intern" is set to release in theaters on Sept. 16.

BY KIM JU-YEON [[email protected]]