So advertising a movie is an art because you have short snippets to interest the audience and if there is a twist also keeping it under wraps. The upcoming modern romance movie Love in the Big City is being criticized by K-netizens after the new posters and previews are out for majorly misleading viewers with its promos. From the promos it appears to be two roommates Kim So Eun and Noh Sang Hyun and their heterosexual romance with each other. In reality the movie is based on a novel and will stick with the original story where the male lead is gay and the story is their roomie friendship and dealing with romance with other people. It is about love in the big city, just NOT with each other lol. K-movies are always way more progressive and gay themes have been normalized on the big screen for over two decades so it makes this misleading promos even more perplexing other than assuming the production wants to rope in viewers wanting a heterosexual romance between the two leads.
Preview for Love in the Big City:
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How didn’t they know? I don’t even speak Korean and I knew it was about straight girl and gay guy besties. I don’t get romance vibes from the trailer but, to be fair, it isn’t obvious the character is gay from the trailer either.
Dang. She looks in her element here. I dunno, it doesn’t give romantic vibes to me based on the trailer. Maybe? I mean, I didn’t know the source material, so I probably would’ve read it as romantic without knowledge of the original story, but knowing the original premise, meh. Seems like it could swing both ways?
I saw the trailer before and totally thought it was about a heterosexual romance… I also saw people on twitter saying that the leads looked good together. I can imagine many being misled by the poster in theaters too. False advertising is a great way to turn people off – both those who know and don’t know the story, and also can lead to the movie getting poorer reviews than it deserves (especially if it attracts close-minded viewers). So yeah, they should change their marketing strategy.
Yep saw the trailer and promo too, and definitely it was trying to market itself as hetero romance. The story in promo reminds me of lee dongwook’s single in seoul, except that one was really about the two leads romance
Oh I didn’t know.
I thought the gay romance was in the short drama with Nam Yoon-Soo that will air in October on TVING.
It all makes sense now. Yeah I was confused about the plot of the movie because the initial synopsis made it think it was a romance between the romanticist female protagonist and the cynical male protagonist. But then the posters said “hands-off romance, everlasting friendship” and there was no scene of the characters in love, just the female lead crushing on different guys and pursuing them. And to make things more perplexing is that in talk show appearances, Kim Go-eun and Noh Sang-hyun acted like a CP promoting their work.
I get that homosexual and other LGBTQ+ representation is still somewhat a touchy subject in mainstream South Korean media, but I perceive that the currrent young generations are open to and interested in such themes (plus aren’t they the target audience considering the age of the characters?), so if marketed right, the movie will gather a trusty audience.
I watched trailers, and it’s clear they’re just friends. Synopsis also don’t give any hints about romance between them. So if people suggest a romance trope between friends, it’s just because they assumpted it themselves, like no one is responsible for your wrong assumption. As trailers, teasers, pictures and synopsis didn’t show any hints to romance trope between two of them, people just made it up themselves.
I didn’t read novel, and didn’t watch a movie yet, but reading synopsis of novel I thought it would be a story about gay male lead and his love life. Looking at teasers and posters of drama, based on the same novel, which will air on Tving soon, it looks as a story about male lead, and part of this story his friendship with female character.
So I was a little confused after some time to see posters and trailers about friendship of two people, not about main lead and his life. Maybe they didn’t want to waste Kim Go Eun’s star power, or changed a story compared to a book. Anyway, it’s just my assumption, as I didn’t see a movie yet and didn’t read a book.
the movie is about the happy roomies. period. that is the story and not THEIR sexual preferences nor any budding romance between them.
posters are just to give the viewers a peek, a feel, a general mood of what the movie is about.
Yes in movie it seems like that. But the original book and the drama based on the book seems to be about male lead and his sexual preferences, so that’s why I was confused by posters, if by talking about “not sexual preferences” you mean my comment.