In what looks like Singapore’s answer to “About Schmidt,” the drama “Ajoomma” follows a widowed housewife as she steps out of her comfort zone by taking a solo trip to South Korea. This upbeat debut for director He Shuming – whose Korean title equates to the Asian respect term “Auntie” – offers longtime TV actor Hong Huifang (“Housewives’ Holiday”) a chance to star in the title role, for which he has already earned a Golden Horse Award nomination. . The cute “Ajoomma” of the Singapore actor was named to the Oscars, and he’s more of a black horse in this race, albeit with the potential to sleep in the art house.
Mrs. Lim’s life is light on excitement. What it lacks in drama, it fills in by indulging in Korean soap operas—a totally uncommon obsession among Asian women (and a growing number of Americans, thanks to services like Kocowa and Viki). “Aunt,” as most other characters call Hong’s character, is deeply concerned about her only son, who long ago agreed to accompany her on a private tour in Seoul. Now, a few days before they leave, he’s backing away from a job interview in New York – one that will put some much-needed distance between the closed young man and his overly stifling mother.
The aunt is not independent, and the thought of going on the trip alone terrifies her. But when she realizes that tickets are non-refundable, she agrees to go anyway, arriving late at the airport and causing inconvenience to everyone else in the process. This sequence must be funny, but it’s the first of several clumsy sets (the most awkward of which is an improbable car chase that shows the aunt at the wheel): While the others are waiting on the bus, tour guide Kwon-woo (Kang Hyung Suk) tracks down the diehard, putting her on Luggage cart and rolls it to the set. Then again, if K-soaps are your jam, what could be more magical than popping it into the airport lounge?
Once on the bus, we learned that Auntie had opted for the “Secret of the Stars” tour, which, as the name suggests, introduces fans to key locations from Korean TV series. For the benefit of the uninitiated, he made some lovable cliched scenes from such a show, enlisting the heart of Korean Yeo Jingsoo (“Hwayi: A Monster Boy”), whose chiseled chin and cheekbones are an unspoken part of the joke (Korean stars are famous for sculpting). As the movie goes on, Auntie begins to accentuate herself in the small-screen melodrama, a cute idea, along the lines of “Nurse Betty,” even if her real-life adventures are silly enough.
It’s New Year’s Eve, and while Kwon Woo has to deal with his tour group, he’s instead busy trying to fix things with his ex. Ergo, he redirected the bus to his mother-in-law’s apartment, not noticing when the aunt came down to take a call. Hong gives a decent enough performance, but she lacks the deceptive gift of farce that would have made her performance more comedic. We neither laugh nor believe her reaction when the bus pulls over as she frantically tosses her cell phone in the air (a gesture that easily leaves her with no way to contact her son).
Suddenly, stranded in a place she’s unwilling to navigate on her own, the aunt gets to meet the cutest man in Korea, a kind security guard (Jung Dong Hwan) who takes it upon himself to help her join the group—only, he and co-writer Chris Ung complicate the plot. Enough to give these two big guys a chance to connect. The aunt knows some Korean phrases she picked up from her favorite show, but these two phrases communicate mostly through a mixture of gestures and broken English. The guard takes her out to dinner, then returns to his house to watch some quiet and intimate scenes. He takes the floor and offers it his bed. By the time they find Kwon-woo and the others, the two are connected enough that the only mystery is what they will do about the beautiful friendship between cultures that is beginning to blossom. The last few scenes with K-soaps (or producer Anthony Chen’s award-winning films) have more in common than Judi Dench’s late-career movie. Frankly, it is not out of the question to imagine her role in the remake.
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