When Life Is for You continues to be a Korean drama that has caused a storm on the Netflix online film platform. The film is set in Jeju, which has gone through many ups and downs and historical events from the 1950s-1960s to the 2000s.
Based on a historical setting, the film script revolves around the lives and fates of poor working class characters. Overcoming all difficult and harsh circumstances, they still maintain an optimistic and strong spirit, striving for humanistic and good values.
At the center of the story are 3 generations of women in the Ae Sun (IU) family. They represent the strong voice of determined and brave women who want to break through all the restraint of habits and prejudices to realize their dreams.
The film is praised for its script built from close, simple, and everyday details. The film easily finds sympathy from the audience. The acting of the stars in the film is realistic and vivid. It is the realistic and approachable factor that has helped "When Life Is for You" to be widely welcomed and shared, continuously increasing ratings, and being among the most watched films globally.
According to KBS World, the appeal of the drama When Life Is for You has helped promote tourism to Jeju Island. The locations used are filming locations such as the sun rising mountain Seongsan - Seongsan Ilchulbong, Gimnyegi beach where Ae Sun's mother and the sea women went swimming day and day, Jeju Island government capital under the Joseon - Quan Da Jejumok era, or the buckwheat flower fields in Ora ward all attracting great attention from tourists.
KBS World wrote that the Jeju government, seeing this opportunity, has cooperated with Netflix to plan to promote Jeju tourism at 1,200 locations through channels such as: releasing promotional videos on YouTube, posting information on the website of Jeju Tourism Bureau, printing large-scale advertisements on domestic and suburban buses, designing tours focusing on film scenes.
Before the movie When Life Is for Us, many other films filmed in Jeju also created a strong, one-man tourism effect such as: Welcome to Samdalri, Blues- Where the Green Island is, Strange Lawyer Woo Young Woo... This series of works has spread Jejus image and beauty to countries around the world.
When Korean films continuously create miracles for tourism, Lao Dong reporter had an interview with Mr. Tran Chi Cuong - Vice Chairman of Da Nang City People's Committee.
The question is, when Jeju tourism and many coastal cities in Korea have been strongly promoted thanks to movies, did Da Nang think of this way to promote tourism for Da Nang.
Mr. Tran Chi Cuong said that Da Nang always wanted to become a film studio - where film crews could come to film scenes. In recent years, Da Nang has organized many cultural and entertainment events and films to attract film crews.
However, to produce a film about Da Nang, set in Da Nang and revolving around the lives of Da Nang people (as Korean film crews have done with Jeju) is very difficult, depending on many factors.
"Investing in a film project requires many stages of calculation. First of all, we need to invite a really good screenwriter to create a good, attractive story, based on the setting, story, and life of Da Nang people. After that, we need a really good director to make the script a vivid film.
To make the film attractive, it requires the entire cast, communication strategy, promotion... That is, to have an effective film project, it will require a lot of investment. We cannot use the State budget like that. We will have to calculate and consider" - Mr. Tran Chi Cuong said.
Accordingly, Da Nang is currently focusing on promotional channels that bring better and faster results - compared to investing in film projects.
