PARK YONG-HA. South Korean Actor-Singer Commits Suicide. Must the GOOD always die YOUNG?

PARK YONG-HA

(August 12, 1977 – June 30, 2010. R.I.P.)

Another talented SOUTH KOREAN artiste’s life being snuffed out at such an early stage?

He was only 33.

Such a shame really.

With his leading man’s good looks and adulation from frenzied fans all over ASIA, he certainly had everything going for him: a starry future ahead.

Friends and colleagues can attest that suicide would be the last thing lurking in the back of this actor’s mind.

He was often seen as sweet and cherubic. He was.

He wore the MONA LISA smile. He did.

He adorned a soulful and doleful persona with impish imploring eyes in all his television dramas.

He put on a bold front, even when all was not well.

On Wednesday June 30 past midnight, he spent his last hours massaging the legs of his cancer-stricken father, all along uttering “I am sorry, dad ….” many times. It was to be his last homage.

At 5.30 am, his mother went to his room and found him hanging from a mobile phone charger cable.

He was a filial son and was in true anguish when he witnessed his beloved father suffering from a terminal disease and was hapless to the situation.

You could say that he was an angel in disguise.

Yet what lied behind the facade?

What made him choose the path to self-demise?

Love? Career blues? Financial problems? Depression?

Nobody can fathom the real answers.

Specially not now.

Now, when a family member commits suicide, the entire family will surely plunge into confusion and grief.

Everybody values life.

Even a blade of grass or flower fights for the privilege of living.

When someone close to you voluntarily ends his life, your entire value system will be thrown into question.

Family members may be consumed with guilt, thinking that they should have seen the early signs that could have misled him to end his life.

PARK YONG-HA.

You are gone, but never forgotten.

May you live on as a STAR high up the firmament sparkling ever so brightly.

Here’s REUTERS full report:

PARK YONG-HA’s body was found by his mother with an electrical cord around his neck but there was no suicide note, The Korea Herald quoted police as reporting.

Park, 33, had recently devoted himself to nursing his ailing father who was in the final stages of stomach cancer. He was reported to have been struggling with sleep problems as well.

Park made his acting debut in 1992 but rose to fame in 2002 in the television drama “Winter Sonata”, winning a following in Japan and other nations in southeast Asia.

He also forged a career for himself as a singer in Japan where he put out 10 hit albums in the past five years and won four consecutive Japan Gold Disc Awards — a first for a Korean pop singer.

He was due to start filming in July for a Korean television drama called “Comrades, Almost a Love Story”, which is a remake of a popular 1996 Hong Kong film.

Park’s death comes after a string of suicides by South Korean celebrities in recent years.

Figures from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in 2009 show that South Korea’s suicide rate experienced a sharp increase from the late 1990s and South Korea now has the highest rate among OECD countries of around 22 deaths per 100,000 people.

LIFE IMITATING ART?

For sure sometimes, TRUTH IS STRANGER THAN FICTION.

KEN THEERADEJ, Thai Heart-Throb Actor. "SIZE? I LIKE it my WAY!"

Step aside, ANANDA EVERINGHAM (he’s the lead beautiful boy from Thai horror film SHUTTER).

Here comes KEN THEERADEJ, currently the FOREMOST, albeit – most bankable actor in THAILAND.

KEN is a household name with his slew of highly rated family dramas and a recent successful feature BANGKOK TRAFFIC LOVE STORY .

He is a beefcake, an intellectual hunk and most of all, he's very well adored…… ahmmm …..endowed.

And like all fallible humans, he does experience the occasional “rude” unexpected awakening.

He is after all, a hot-blooded male.

If curiosity can kill your cat, read further.

It’s just a matter of SIZE and SIZING it up, man.

“Excuse me, Mind your Naughty Bulge.”

Even celebrities have their fifteen minutes of embarrassment, when the inquisitive paparazzi put them in uncompromising situations, as in the case of heartthrob KEN THEERADEJ.

Check the above titillating pictures.

Everyone around him were doing the respectful “wai” but observe KEN’s bored expressions.

What was on his mind?

He looked a sultry hapless, but his crotch was growing, gnawing and glowing with seething impatience.

Oh, naughty Ken.

“Oh, what were you thinking?”

“Look, I was just minding my business glorifying myself, can’t I?” he smirked.

Maybe he was wearing tight undies and that “little thing down there” was suffocating for want of fresh air …..

Now, fret not, folks.

Each and everyone of us do get caught off-guard sometimes.

Right ….

Heard of the 60s song:

HOORAY FOR HAZEL, she put me down,

Hooray for Hazel, she made me her clown,

Hooray for Hazel, she’s up to her tricks,

Hooray for Hazel, she’s getting her kicks!

The paparazzi must have had a field day …..

but who on earth is HAZEL anyway?

So YOU are DOWN in the DUMPS, my FRIEND?

WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN YOU ARE TAKING A DUMP?

Stare blankly at the empty space just right in front of you?

Or you close your eyes, sigh resignedly …..

and ponder over the day’s happenings?

Do you grimace when the poop takes a little longer than usual to surface …..

But no matter ….

The day’s goings may be rough – because each and everyone of us do get constipated in ideas and forms once in a while.

We are what we eat,

We are what we put into our brains,

Sometimes life’s experiences can harden our hearts making us increasingly resentful and afraid for no apparent reasons,

Not easy,

Confronting our own inner demons,

Facing toxic people …..

Shall we start a fresh attitude?

When we look to see that yesterday was yesterday, and now it is gone.

Today is TODAY and now it is NEW ….

It is like that every hour, every minute is changing.

Wish we can transform terror and pain into joy and compassion.

SRI AUROBINDO says in his poetry on SUFFERING:

” The vast universal suffering feel as thine:
Thou must bear the sorrow that thou claimst to heal;
The day-bringer must walk in darkest night.
He who would save the world must share its pain.
If he knows not grief, how shall he find grief’s cure? “

Even ANIMALS have a right to live, you know?

Have you witnessed the brutal killing of animals in uncivilized countries?

Chickens have their heads chopped clean off with an ax.

Goats and sheep have their throats cut. You lead them out to a patch of bare ground below the stable, where you pin them down to the ground with their heads pulled back and their arteries opened.

The killings are often mechanical and impassive.

Chickens would be the most frenzied : they will run around insanely, spouting blood.

The sheep are the most docile. They stand almost stupidly as they bleed, watching the world fade away.

Now pigs are a different matter. The pigs would have their legs trussed up and rolled on their backs. Then you pierce a thin filament of iron right deep into their hearts.

There is no sound on earth like the sound of a pig dying. It is a shriek that tears at the primal, unconscious mind. It is the noise of babies abandoned, of women taken by force, of the hinges of the world tearing loose.

The screaming starts from the moment the pig is seized, as if it knows what is about to happen. The pig squeals and cries, it defecates in terror, but nothing will stop its life converging to a zero on the point of that thin metal stick.

NOW, having known all these, when you look at the scrumptious piece of charbroiled meat on your platter during meal time, what would your reaction be?

LONG LIVE THE ANIMALS?

Bless you, my friend.

THE BACK-UP PLAN Movie Preview. "SIR, Can you spare me your SPERM?"

PRESS PREVIEW

Excuse me …..

Are you in a flippant mood now and wanna take a dig at something?

Then let’s check out this romantic comedy called THE BACK-UP PLAN.

It stars the ever effervescent JENNIFER LOPEZ.

An illustrative anecdote of the plot?

Nothing sugary along the fine line of MARY POPPINS’ cheesy “just a spoonful of sugar makes the medicine go down”.

This one is rather, a naughty sexist poke at “Excuse me, Sir, can you spare me your sperm?”

This is the BACK-UP PLAN, for starters.

We should move next to the MAIN course.

THE BACK-UP PLAN boldly assures us that beauty is not everything …. (gasp)

and that NOT all vivacious and voluptuous women are guaranteed a heavenly ticket to conjugal bliss.

As in the case of ZOE (JENNIFER LOPEZ), a corporate woman turns pet shop owner.

She probably has enjoyed countless dates and a few relationships, yet true love is eluding her.

She becomes a desperado.

Who can really blame her?

When she realizes that her biological clock is ticking away, she panics, does a “Johnny-come-lately stance” and decides on her own back-up plan of being a single mother, by having her own baby.

She does some soul searching and accepts artificial insemination as a viable solution, and goes to the fertility clinic for her “jab”.

But Cupid intervenes and springs on her a last-minute surprise.

On that fateful day, upon completing her insemination process, she bumps into STAN (ALEX O’LOUGHLIN) the beau-of-her-dream in a taxi, and fights with him over “whoever gets into the taxi first”.

It is this chance encounter that love beckons under the most ridiculous circumstance.

STAN is a sexy himbo (male term for bimbo) – an organic goat’s cheese maker at that, who aspires to open a gourmet shop.

He’s smitten by ZOE’s sex-in-the-city persona and decides to woo her.

Likewise, ZOE drools over his "come-touch-me-here" six pack abs and longs to get into his pants.

So 1 + 1 = 2 horny animals.

Nurturing this new found love-cum-sexual relationship is baffling for ZOE who tries to conceal her early signs of pregnancy from STAN, thereby resulting in a comedy of errors.

After the fleeting period of excitement knowing that she is going to be a mother, she now has to face the throes of pregnancy blues alone.

Her best friend sharply reminds her that a woman in her early stages of pregnancy may develop a withdrawal symptom such as an unusual craving for food and sex.

Gags aplenty in the form of love, food and sex are properly executed to provide the comedic banter and laugh out situations.

The Back-Up Plan can be an acceptable romantic romp in the park, that is, if you follow the roller coaster of love’s “now you see, now you don’t”.

It is said that JENNIFER LOPEZ hopes for a triumphant return to the big screen after giving birth to twins.

Her last feature EL CANTANTE tanked dismally at the box office.

THE BACK-UP PLAN is a warm, glossy holiday fable that has some surprising sweet notes.

Relish some tender, family-friendly moments with J.LO and ALEX O’LOUGHLIN, both giving mesmerizing performances.

All in all, THE BACK-UP PLAN is a fun-fun-fun romantic comedy dedicated to fans of J.LO.

And for that alone, it serves the very purpose.

THE LEGEND IS BORN: IP MAN 葉問前傳 Movie Review. The FIGHTS are leaner, cleaner and astonishingly heart-pounding.

葉問前傳PRESS PREVIEW

There’s little doubt that DONNIE YEN is widely acknowledged as IP MAN, the brand.

DONNIE YEN is indeed, IP MAN.

This association has been cleverly crafted.

It’s a star positioning that has been successfully entrenched in the heart and mind of the Chinese movie goers all over the world.

IP MAN is a true cinematic legend now. So is the art of WING CHUN.

It’s a lucrative formula that has made actor DONNIE YEN a superstar,

And for film producer RAYMOND WONG, he has hit “boom time charlie” with the IP MAN chronicles.

2010 is the year of IP MAN. And WING CHUN.

It’s a box office roll, a successful cash cow that maketh the world go round.

And as money speaks, more IP MAN productions are in the pipeline, moving across the drawing boards, jumping on the bandwagon.

We are having an overkill here, so stay braced.

So what of THE LEGEND IS BORN: IP MAN, the newest offering directed by HERMAN YAU from a competitive camp?

HERMAN promises unique martial arts sequences that have never been seen before and fights between real life WING CHUN professionals.

It’s another IP MAN movie reprisal, this time around it has this studious-looking newcomer DENNIS TO YU-HANG (he is reminding me of Singapore actor NAT HO) playing the pivotal role of the Grand Master.

Incidentally, DENNIS TO has REAL fight credits. He happens to be a true disciple of the IP MAN’s School of Wing Chun and was the original martial arts consultant on the DONNIE YEN’s IP MAN series.

DENNIS is the current World Kung Fu Champion, the first Hong Kong Champion of the 2005 East Asia Games and winner of various international martial arts tournaments.

And his portrayal of the legendary IP MAN with quiet charm and grit is justifiable enough for us to sit up and take notice.

This dude can fight!

THE LEGEND IS BORN: IP MAN is a semi-fictionalized prequel.

It transports us back to a time, way before the 1st IP MAN movie – and chronicles the formative years of the WING CHUN pugilist.

From his younger days, IP MAN was already learning WING CHUN from CHAN WAH-SHUN (SAMMO HUNG), NG CHUNG-SUI (YUEN BIAO), and subsequently from LEUNG BIK (IP CHUN).

This film focuses on IP MAN’s resistance against the invading Japanese and his romantic relationships with the woman he eventually marries CHEUNG WING-SING (CRYSTAL HUANG) and his fellow student LI MEI WAI (ROSE CHAN) who is secretly in love with him.

The staging of the fights are awesome.

A correct Wing Chun stance is like a piece of bamboo, firm but flexible, rooted but yielding. This structure is used to either deflect external forces or redirect them.

At its heart, it is about motion, forward motion, momentum, unfolding spectacle, BONE CRUNCHING and HEART STOMPING stances in true WING CHUN style.

Yet there is a soul in the midst of all its bone crunching mayhem, big in power and scope.

The multi-layered actions are pow-wow, fast and furious and will definitely keep you on edge of your seat.

So who’s a better WING CHUN performer, DONNIE YEN or DENNIS TO?

Grand master IP CHUN airs his views:

“DONNIE excelled and trained extremely hard in WING CHUN for his movies. To the untrained eye it looks fantastic, but a real WING CHUN master would take one look at his moves and know that it wasn’t pure WING CHUN,

DONNIE does not have a foundation in WING CHUN, so no matter how hard he trained, some of his non-WING CHUN fighting moves would be noticeable!”

Well said, but DONNIE YEN has that “majestic” albeit charismatic presence that newcomer DENNIS TO would have to take many long years to accomplish.

Well, something’s gotta give, right?

Director HERMAN YAU has helmed an admirable movie that’s truly entertaining, at best.

Whilst the rip-roaring actions in DONNIE YEN’s IP MAN aim to glorify, the fights in THE LEGEND IS BORN, on the other hand, seek to justify.

It’s all in true WING CHUN form.