Ji-woong is a young man who looks like he can talk his way out of any situation, but who this time has really got his back to the wall. Unable to find a job, and months behind on his rent, he is kicked out of his rented room with only a few coins in his pocket. Luckily (?) for him, he lives across the street from Hong-shil, a tight-fisted, iron-willed woman with an uncanny gift for dreaming up ways to earn quick cash. She agrees to take Ji-woong under her wing and teach him what she knows about making money, provided he follows her orders and lets her control the bank account. For someone as desperate as Ji-woong, it seems too good to be true -- and it is: Hong-shil has ulterior motives.
Penny Pinchers is a romantic comedy for hard economic times. In contrast to the luxuriously decorated apartments, lavish shopping trips, fancy cars and high heels of the stereotypical romantic comedy, this film features a female lead who owns no television ("Why waste your money on something like that?") and who collects used beer bottles in order to trade them in for cash. Ji-woong, for his part, certainly wishes that he inhabited the world of a bigger budget-romantic comedy, but circumstances force him to learn how to get by without the standard material comforts. Can romance bloom in such impoverished circumstances? I'll bet you can guess the answer.
Although it doesn't adopt any radically new formulas, Penny Pinchers is a thoroughly appealing film that benefits from its down-to-earth backdrop. One of its strengths are its charismatic lead actors. Leslie Han (Han Ye-sul), who grew up in the US, projects a slightly different image from that of most Korean actresses. The character she plays is nothing short of obsessive, but she succeeds in being both convincingly obsessive and appealing at the same time. Song Joong-ki, meanwhile, ranks among a group of male actors in their 20s who have collectively set Korea buzzing in recent months -- the others being Yu Ah-in of Punch, Yoo Seung-ho of Blind, and Lee Je-hoon of The Front Line. His upbeat personality makes for a good match with Leslie Han's heart-edged demeanor.
Penny Pinchers may suffer from being too long -- a fault shared by most romantic comedies from Korea -- but it avoids many of the silly excesses of its peers, and leaves behind a lot of goodwill. Could it be true that the film appeals more to viewers who have lived through hard financial times, compared to those who haven't? That may or may not be the case, but it seems to me that the leads of the film possess a charm that is pretty much universal. And who knows? -- while watching the film, viewers may even pick up some useful tips about how to earn extra cash.
Darcy Paquet