The Suspicious Housekeeper
상한 가정부
SBS (2013) 20 Episodes, Grade:
A+
Family Melodrama Masterpiece, Mystery, Crime
Korean Drama Review by Richard, Ireland (Some "Spoilers" Ahead)
The Suspicious Housekeeper
(2013) is one of the most complex and remarkable Korean
dramas I have yet seen. This review only gives a partial
indication of its excellence and I am sure that each time I
see it, I will find something new.
The plot is well
structured, with a double center. There is, first of all,
the suspicious housekeeper herself, Park Bok Nyeo (Choi Ji
Woo, Winter
Sonata, Twenty
Again) who is psychologically dysfunctional,
having witnessed the murder of her family and been suspected
of being party to the deed by the police, and especially by
a particularly unpleasant, vicious, and fiercely domineering
mother-in-law.
Then there is the dysfunctional
family she comes to serve as housekeeper, the Gyeol family.
The tragic mother has committed suicide, in part because her
husband Eun Sang Chul (Lee Sung Jae, Gu
Family Book, Jealousy
Incarnate) has been cheating on her. He is
seriously, morally indecisive, and quite confused about
where his loyalty should lie - with his four children or
with his mistress Yoon Song Hwa (Wang Ji Hye). Indeed, so
incredibly weak-willed and afraid of responsibility is Eun
Sang that for a considerable time he lives apart from these
loving children and favors Yoon Song, despite the fact that
she is willing early in the drama to throw him under the bus
to save her job.
Full OST With
Scenes
For each of these two plot
lines there is a villain. Yoon Song is certainly the
dark person in the family story. She is most
immediately responsible for the mother's depression
and suicide through her taunts that she possesses Eun
Sang's love.
Far more wicked is the evil Seo Ji Hoon
(Song Jong Ho). While Yoon Song does grow as a
character, and finally achieves some sacrificial
redemption, Seo Ji Hoon remains a horror to the end.
Motivated by jealousy and consumed with a desire to
control Bok Nyeo the housekeeper, he initiated the
fire that killed her family, manipulated the
dreadful mother-in-law, corrupted a detective,
changed his identity and was able to stalk Bok Nyeo
by keeping tabs on both Eun Sang and Yoon Song
through offering them jobs with his firm.
There are some interesting side-plots,
such as the story of the relationship between Eun
Sang's father-in-law Woo Geum Chi (Park Geun Hyung)
and the woman who directs Park Nyeo's agency, Dr.
Hong (Hae Sook Kim). The busybody neighbor of the
Gyeol family rings another variation on the cheating
husband theme, and there is the gentle early love of
Han Gyeol for a member of the pop band, Soo Hyuk (Kang
Joon Seo).
However, the
major power and drive of this drama has its origin
in the tremendous acting performance of Choi Ji Woo
in the title role.
When we first meet her she is clearly
psychologically crippled. The combination of the
murders of her husband and son, and the hateful
influence of her angry, vengeful mother-in-law,
combined with being stalked by the corrupt detective
who is secretly employed by Seo Ji Hoon, has left her
unable to respond with love to others.
She adopts a defense mechanism - an
external robotic coldness that caps the volcanic
emotional turmoil within. She works according to set
patterns; she follows orders which permit her to
avoid making morally responsible choices. Her
request "Is that an order (myungyung)?" frees her
from making a moral choice by giving control to
another.
On two occasions we
see the danger of this situation. First, she takes
the little Hye Gyeol (Ji Woo Kang) to the river
where the mother died. She leads the child into the
water and is clearly reaching a point where one or
both might be swept away. Fortunately, the oldest
son Doo Gyeol (Chae Sang Woo) arrives in time to
prevent this from happening. This is a very
disturbing scene - particularly as Bok Nyeo is
following little Hye Gyeol's orders.
Later, Se Gyeol (Nam Da
Reum) is being bullied and in a fit of depression and
anger tells Bok Nyeo to kill the bully.
She nearly does.
Se Gyeol is there on the scene to
stop the deadly attack and, in fact, he learns from
the experience that violence is not always an
effective answer to life's problems.
As the drama
progresses, Bok Nyeo slowly humanizes. She organizes
the house; she goes to the school to deal with the
problems of Se Gyeol; Doo Gyeol at first resents her
but is won over as Bok Nyeo helps him discover a
hidden talent; she cleverly helps prevent Han Gyeol
(Kim So Hyun) from making a disastrous sexual
mistake, and most significantly she forms a deep
emotional attachment with the little Hye Gyeol - in
effect she becomes a mother figure to the little
girl.
This gradual change - the deepening of
character and moral authority - is brilliantly
conveyed by Choi Ji Woo. With incredibly skillful
minimalistic acting she conveys the emotional
transformation of the character with slight movements
of her facial muscles, through body language, through
tonal variations in her voice, and with that
incredible gaze.
And through it all she never smiles
(her angry mother-in-law had ordered her not to).
Later she actually plays the part
of a mother. But this is actually a way of helping
the children and the father to finally face their
feelings for their dead parent. They must be
faithful to the love they have for her, and they
must learn this lesson by again acknowledging that
maternal love, and re-experiencing the sorrow of her
loss.
Oddly enough, Seo Ji Hoon is a factor in
Bok Nyeo's transformation. Finding out that he is
alive after all gives the housekeeper a powerful
motive to re-direct her energies. Proving his guilt
of killing her family to the world frees her from
her own guilt, and frees her from the malignant,
psychotic hold of her mother-in-law.
And, finally, in
a wonderful scene near the end, she smiles. :)
Don't miss The Suspicious Housekeeper!
