In the spirit of watching Korean comedy movies, I opened “The Young Master of the Whorehouse” with the usual flamboyance and exaggeration. I was not expecting it, but when the movie came to an end, I was so saddened that there were still some tears on my face. What made me so moved? Perhaps, it was the sad fate of the main character, Xu Se, that made me feel the same way.The Young Master of the Brothel”, also known as “The Young Man of the House”, is about the love tragedy between Xu Se, who was born to a prostitute and grew up in a brothel, and Hai Yuan, a young lady.
Xu Se’s mother passed away early due to emotional problems and entrusted him to the brothel’s pimp aunt. The aunt scolds Xu Se, but she treats him as her own son. She especially opposes Xu Se’s hanging out with the flamboyant girls and hopes that he will study for his exams to change the humble fate of the brothel.
Xu Se grew up to be a scholar who was a good scholar, skilled in Chinese chess, calligraphy and painting, especially in portraits, and also knew Siamese Dougu (Thai). However, due to his bad birth, he was not qualified to take the Imperial Examination, which would have made him a prime minister. Growing up under the skirt of a prostitute, Hsu Se was very kind and understanding to women, so he was liked by the sisters of the brothel. Especially, the youngest sister, “Oldest”, who was sold into the brothel as a child, regarded him as a brother and had a secret love for him.
The township where the brothel is located is a microcosm of feudal male society, and the head of the township has built a “Hall of Martyrs”, which is dedicated to chaste women. However, there were always women who could not stand the endless suffering of chastity and went to the brothel dressed as men for fun. Naturally, the various prostitutes in the brothel were unable to satisfy the needs of these new “johns”. When the aunt is at her wits’ end, Hsu Se reveals that what he sees through is the look in his eyes as he passes by the fake “johns”.
From then on, Xu Se became a “prostitute” in the brothel. His enchanting beauty, poetry and painting, delicate dancing, and sweet words attracted hordes of chaste women to patronize and fascinate them, which also saved the brothel on the verge of closing down. However, Xu Se had only heartfelt sympathy and care for these women, so he only drank and had fun with them. It is not until he meets Haiyuan, a young lady, that he feels true love. So, he launched all kinds of joking and joking pursuit of Haiyuan, and finally captured her heart.
The good times don’t last long. When Hae-won curiously asks him about his talent but not taking the imperial examination but only the translation exam, he suddenly wakes up with a heavy blow and realizes that he is separated from Hae-won by an abyss-like class gap. So, he ran away from Hae-won and hid himself in the corner of a brothel…
At that time, the youngest sister of the brothel reached the age of 17 and became a client. In order not to be a common man, she only committed herself to a scholar who had a wife, and was full of chastity for that man, expecting him to redeem her after high school. Until one day, she saw that man really high school in the street, servants sounded the gong to open the road, crossed the white horse to ride past her, but ignored her. Finally, she woke up from her dream, desperate, and finally understood what Xu Xie meant when he said to her, “How can a prostitute enter the Hall of Martyrs”, so she chose to hang herself.
The death of her sister, Missy, together with her mother’s sadness, ignited Xu Se’s anger against the “Hall of Martyrs”, a male-dominated society. So, after getting drunk, he burned down the “Martyr’s Hall”, and also left a handle on the noble son who grew up with Haewon and failed to propose marriage, and sent Xu Se to jail after a group beating.
He is sent to jail after a group beating. Hae Won visits Heo Seok in jail and asks if Heo Seok really loves her or is a “whore” by nature. At this time, Xu Se had already lost his heart and turned his back on Haewon and said, “A whore like me would never fall in love with anyone”. These words completely chilled Haewon’s heart, and she left the cell door in despair, leaving Xu Se to sob deeply…
So, the desperate Haewon married a nobleman. And Xu Se, since then, living in seclusion in the countryside, a person to live a life of painting and farming. At the end of the movie, it is Haewon who comes looking for him, and sends her little girl to visit Xu Se, who has grown a lot of hair. They didn’t see each other after all, and Xu Se only asked the little girl to bring back a painting to her. When they were young and in love, Xu Se once painted a portrait of Haiyuan, and the maids made a scene and stained the ink, so the painting was not finished. At that time, Hae Won just lightly said “It’s okay, you can paint for me again in the future”. I didn’t expect that this painting would be the end of their lives.
When she saw the painting, Hae Won, who was already a noble lady, used the Thai word “bentrakun”, which Heo Sae had taught her, to praise the beauty of the painting. The lively girl told the lady that she had been taught a few words of Siamese, and that “benglakun” did not mean “beautiful”, but “I love you”!
Hearing all this, Haiyuan’s old tears welled up and she muttered: Is it so hard to say I love you?
Eventually, Haiyuan got into the carriage with the support of the servants and turned to leave. And Xu Se, standing in a farmhouse on the hillside, watched a group of people holding the carriage go away, leaving only the rape flowers on the roaming hillside gently swaying…
From then on, my life no longer has dreams, only the staggering of day and night and the wasting of life. The first thing you need to do is to use your life to paint the love of your life. I, on the other hand, have long become worldly. About love, I, like most people, chose to laugh at myself and bury it.
The Young Master of the Whorehouse” is a small budget comedy movie with a low rating, but I spent so many words to write this afterthought. Because, he can make me shed a few long-awaited tears for this sad fate…
