Let’s take a look at the behind-the-scenes and TMI of the movie “A Bittersweet Life”.
1. The scene in which Lee Byung-hun fainted after being hung for 12 hours
The scene in which Sun-woo (Lee Byung-hun), who was kidnapped after being attacked by President Baek (Hwang Jung-min)’s henchmen, was hung in a factory building and faced President Baek’s gang.
Lee Byung-hun was drenched in water in the middle of winter and hung from the ceiling for hours. The shooting lasted 12 hours and he had to act while being wet in cold water.
When filming this scene, there was a scene in which Oh Mu-sung (Lee Ki-young) was beaten on the back with a blunt object believed to be an iron pipe. Even though he was wearing a protector to protecting actors, the blunt object he was wielding hit the part without the protector. It is said that the scene in which Lee Byung-hun struggled in pain in the drama was real, not acting. Fortunately, the blunt object is a prop that is not real.
2. The scene where Lee Byung-hun has a black plastic bag placed over his head
In the scene where Sun-woo is being dragged out of a Bongo car, a black plastic bag is placed over his head and covers his face, making it impossible for him to know where he is.
This scene reflects the grim aftermath of the Iraq war at the time. This is a reference to the setting in which U.S. soldiers and Iraqi terrorists wore black masks on prisoners.
3. The scene where Lee Byung-hun shed tears as he assimilated Sun-woo’s feelings
In the scene where the crime boss Kang and Sun-woo meet at an abandoned warehouse on a rainy day, Kang asks Sun-woo why he made such a choice.
Lee Byung-hun’s tears in this scene reflect Sun-woo’s feelings. He has been abandoned by his own boss, whom he serves for a long time and considers like his parents, so there is no one he can depend on anymore.
4. Behind the scenes of Sun-woo’s burial
The scene where Sun-woo is buried alive and barely manages to break through the ground to escape was filmed at an abandoned warehouse in Cheongpyeong.
In the first place, when Lee Byung-hun was put in the hole, the surface was only covered with soil slightly and a safety device was also installed so that he could come out right away. However, when the production team added heavy rain, the soil, which had slightly covered the hole, was swept away by the water, making the scene become like a real living burial. The whole team eventually had to film the scene twice.
One or two 5-ton water sprinkler trucks were mobilized to the filming set every day for the production of rain in this scene, and Lee Byung-hun was completely soaked in water. Other actors appeared with umbrellas, while Lee Byung-hun was the only person who had nothing to cover. They filmed the rainy scene like that for about two weeks. Lee Byung-hun had to act on the bare floor with only a shirt on and got 100 tons of water poured on him in the middle of winter.
It was to the point that Lee Byung-hun had to follow a separate health care treatment after filming this scene. It was Lee Byung-hun’s most difficult performance ever.
5. Lee Byung-hun performed action acting in a chaotic situation while wearing a body camera
It was Lee Byung-hun’s warehouse scene that was highly praised by viewers in both Korea and overseas. To make the scene look more vivid and add liveliness to the scene, he wore a body camera while doing dynamic action acting. Lee Byung-hun said he was very busy at that time because he had to act while also paying attention to his fast action and the body camera
