Bargain director explains K-drama’s nail-biting one-take style

The fame of K-dramas has reached new heights in the last few years, with writer and director Jeon Woo-sung’s Bargain focusing on a human organ trafficking event going wrong thanks to an earthquake in a continuous one-take filming style.

Based on a Korean short film, Bargain K-drama is a thrill ride of survival, deceit, and the darkness of capitalism. No Hyung-soo (Jin Sun-kyu) is a run-of-the-mill businessman who decides to pay for sex with Park Joo-young (Jun Jong-seo). Taking place in a remote motel, he’s pleased with what he’s paying for.

But he soon learns the dire truth – his organs are being auctioned off. An earthquake allows him a chance to escape, but not without fighting off the people who bid on him. While Bargain’s storyline is filled with grit, its use of a one-take and continuous filming style adds an even higher level of anticipation.

Dexerto spoke with Bargain director Jeon Woo-sung to discuss the necessity of the filming style. As well as its connection to the original short film.

Bargain K-drama director needed to stick to two guidelines

When adapting the original short film into a K-drama, director Jeon had to maintain the original storyline while introducing the sudden earthquake, leading to the use of one-take continuous scenes.

While watching Bargain, audiences are made to feel as if they are in the room with the characters and watching chaos unfold. The camera sees everything from Hyun-soo at the motel to Joo-young meeting her co-workers and boss behind the scenes. It’s as if audiences are the fly on the wall following everyone and everything.

The original short film is almost exactly what audiences see in the first episode of the K-drama. A supposed high school student selling her virginity to a client for money. In reality, the client will be another victim of organ trafficking. Director Jeon had to meld together the original short film story with the K-drama’s tension of the sudden earthquake.

“When I was first offered to adapt this short film into a series, there were two predefined premises. The first was to preserve the original short film as the intro for the first episode of the series. The second was to introduce a sudden earthquake during an ongoing auction, leading to a dramatic shift in the situation,” explained the director. “When considering these two concepts, it was only natural for me to opt for the one-take camera action. Of course, this shooting style was advantageous not only for maintaining a continuous sense of tension but also for other aspects.”

The filming style helped create a perfect melding between the original and the K-drama. Director Jeon wanted to preserve the short film’s use of a twist cliffhanger.

“As the relationships between the characters kept getting redefined, the dynamics shifted, and situations from before were overthrown, giving rise to a black comedy. Additionally, unique characters – enigmatic villains who meet for the first time and walk the tightrope between truth and falsehood from beginning to end,” said the director.

Bargain is available to stream on Paramount+, and you can read more K-drama news here.