If you thought Kiran Rao’s watchlist only holds niche festival cinema and moody art-house gems, think again. The filmmaker has officially caught the K-drama fever, and she has her heart set on one iconic classic.
During an appearance on the podcast The Popcorn Hour, the Laapataa Ladies director opened up about her unexpected love for South Korean television. Acknowledging that she rarely tracks buzzy pop culture trends, she confessed, “I watch K-dramas. I mean, considering that I don’t usually follow popular culture, can you imagine me watching K-dramas? It’s crazy.” Yet out of all the shows she has explored, one series stole her heart completely.
“Best K-drama is a show called Reply 1988. It’s a fantastic show. It’s actually set in 1988. In fact, that’s something I would love to remake,” Kiran revealed, instantly sending cinephiles into a frenzy of excitement.
Released in 2015, director Shin Won-ho’s Reply 1988 remains the undisputed gold standard of slice-of-life storytelling. It tracks five childhood companions growing up alongside one another in Seoul’s charming Ssangmun-dong alleyway. While teenage heartbreaks and coming-of-age quirks drive the plot, Kiran observed that the series’ genuine emotional weight belongs to the older generation.
“The genuine jewel of this show is the older women, the mothers, and the fathers. They are just so good,” she explained, admiring how gracefully the show handles their silent sacrifices and financial worries. Drawing a poetic cultural parallel between Seoul and home, she added, “It’s set in a para, as they call it, a neighbourhood in Seoul in 1988. In fact, in Kolkata also you call it para only.”
It makes total sense why the narrative strikes such a deep chord with her. Rao’s cinematic sensibility, from the quiet urban connections in Dhobi Ghat to the grounded rural empathy of Laapataa Ladies, has always found magic in community bonds. Ssangmun-dong’s doorstep banter and shared dinners translated into an Indian neighbourhood with Kiran Rao at the helm? Now that is truly an adaptation dream Bollywood could get behind.
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