“We should totally go on a road trip!” How often has a sentiment like that, delivered late in a night of heavy drinking, led to an actual road trip? It nearly doesn’t in this amusing deadpan comedy; three guys in a Seoul bar swear they’re up for a trip to cheer up their pal Hyeok-jin (Song), who’s just been dumped. But the next morning, Hyeok-jin arrives by bus in a summer-vacation spot in the dead of winter, only to find he’s the only one who really was up for the trip. For the next several days, he wanders around calling his friends to try to get them to join him and drinks heavily with strangers, with the results you might imagine—yes, he loses his wallet, his cell phone and his pants.
Hyeok-jin’s misadventures arise from two sources: the etiquette surrounding drinking in Korea, and male hormones. To say no to an offered drink is simply not done. And when a girl says “Buy me a drink,” how can a guy say no?
As any designated driver will tell you, watching people drink and listening to their drunken conversations wears thin pretty fast, but Noh keeps Daytime fascinating by keeping his focus on Hyeok-jin’s hopeless effort to be left alone while fate has other plans.