Reviews

Have your tissues handy

"Remember" might be uncomfortable for some given the subject matter of the Japanese occupation of Korea. Forced labor to other countries of Korea's young men, young women under the guise of working in a factory being forced to give "comfort" to a foreign invader's military men, businesses aquisitioned for the growth of the invading power are but a few of the points at the forefront.

"Remember" was tight and lacked the flaws usually found in a film. The determination of the lead character in his mission was lead by an equal fixation of the scripwriter and director. The plot was straight forward with no detours. Action, Thriller, and Historical genres were given equal measure, with suspense heavily-laden. There was NO room for romance. No room for dilly dallying away precious time in a nearby coffee shop. The story was moved along with one goal in mind. And it was fantastic!!!

I have no descriptions for the 2 main leads. There aren't enough superlatives. The supporting cast were mainly veteran actors who never give less than in any project. It was a male-driven film.

Oh, and if the truth about the past is not remembered & preserved we'll definitely be inclined to repeat it.

Seriously, the ONLY thing that bothered the heck out of me during the entire 2 hours and 8 mins was the Americanized nicknames for the T.G.I.F's (more commonly known now as Friday's) employees which I've seen in other dramas. THE USE OF JASON AND FREDDIE GRATED ON MY NERVES. I hope this one factor isn't an issue with the local employees of the international company. It's degrading and disrespectful.

I rated the music lower ONLY because, well, did it have music???

Leia Mais

This fish may put you over the limit

If The Legend of Jiang Zi Ya was not a cheaply made movie about the titular character, then it did a good masquerading as one. The CGI was close to home computer level quality. Jiang Zi Ya would most likely be a familiar character to the audience and perhaps that's why the writers glossed over anything resembling character development, but by doing that it significantly lowered the stakes for the characters in the movie.

Jiang Zi Ya battles a river demon after it has eaten the parents of a little girl named Phoenix who were fishing on a raft. After imprisoning the river demon, Jiang is called on the carpet by Primus. Primus tells him he must apologize for hurting innocents during his battle with the river demon. Jiang steadfastly refuses and is subjected to 15 years of lightning bolts and then being thrown down to earth as a mortal. The now grown Phoenix rescues him and miraculously carries his bruised and bloody body into her hut. The villagers quickly turn against him thinking he is responsible for another river demon threatening them and try to feed him to the giant fish. He ends up saving a little girl from being eaten and is now hailed a hero. The local earth god shows up and lets the cat out of the bag as to who he is. He sends Jiang to the Mausoleum of Deification to retrieve his Deity Whip. Phoenix who feels indebted to him for saving her life years ago, agrees to accompany him as does Rocky, the idiot who loves her. Rocky is the kind of sidekick who makes sure they leap from the frying pan into the fire on various occasions because of his lack of intelligence and self-control. While escaping an ancient ax-wielding demon, Jiang is hurt. Goddess Phoenix (yeah, I have no idea why she looks just like earthly Phoenix and the writers didn't explain) tells mortal Phoenix to transfuse blood into him. This seems to give him his powers back, but it could be because goddess Phoenix was mixing her blood in, too. Again, no clarification by the writers. They finally arrive at the resting place of the whip but are stopped when a voice tells Jiang if he takes the whip, the villagers will die. Our hero goes back to the village sans whip and now has to battle the river demon who has escaped his prison and is looking for payback.

The ending deals with sacrifice and benevolence. Thankfully, after all the sacrifices the women in Jiang's life made for him he's learned to let go of romantic love. Didn't help those women, but at least he's free to go on his heroic way unfettered to do his Investiture of the Gods work.

The movie relied on primitive looking CGI and the battles weren't exactly tension filled. The fight choreography was simple and unimaginative. Primus looked suspiciously like The Eye of Sauron.

Despite the low quality effects Benny Chan and Niu Ze Meng were likeable in their roles. They fell in love awfully fast. Of course, hers could be hero worship and for him she was a ringer for his girlfriend (who he hadn't seen in 100 years). The acting aside from the main two characters was cringe-worthy. One older woman's job was always yelling someone's name repeatedly when there was danger. "My granddaughter!" "Phoenix!" "Xiao He!" It became humorous after a while. The version I watched used English names for some of the characters in the subs, just to make you aware there are different versions out there.

Aside from the female doppelgänger situation, the story was easy to follow. For the most part it was entertaining despite the cheesy CGI and acting. The ending was a letdown as it used the female sacrifice trope I am well and truly over. I began to think the river demon cleaning house wouldn't be such a bad idea. Clocking in at just over an hour, The Legend of Jiang Zi Ya doesn't require much commitment but it could strain your patience.

3/16/23

Leia Mais

I don't really know what I liked the most, maybe the peaceful energy.

I was not fond of the end, I guess open ending like that aren't my cup of tea, but it was still interesting in a way.

But for sure, I felt the pain of the mother. She lost everything, and she stills accepted to take care of him. She is sick, she is feeling a great distress, she is lost, she feels lonely...
Having him might have woken up the old her, the piece of her she was searching for.

Overall, I liked it. It wasn't that exhausting to watch and differents subjects were still talked about. They weren't talked about in a light way and it wasn't pressuring as well.
I feel that it is a really hard to recommand that movie but you should at least all try to watch it once.

Leia Mais

I am actually someone that is scared super easily but I don't know why, I was able to watch it completely without being that scared (which is actually amazing).

I didn't put 10 for the rewatch value because if you know the plot, the story isn't that surprising anymore. I liked it...no I think it was great. The story was not seen before (from my perspective I guess), which made the whole movie a lot more interesting.
The acting was also on point. Woo-shik and Da-mi did an amazing job, I'm impressed.

I think it's the type of movie you should all watch without looking for the plot before, it makes everything 10 times better.
Captivating is the right word for this movie.

And unexpected.

Leia Mais

Old school revenge

This was the most camp Korean movie I've ever seen. So exaggerated, so melo, so in your face. I laughed way too much at just how perfectly done it was. Now you may ask why only six stars? Because the cinematography is so dated it looks like a 1970s movie even though it was filmed in 2005 and there just wasn't any need for it to look that bad. In any event, it was quite interesting.

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Leia Mais

good mood and tone

Sunny Our Heart Beat Together is a girly friendship Japanese movie by Genki Kawamura, who is also the director of Your Name (2016). This movie is about a 90s high school friend group named "Sunny," which used to spend their teenage years together. Until 22 years later, each of them was grown up and facing adult problems for themselves. One day, one of the members, Nami, runs into another Sunny member, Serika. But, she has been ill because she has cancer, which has no cure. Serika told Nami that she wanted to reunite with Sunny before she died. Then, Nami is trying to do everything to make Sunny come together again.
They did very well in the part that can make the audience deep down with their relationship. And, the scene of the movie is cut back of forth between the part of past and past of present making the audience not bored. Moreover, mood and tone obviously show the difference between the colorful life of a high school girl and the dark life of an adult woman. In the past part, there are also some scenes that use song to be the main theme of that part, like it’s a musical movie. For me, it caught my attention and made teenage life more wonderful. Many scenes are lighthearted. On the other hand, there are also many scenes of gloom. It made this movie do very well in contrasting bitter and sweet. Good combination.

Leia Mais

Felt like a drama recap were if you haven't watched the drama you wouldn't feel the connection

Such a missed opportunity! I was so excited seeing the leads and so disappointed as I finished the movie.
The story is your usual youth stories, the main characters were really interesting, the hopless playboy, the female school leader, and the mysterious new Seoul girl. They had so much potential but got totally sidetracked by the mix of everything in a small pot.
Like so many side stories shouldn't have been there because we got barely any attachment to anyone in the movie. The 2nd female lead had an interesting story that was left vague and never told.. even the fl was kinda never really explored. The story losses the way from the very beginning, you end up not knowing what was all of this about.
Like there are even characters (the beared guy who's always in MLs house) that serve no purpose but to take up screentime as if the movie has alot to spare!
6/10 It's watchable until the end
Rewatch value : never

Leia Mais

Action Scenes strung together....

The only redeeming quality of this movie, are the action sequences and production value.
Watch it once if you can pay attention for that long and move on.

I have no prior knowledge of the novel this is based on, nor watched any of the previous adaptions.

These series of novels are famous and very popular supposedly. Based on this and another adaption of a different novel from same author, they just seem like badly written webtoons. Makes sense if these are what inspired all the badly written webtoons... lol. I am a fan of Wuxia, but so far these adaptions of these popular novels are not it.

The way the story is told, pacing and unlikeable characters presented you left with the feeling of indifference and confusion. The way ML is setup/found multiple times in the same way, was almost comical. The romance seemed forced, and many of the characters introduced are rushed and thrown in from out of nowhere.

The ending is rushed with a few flashbacks causing more confusion rather than completing the plot holes. You don't make a standalone movie expecting your audience to have knowledge to fill in half the story.

It just feels like this movie was just to showcase Donnie Yen directed action sequences. Which was great! Except the final fight, too much telekinesis ki power maybe? Every time ML fired off his ultimate move, i heard the T-Rex from Jurassic Park. lol.

Leia Mais

Disturbing to say the least

This movie has the basest yet most disturbing plotline I've seen in a while and the thought this was made in 2019 almost brought me to the brink of despair. The scriptwriter has to have been a sadist otherwise there was absolutely no reason to tell this half-assed story about a special needs young girl who was raped repeatedly -on screen- in the most harrowing of circumstances. What was the point of this?

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Leia Mais

Miss Manners for martial arts

Martial Club followed Wong Fei Hung from goofball show-off to accomplished and more thoughtful fighter. Though the story wasn't too compelling it had some interesting fights in it. Gordon Liu, Robert Mak, and Kara Hui as three young fighters from two different schools had a nice, if not too dynamic camaraderie. If it feels like I'm damning this movie with faint praise, I probably am.

The movie opens with an elaborate Lion Dance that is interrupted by a rival school led by Lu Zheng Fu (Chu Tit Wo). Wong Fei Hung's father (Ku Feng) and Master Zheng Tian Shou (Wilson Tong) attempt to keep the peace with the troublesome school. Meanwhile, Wong Fei Hung and his buddy Wang Jinlin (Mak) have more fun horsing around and picking fights with paid marks than they do actually training at their respective martial arts schools. Wang Juying (Hui) has a crush on WFH and runs interference for her brother Jinlin. Along comes Master Shan Xiong (Johnny Wang), a fellow from the North, and apparently all people from the north are considered rubes and less intelligent, in a classic case of miscommunication, he delivers a punishing blow to Jinlin, stopping short of killing him. The aftermath causes WFH to rethink his devil may care attitude and he decides to commit to his training while Jinlin continues to hang out at the brothels.

Shan joins up with an old acquaintance at the rival school to the other two. Think Slytherin vs Hufflepuff and Gryffindor. The shady Lu's son (King Lee) and his buddies trick Jinlin at the brothel and nearly beat him to death doing nothing to help the tension between the schools. Afterwards, Lu invites the others to a Cantonese opera and then tries to have them arrested for watching the show without a ticket. An extended free for all brawl takes place until Papa Wong shows up and calms everyone down. Master Shan refrains from any of the infighting and often restrains the Lu family when he can. He tests WFH on his martial courtesy and is pleased. The two have a "friendly" duel in the Zig Zag Alley which was the highlight of the film. And then a pointless and abrupt ending.

There was little to complain about with the fights. Gordon, Robert, Kara, and Johnny were a delight to watch as always. Hsiao Ho also showed up to add some acrobatics. Gordon and Johnny's duel showcased a number of styles well done, especially as the alleyway became narrower and narrower. Kara was an elegant fighter, even if her character was a bit of a hothead. Lau Kar Leung, King Lee, and Hsiao Ho provided the creative martial arts choreography managing to make huge brawls and one-on-one fights interesting.

The problem I had with the film was that there wasn't anything really at stake except for school pride. Though the Lu School played dirty, they never received any punishment for their misdeeds because everyone was too polite and more concerned with keeping the peace. The film was largely about loyalty and martial arts decorum, manners if you will. The implied crush between WFH and Juying had no spark to it, at least on his part. Kara looked like she was trying to make some chemistry happen, but came up against Gordon's stony façade. The friendship between WFH and Jinlin faded as WFH separated himself skill-wise. Other than WFH's seemingly overnight maturity and leap in abilities, nothing actually happened in this movie except for a bunch of fights between the schools.

What I did really like. When I see Johnny Wang's name on a cast list, I immediately know who the Big Bad or the Big Bad's #1 henchman is going to be. Johnny nearly always plays a villain. This is the first film I've ever seen him play a reasonable, fair, moral character and he did a good job at it. It's a shame he didn't have more morally righteous or at least gray characters. Seeing him smile at WFH's courtesy and abilities and not because he'd just murdered a small town was something I didn't know I needed.

Things I learned about the Lion Dance and life:
#1-A lion should never smell another lion's butt. #2-There should be no blinking at another lion. #3-Do not approach another lion with a raised foot.

Martial Club had quality fights and a likeable cast. It just lacked that special spark to make it memorable. Any kung fu movie that could tame Johnny Wang might be too polite for the genre. Who knew making an exciting movie about martial arts manners could be so difficult?

3/15/23

Leia Mais

Monumental work for Korean independent movies!

Where was I in 2006? Dang, doing stupid things and nowhere close to this gem. You have to grow up to this. And grow up in all senses.

This showed South Korea inside out, not just as gay intolerant and hypocritical mainstream community, but corrupt, patriarch, insensitive, dirty on the inside. And Kpop smile on the outside. (no movie has nothing to do with Kpop, but if you know the industry, you know)

I'll start with the ending. Promise no spoilers, but if you watch close the last 10 minutes could stop at any point. We go from tragedy to triumph every minute of the ending. Director could choose to cut at any moment, and we could have been hysterical regardless. He made a right choice though...right?

The whispering scene (you will know if you watch it): the most magical moment between two humans. We all want a moment like that in our life to remember. What a string to pull!

Story is so...whats the right word? because "raw" doesn't do a true justice. You have to reach a certain point in life to realize that everything we do is based on the trauma of some sorts we had as a child or growing up.

Sets are just faultless and it feels like its part of the emotional rollercoaster this project puts you through.

If you are for quality, this is it!

Leia Mais

Not single 1 kiss in this*

In "Missions Of Love", out of all the missions, mission number 3 is kiss already. So, things looked like this movie should be cool and no waiting for number of episodes for nothing like in dramas, but! It doesn't happen. Then, what were missions 4 an on about? Nothing happens with the lead boy or any other boy.. (Like the lead from 'Mischievous Kiss'!)

The ending was probably intended to be moving, but it didn't work on me really, it kind of lost the spark a long while along:) It was just funny there was not much about which she could write "a novel".

*I'm not counting the ending credits kiss & I think they kissed each other right above/below the mouth anyways:)

Leia Mais

So Good

This movie exceeded my expectations. It's just a lighthearted comedy, that's what I first thought. But it continually made me smile when they smile, and my heart hurts when they're sad.

The ML is so respectful to the FL, he is someone who all females should hold candles to. Never settle for anyone who doesn't worship you like he does to her.

Their chemistry is also so sizzling from the get go (when they started talking on the phone). In the other dramas/movie, often the sizzle fizzes out once they're a couple, so when they decided to meet up halfway in the movie, I thought that's it, the chemistry will be gone. But not here.

The first time they met, they looked at each other shyly, and it made my heart smile. They were so sweet together!!!

I watched it again and again over the years. So rewatch value is definitely 10. It's so well acted. Well done!!

Leia Mais

ONE OF MY FAVORITE BL!

I've watched this movie version because I can't find a good copy of the series version, but I think they're just the same... Well, anyway, I love this so much. I love the storyline, the concept, the development, the conflict, everything... I really love everything in this movie. The actors portrayed their characters well, and they're very handsome. I love every of their interactions, how their relationship blossomed, the different characteristics of the male leads... I mean, it's really cute... how they act towards each other, they're really meant to each other and I love them so much. The effects are also fine... it's great actually, the music, the ending... ahh I love the ending. Just remembering their moments together make me smile. This is definitely added to my favorite list!

Leia Mais