Just as problematic as the Taiwanese original :/
Ok so I only watched this because I watched the original Taiwanese versions so many times (which I think I only ever really liked because it was the first Mando-language drama I ever watched). I was really hoping they wouldn't repeat the same ultra problematic coercive control theme for this version, but they have. To more or less the exact same degree as the original which is a shame (and hence the low rating).Otherwise, I do feel like this version has a couple of things going for it. First, I am so grateful they changed the story timeline for this version. Because holy moly, the amount of flashback scenes in the original Taiwanese version was incredibly jarring and confusing. This version tells the story more or less chronologically which has saved a lot of grief.
Second, I liked how Ou Chen was written in this version compared to the Taiwanese. No shade on Peter Ho, I think this was a case of scripting rather than acting. Personally I found this version of Ou Chen a lot more believable than the Taiwanese one. He's also a bit more likeable/human in this version because has his business partners alongside him (rather than the Taiwanese version who was a clear loner).
Luo Xi's character I found more or less on par with the original. Other reviews noted that he seems to be younger in this version but if anything, I think that actually might work better in explaining his character's level of immaturity.
I know I said in my review of the Taiwanese version that Barbie Hsu was a bit lacklustre as Xia Mo compared to other roles she's done. But that said, the one thing she did get spot-on was the 'ice princess' side to Xia Mo's character profile. I found Zhang Xue Ying to be a solid all-rounder though without any real stand out moments.
A couple of things I was really disappointed by were, first, a secondary love story that did exist in the Taiwanese one but only as subtext (not being specific to avoid spoilers). Honestly, it should've stayed as subtext because I skipped most of that storyline in this version of the drama. Second, the music in this version was pretty poor compared to the Taiwanese version. The key difference there is that Barbie Hsu and Peter Ho are professional singers and so were able to contribute their voices.
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Pure camp joy
Hana Kimi is an absolute batsh1t crazy delight of a series. What this drama does so well is combine zany over-the-top comedy with beautifully sincere emotion. Disbelief? Suspended. Tears? Overflowing. And mind you, I rarely give out 10 star ratings.I've watched this series around half a dozen times and each time I get something new out of it. This is a massive credit to the writers who have deeply invested in their characters and have perfected the art of multi-level subtext. When I first watched this series in my early teens, I enjoyed it entirely at face value, rolling with the easy gags and appreciating the romance triangle.
Now, in my late 20s, I've been loving all the queer shenanigans going on just beneath the surface of Hana Kimi. Sure, there's heaps of queer stuff happening openly throughout the series, but it's really hard to describe just how camp this show is. And unapologetically so too. Sure, there's some queerphobic tropes at play – certainly a product of the time – but these are smothered with the overwhelmingly camp energy of the production.
I don't think you could make a series like this now. I think it would be condemned for being too "cringe" among the younger Gen Z crowd. I also think it would struggle to emerge from what is currently a big cinematic pile of Literalism. Which is a shame because, as my username suggests, I appreciate TV that is just a little bit unhinged.
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A satire that becomes the thing its parodying
EDIT: Came back to drop this from a 7.5 to 6.5 when i remembered that weirdly homophobic episode from the first half.The way I was bawling my eyes out with laughter for the first dozen or so episodes and then.... stopped. A Dream Within A Dream starts off as a fkn hilarious satire aimed at Chinese costume drama fans like myself. After having been let down a while ago by My Only Love Song – a Kdrama with a similar premise to ADWAD but terrible execution – I was ready to be hurt again.
Was I hurt? Yes. But only after thoroughly enjoying the first half of this series. And because the start was so good, I was uncharacteristically forgiving about the narrative trajectory for the rest of it (hence the weirdly high rating). A lot of times I was laughing at scenes in the middle episodes because I was viewing them through a satirical lens, even though the parody elements kinda fell off the wagon around the mid way point. There was also just enough small gags to keep me going to the end, but not without disengaging from major chunks of the storyline along the way.
The problem is that ADWAD ultimately folds in on itself. It becomes what it was parodying. And despite some attempts to salvage some of the humour and satire at the end, it never truly recovers.
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A thrill ride into an overlooked story
I'll be the first to admit I know very little about the Pacific Theatre of WWII. This may seem surprising given australia's geographical proximity and involvement in the fighting, but most of our nationalistic myth-making leans more into the WWI imagery than WWII.And as much as I would like to say a curiosity in history was the reason I chose to watch Dongji Rescue, I'd be lying. I was 98% there for the cast. And damn, did they deliver.
I didn't even recognise Zhu Yi Long, even though I finished a third re-watch of the Story of Minglan earlier this year. Boy, does he have range! Same goes for Wu Lei, who I've seen in a few things, but I felt like couldn't quite shake the child actor background until now. Yet despite their stellar performances, Ni Ni takes the cake. Her character doesn't feature much until the latter half of the movie, but from therein she steals the show.
The storyline is a classic thriller style, mixed with the usual tropes of Chinese films set in this era. Like every Cdrama, the white characters are super cringe. Thankfully, their parts are kept relatively short, and only one pom sticks around long enough to get a name. There seem to be two thematic strands in the movie: the moral obligation to save lives, and the fraternal bond between the male protagonists. The first is executed well, but the latter suffers with the movie focussing more on plot progression than character development.
With that in mind, I think they could've chopped out Ni Da Hong's character altogether. He was simply one character too many and didn't really do much other than give Ni Ni's character substance. Not that her character needed it. She had depth after just a few seconds on screen. The other drag for me was a couple of scenes that verged a bit too close to melodrama. Combined with the cringe poms, they did take me out of the film quite a lot.
That said, the underwater and on-water shooting was the best I've ever seen. I would love to see behind-the-scenes footage of how that was achieved because, in spite of my mild thalassophobia and claustrophobia, my eyes were glued to the screen.
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Arthdal Chronicles Part 1: The Children of Prophecy
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Arthdal Chronicles was way more interesting than my political science degree
~Review of Part I only~Honestly, the political drama genre is almost dead to me at this pint. I'm sick of men in suits flouncing around parliament corridors pursued by journalists. I'm also tired of the high fantasy spin on the political drama genre which ends up just being an excuse to objectify women and showcase long-winded battle scenes. So I was thankful when I started watching Arthdal Chronicles for the breath of fresh air.
Part One – the first six episodes of the series – is all about the rich world-building. You're introduced to the characters, their settings, and the key political dynamics that set up the rest of the series.
These six episodes set the key themes for the rest of the series. These revolve around empire/nation building, racialisation, and spiritual agency. The show writers have been careful in their political crafting. They haven't just opted for a simple coloniser versus colonised binary, and instead have woven in layers of nuance right from the opening scene.
The writers also don't seem too keen on didacticism. The colonising act (trying to avoid spoilers here) is certainly depicted as cruel, but at this point the audience already has sympathy for characters on both sides. Ditto in regards to Neanthal, Igutu and Saram dynamics. This way, the characters and plot are able to achieve complexity and depth – the result being a beautifully rich world.
There's also something interesting happening with how the series treats religion/spirituality that means I'm refraining from calling this a fantasy series, but I'll get to that in my review for Part Two.
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Ask for a water pistol, get intergenerational trauma instead
This is an odd movie. Firstly, Above the Dust isn't your usual Chinese production. Chinese film faithfuls will note the lack of dragon seal in the opening credits: the usual sign a movie has passed Chinese government film regulations (i.e. censorship).Director Wang Xiaoshuai did submit Above the Dust for review, but he ended up having it screened overseas, after the censorship process dragged on.* And I can see why regulators would take issue with the film's substance. It casts a critical eye on the cultural revolution via the viewpoint of a family descended from a rural landlord.
Second, the movie is also odd in its storytelling approach. Narrating through the eyes of a modern-day child who encounters the ghost of his grandfather is a well used narrative device. Using the kid's obsession with a water pistol as a springboard into major political themes was a clever move.
However, it felt like narrative cohesion suffered due to split focus. It touched on family betrayal, connection to land, urbanisation, and contradictions within state governance. Yet with so much to chew on, I felt the storyline didn't delve deep enough for me to digest any of this properly.
In terms of visual style, I'm not sure why, but the blanched colour grading felt grating to me after a while. I know its purpose was to emphasise the dry land and provide a dream-like quality. However, to me I felt like it was...obscuring something? I don't know. I just kept constantly wondering what the scenery really looked like.
Still unsure if I can say whether I liked this film or not. I'll need to sit with this one for a bit.
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* Source: https://variety.com/2024/film/news/wang-xiaoshuai-china-berlin-above-the-dust-1235913938/
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Robin Hood plays it safe
Kundo feels as if some film bro wanted to play around with some Western genre tropes and picked up the first script that would suit his purpose.It's a typical Robin Hood style narrative. The underdog protagonist and his tight crew give their all as they fight against the tyrannical overlord. Swords swing, arrows fly. And a female character is even allowed a few lines.
The result is a patchwork of horses, fields, and fight scenes. And by patchwork, I mean patchy. The entire thing is very roughly sewn together. Once every 20 minutes there's an awkwardly inserted Western trope, after which the film awkwardly limps until the next one.
That said, there's a couple of well choreographed fight scenes in here that helped lift the production value a little. And just to help me get past the halfway mark is Kang Don Won who plays a captivating villain, aided by the fact that he's quite hot. Thank you for your service.
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Not sure what the director was trying to achieve here
To be fair, I did only see the second half of The Last Emperor. I was flicking around for something to watch at 1am and this was playing on SBS World Movies. For those of you familiar with SBS, you would know that this is the only true way to properly experience SBS movies.Admittedly, I initially thought Joan Chen's Empress was the protagonist. Partially, because she was the feature of the scene I came in halfway through, but also because she had the strongest presence on screen. Honestly, what a diva. Recognised her immediately due to having watched Ruyi's Royal Love in the Palace so many times.
Otherwise, this film just gave weird old-school Hollywood vibes (yes, yes, I know he's Italian, whatever...). First of all, did this seriously need to be almost entirely in English?? Like I get that Western audiences are racist, but if they've chosen to watch a movie about the last emperor of China, I feel like they can handle some Mandarin, y'know? Plus, you have the lethargic orchestral score, and then the weird flattening of Evil Japanese and then Evil Maoists...well, it all left a bland taste in the mouth.
Needless to say, I'm really not inspired to go back and watch the first half. Cheers.
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One for the Austen girlies
To lovers of Pride and Prejudice: I strongly recommend The Story of Minglan. You will easily find familiarity in this drama. A sharp-minded protagonist. A well-off but extremely hectic family striving for status. Leisurely pacing to match the domestic world to which Minglan is mostly confined.The class perspective is also parallel. While there is much empathy for Minglan’s plight as the lowest on the rung within her own family, that empathy is not extended to the servants who follow the usual loyal/disloyal trope that I’ve spoken about in other reviews.
But it also feels a bit mean to make the Austen comparison. I found the Story of Minglan to be thematically richer than Pride and Prejudice. Here’s how:
1. The drama knows to condemn the Bingley character (Yuanrou) for his lack of backbone and perspective, no matter his polite manners and intent. Big thumbs up from me (My ex’s major flaw was lack of backbone,).
2. More importantly, the Story of Minglan acknowledges what so few Western romance stories do: a wedding isn’t the end. In this drama, a wedding can mark either relative freedom or eternal hell. It was quite convenient that Darcy’s parents in P&P are dead. Darcy’s domineering aunt is outside of the immediate household and so Elizabeth need not mind overbearing in-laws. On the other hand, all three Sheng sisters must contend with oppression in their new household in one form or another, whether that’s domineering in-laws or neglectful spouses. The man who Minglan ends up with is depicted as a perfect match not only because he understands the struggles of women but also because he accepts and celebrates her, warts and all.
3. The inner chambers are just as dangerous as any battlefield. While the patriarch may be the source of authority in the household, he is not always the wielder of power. These women wage war and men are factors in their calculations.
There’s much more I could praise about this drama. It’s beautifully intricate and the characters are superb thanks to exceptional acting. Give it a go.
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Laugh one minute, cry the next
I watched Post Truth while at home sick and it was exactly the heartfelt pick-me-up I needed. This movie is a seamless blend of comedy and sincerity, with everyone giving their all to the bit.The comedy element comes mostly from Wei Ping'an's wild goose chase as he hunts down the source of a bad rumour about a dead woman, Hu Lan, who he had briefly met when she had bought her grave plot from him. Special mention goes to Li Xue Win – who plays Ping'An's sister – for her performance in catfishing a guy essential to Ping'An's chase. This gag was extra funny as I definitely have friends who would do the exact same thing if called for.
The heartfelt part of the film comes from Ping'An's relationship with his daughter who, parallel to her father's quest, also grapples with doing the right thing, despite the steep cost. Their storyline was the perfect balance to the absurd hilarity that meant that Post Truth kept strong pacing.
A good romp if you need one.
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Hidden gem of a documentary
Hidden Letters is not an academic documentary. Instead it reveals history through the present, following two modern Nushu writers. Except for the opening frames (I'll address those below), the documentary is a delicate and thoughtful exploration of Nushu in its present form.The documentary explores the modern-day contestation around Nushu – through the women who engage with it – but also the opinions of men who think they know what they're talking about. (It turns out that mansplaining is the same in every language.) Unsurprisingly, it's the discussions between women about Nushu which come across as the most sincere.
The two Nushu writers meet with their own struggles as women, in part related to Nushu and in part related to their existence as women in a patriarchal society. Of course, these two things are enmeshed with one another. It is through their lives that Hidden Letters drives its emotions and messages.
For me, the only downside of this documentary is the opening frames. These are simply lines of text on a black background:
"For thousands of years, women in China were born to obey their husbands, fathers and sons.
Forbidden to read and write, their voices were silenced. Most left no record of their lives."
I'm not sure why Hidden Figures opens with such sa weeping, homogeneising statement (and in English too?). Particularly when what follows is a nuanced and complex insight into the evolution of Nushu. In a historical sense, Nushu itself was limited to the women of the inner chambers (and therefore not relevant to peasant women). But even saying "their voices were silenced" is in direct contradiction to the existence of Nushu itself – as well as other written records left by Chinese women of the past.
I'm not saying that oppression of women didn't exist - on the contrary, it was under such conditions that Nushu came into being – but I think Hidden Figures does itself a bit of injustice by opening with such a reductionist introduction to a deeply complicated form of communication.
That said, I highly recommend this documentary. It's well crafted and provides an intriguing insight into the intersection of Nushu and the everyday struggles of women.
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Meandering but exquisite cinematography
Still not sure how I feel about this film. Although at first glance, Viêt and Nam appears to be a romance, the complex storytelling makes it far bigger than just the story of two miners finding solace in one another.The film meanders, geographically and temporally, between the search for war martyrs and the vacillation of characters Viêt and Nam as they decide whether to leave the country. This film is exquisitely shot. And honestly, I was so wrapped up in the composition of some scenes that I wasn't really paying much attention to the blurring of reality and dream. You can totally see how this made it to Cannes.
Ultimately, I would say Viêt and Nam is more about the processing of post-war trauma than it is about romantic love. Or rather, the latter is a manifestation of the former.
I have mixed feelings about the ending which, though based on true events, feels trope-y compared to the rest of the film. I also feel like that level of pessimism is a bit of a cop out, regardless of whether its depicted as dream or reality, but happy to be convinced otherwise.
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An intimate view into the life of a North Korean loyalist and massacre survivor
With a shaky cam, home video style of filming, Yang Yonghi takes you into her family home in Osaka and documents her interactions with her aging Zainichi* mother.The documentary opens with a startling intro: Yang's mother is a survivor of the Jeju 4.3 massacre. And although the documentary starts and ends with a focus on this event, the documentary isn't really about the massacre itself.
Much of the doco sees Yang spending day-to-day family time with her mother while also trying to figure out why her mum has made the decisions that she has made. A key focus is Yang's simultaneous understanding and perplexion around her mum's decision to send her three sons to North Korea.
Initially, I was a little worried about the run time. Two hours is a long time for these types of home video style productions. But there's clearly been a lot of thought put into the narrative structure that balances well the family quotidian and the political themes.
The big weakness of this doco, I feel, is the animated sequence past the mid-way point. The purpose of this sequence is to provide background into the Japanese colonisation of Korea and the eventual split between the ROK and the DPRK. But this comes far too late in the program and, given the ground already covered at that point, feels repetitive. It would have been far more effective near the beginning for those unfamiliar with the history. The animation itself seems muddled with different styles that gives it a uni-student feel.
What this doco does deliver well is intimate insight into how family relations are bound up in broader historical and political dynamics. It's touching and sentimental without straying into romanticisation.
*Zainichi are Japanese citizens with Korean heritage.
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Where simple storytelling draws you in
For the record, I don't give out 10 star ratings lightly. In fact, I think this is my first one on this site.Liway isn't particularly intricate in its storytelling or production. It tells the story of a couple of freedom fighters who are imprisoned with their two kids under the Marcos regime. But its simplicity is Liway's greatest strength.
The plain storytelling works so well for two reasons. One, the characters are rich and tactile. The actors do an incredible job in demonstrating what make each character tick, their fears, and their raison d'être. It makes them feel incredibly human and incredibly real.
And thus reason two: the story is a true one. The punch of this really follows through in the epilogue and credits where the connections between the film and real life are made explicit. I already knew about the big reveal at the end before watching Liway, but it still hit me emotionally like a tonne of bricks.
All in all, despite the occasional cliché (though these are done well) and a little heavy-handedness with the music, I think Liway does have an important place. The emotional weight of the storytelling aside, releasing this film during Duterte's presidency – and having watched it now with Marcos Jnr in power – really highlights the necessity of stories like this in contributing to collective memory.
And, yes, you will need a tissue box for this one.
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Very lowkey smut (by mainstream Chinese standards)
Honestly, this is the first vertical drama I've watched all the way through so perhaps I've been too harsh with my star rating. That said, I don't want to get anyone's hopes up.The premise of this drama is a slightly different take on the contract marriage trope: the FL and ML have already been married for three years (but are still keeping their relationship secret under the guise of love/hate coworkers). This allows the storyline to skip the usual ML chasing FL convention and cut to the chase: steamy intimate scenes. These are really the closest thing Chinese media can get to sex scenes. They quickly get repetitive, but the first couple get a solid thumbs up from me.
For what it's worth, the FL and ML have decent chemistry, although I feel the actress does most of the heavy lifting. However, the story isn't particularly engaging and I ended up watching this drama as a way to help me get to sleep. I definitely got to the point where I was scrubbing through whole episodes to see if there was anything worth watching for the last 30 mins of episodes (spoiler: no, not really).
Anyway, I guess this was an ok way to dip my toes into the vertical drama world.
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