TheUnhinged

Incredibly endearing but with a massive mid-way lull

It looks like I hold the relatively unpopular opinion that the last two episodes featured some of the best writing of the entire series. More on that soon.

What initially captured my attention for Twenty-Five Twenty-One was a) Kim Tae-Ri and b) the time period setting. The latter actually didn't seem to have much of an influence on the story as a whole but rather intervened in key moments at the beginning and the end. I think that's ok. And, of course, it goes without saying that Kim Tae-Ri put on a superb performance.

Nevertheless, it took me TWO YEARS to finish this drama. Yep. That's right. Essentially after the conflict between Na Hee-Do and Ko Yu-Rim was resolved, I felt like I was wading through molasses at the mid-way point of the series. I wasn't invested in any of the romantic plot lines and felt like at least half of the screen time between Hee-Do and Yi-Jin should've been slashed. I was desperate for more screen time between Hee-Do and her mum as well as Hee-Do and her daughter. In fact, it was the relationships between the women that meant that after a lottttt of dipping in and out, I was eventually motivated to finish watching the latter episodes.

Personally, I don't think this could've been a true coming-of-age narrative if those last two episodes had been any different. Putting aside the wish for more screen time between the characters mentioned above, what the last two episodes satisfied was the really annoying itch that had bugged me throughout all of Hee-Do's high school years. Yi-Jin felt like a teenage first love. And because he felt like someone trapped in that naive bubble, I struggled to invest myself into their relationship. But in the last two episodes, the two characters grew independently so quickly - while also growing apart from one another - that I rapidly became invested in that romantic storyline at the same time that I was crying over its poignantly inevitable demise.

At the end of the day, I believe the strength of the story actually comes from Hee-Do and Yu-Rim's relationship. Honestly, this is despite some hella bold choices from the drama's creators. Picking Hee-Do as the protagonist was risky. I think this could've been just as strong a story if it had been told from Yu-Rim's perspective (and I do think some of the class elements were fumbled a bit). But I think they made it work nonetheless. The other major risk was choosing fencing as the feature sport given it's relative lack of popularity and that it's - let's be real - super wanky. But, again, I think it ultimately worked.

In my opinion, Hee-Do and Yu-Rim's relationship should've been more central than the romantic one. I don't think it's a coincidence that I found the overall pacing slowed down when the pacing in the development of Hee-Do and Yu-Rim's relationship slowed down. Otherwise, maybe I could've squeezed out another star for this drama.

Read More

Souls trapped in the human realm, unable to move on

As much as I hate to admit it, it was the movie adaption of John Green's The Fault in our Stars that taught me, "Funerals... are not for the dead. They are for the living."

From watching the trailer, I thought this film would be presented in clashes of dichotomies: death vs life, tradition vs modernity, religion vs industry. And while all these themes do surface in the film, they don't do so as mutually exclusive dichotomies. Instead, the richness of The Last Dance comes from the intersections and overlap of these themes.

The story structure itself is neat. There are three parts and the narrative comes fulls circle, starting and ending with the Taoist funeral ritual of Breaking Hell's Gate. The cinematography of the ritual scenes alone could carry the film if needed. But the bulk of the film is what provides the emotional impact of these scenes.

The strength of this film is its messiness. And the messiness is found at the intersections. Tradition and modernity don't so much clash with one another as grasp out to one another, trying to find purchase, albeit sometimes in awkward or painful ways. This doesn't only play out in the funeral home between the male leads. The friction and fondness also happens within the family home as the characters try to figure out how religion features in their own identities and how it impacts their relationships with one another. There is also just enough wry humour – mostly from Dayo Wong's character – to provide breathing space (pun intended).

Unsurprisingly, there is a lot of death in this film. Despite the music being a tad heavy-handed at times, these are emotionally deep touch points. Each death progresses the narrative and also reveals some new aspect to the intersecting themes of the film.

To bring this review back to full circle, The Last Dance itself is for the living. Perhaps this is why we don't ever get to see any of the deceased characters on screen alive. The film is *about* the living because it is *for* the living. After all, no one gets to see their own funeral.

NB: "Souls trapped in the human realm / Unable to move on" are the translated lyrics of Terence Lam's song 普渡眾生 which plays during the credits.

Read More

When the only interesting part of someone's life is their execution.

This docudrama is surprisingly hilarious. It's also cleverly meta – in more ways than one.

Bayaning 3rd World follows a couple of filmmakers keen to cast a critical eye on José Rizal as The Phillipines' national hero. But at the same time, they struggle to figure out how to transform their take on Rizal's life into an engaging movie. So Bayaning 3rd World is a story about telling the story.

The humour comes from the filmmakers (who are not the actual filmmakers, btw, they're actors). They playfully navigate and interrogate this huge figure of Filipino nationalism. The storytelling style reflects this playfulness too – the filmmakers sit down with Rizal's family members and "interview" them. None of this is to say they are disrespectfully mocking Rizal. Quite the contrary, it's clear that the makers of Bayaning 3rd World are 100% sincere in their poking and prodding of what has made Rizal into a national hero.

One sticking point is Rizal's "retraction document". Supposedly, just before his death, Rizal converted back to Catholicism and, in doing so, retracted all his previous criticisms of the Church. But Bayaning 3rd World questions this version of events, suggesting that the document might be inauthentic. Why the fuss? Well, as one of the filmmakers points out, in Rizal's era, the Church and the State were one and the same. So for Rizal to renounce his criticism of the State would make him less worthy of national hero status.

To add another layer to this meta docudrama, it's important to note that director Mike de Leon made Bayaning 3rd World in response to the film 'José Rizal'. Directed by Marilou Diaz-Abaya, 'José Rizal' had come out two years earlier in 1998 as part of the centenary commemorations of Filipino independence.

To quote Antonio D. Sison's commentary, "In Diaz-Abaya’s film, Rizal is the prodigal son who returns to the colonial Catholic religion of his oppressors and renounces the very works that 'served to restore dignity, self respect, pride, and patriotism among the Filipinos'. De Leon makes an intellectual and entertaining effort at questioning this cut-and-dry story but without actually providing answers himself".

At the end of the day – hero or not – Rizal is still the central character to Bayaning 3rd World. Of course, it could've been otherwise. As one of the filmmakers remarks more than once after "interviewing" one of the women in Rizal's life – "Her life would be a much more interesting movie than Rizal's!"

===

Antonio D. Sison's review: https://www.sensesofcinema.com/2005/feature-articles/3rd_world_hero/

Read More

a religious production with rich anti-colonial flavour

This film caught me unawares. I was not expecting a Christian production from *checks notes* Jesuit Communications to be of this high quality. But that's because Gomburza "isn't just about church politics", to lift a line from one of the characters.

The premise of the movie is relatively straightforward: Filipino-born priests fight to be seen as equals to Spanish-born friars. Eventually, the priests are caught up in broader anti-colonial struggles at great peril.

However, less straightforward is the underlying question of the whole film: what is the Filipino identity? Of course, the film does not – and cannot – answer this. And to be fair, it doesn't try. It is the posing of this question that lends the film an extra layer of sophistication and makes up for some of the poorer writing in the first half.

The narrative premise and the underlying identity question do result in a split focus. The storyline revolves around José Borgos as one of the key individuals fighting to be recognised on equal footing to the Spaniards. But the storyline also diverts, often awkwardly, to follow poorly developed side characters who are meant to form an important part of the broader anti-colonial movement and theme.

Despite the meandering, Gomburza is an intellectually engaging film – at least for me as someone completely unacquainted with the history. It is also a highly emotive film, something I didn't realise until it crept up on me in the last twenty minutes and I found myself bawling my eyes out even though I thought I hadn't developed an attachment to the characters.

All in all, as someone who grew up in Anglican and Uniting Church spaces here in Aus, seeing a religious production with a powerful anti-colonial flavour is incredibly refreshing. Colour me impressed.

Read More

Mahjong? more like Nahhh-jong

This is an odd film. The story centres around the competition between two family members vying to inherit a Mahjong house.

At least I think that was the plot? Honestly, it was pretty boring so I had it on in the background while I was doing work. I'd say the first and last 20 minutes were the only vaguely interesting parts of the film.

The pacing is slow, the stakes don't really seem that high, there's little intrigue, the characters feel flat, and the eccentric humour is...well....eccentric.

Personal highlight was Betty's hair, makeup, and costuming; it gave the aesthetic a touch of retro cool.

Read More

Romanticisation at a cruel cost

The credits roll and my first thought is: What is the Filipino take on all this?

But we’ll get to that shortly.

The film Onoda is the fictionalised story of Hiroo Onoda, one of the last Japanese soldiers to surrender after the end of WWII. He was a ‘holdout’ on the Filipino island of Lubang until 1974. He survives in the jungle in denial of the war's end, losing his compatriots one by one. The story is fictionalised in more ways than one, but we’ll get to that shortly too.

At face value, the movie is surprisingly engaging given its long run time. There are also some pretty landscape shots. But that’s about all the positives I have for this piece of cinema. Buckle yourself in, folks!

Let’s start with a simple point. For a story so embedded in its Filipino geography, the decision to shoot in Cambodia feels off. And there’s good reason.

It’s a European production…with a French director…about a Japanese soldier…in the Philippines. Yes, that should raise an eyebrow.

“If you add up all those nationalities [who worked on the film], it makes the film from nowhere,” director Arthur Harari says in an interview with Asian Movie Pulse.

Yet, Cambodia was the destination of choice because Harari wanted a French-speaking film crew. Cambodia is a former French colony. It's certainly not “nowhere”. Neither is Lubang. The shoot location is only one of the ways in which colonial politics seeps into this cinematic production.

Many a filmmaker has simped for the romantic man-survives-jungle trope and Harari is no different, citing the likes of Joseph Conrad as original inspo for this movie. But it comes at cruel cost to the Filipino characters and their real-life counterparts.

I agree with James Lattimer’s assessment that the Filipino characters are used as “little more than cannon fodder”. Harari’s avoidance of the Filipino side – in terms of both geography and narrative – is a result of wilful ignorance. That is because he relies on Onoda the myth, not Onoda the man.

In true à la française style, Harari projects some kind of universalist reading of human experience onto Onoda’s story.

“I didn’t read historical books about Japan or the war,” he admits in an interview, “because the fact is that everything about Onoda’s story can be understood even if you don’t really know the general situation of the war, the Pacific War, or the history of Japan.”

In fact, Harari only read one book about Onoda, written by two Frenchmen: ‘Onoda: Seul en guerre dans la jungle’. As far as I can tell, the text seems sympathetic to Onoda’s side of the story, describing Onoda as a “prisoner of that island, of that oppressive jungle” (own translation). Heart of Darkness much? Either way, Harari mostly upholds the romantic hero image of Onoda in the film, an image which Onoda himself first established when he published his autobiography.

But even a little bit of reading about Japan or the war reveals how the Filipino people were cruelly caught in colonial crossfire. Their lives and land were used as military props and staging by the Japanese (and, of course, the Spanish and the Americans before that).

Onoda’s autobiography omits Onoda’s many gruesome murders of Lubang’s residents. Tsuda Shin, ghost-writer of Onoda’s autobiography, revealed this much when he wrote his own exposé on Onoda a couple of years after the autobiography came out.

Even now, it’s Harari’s cinematic project that receives the funding and the spotlight. Meanwhile, the Filipino side of the story struggles to see the light of day. Mia Stewart has set out to correct the record via documentary making. Her maternal relatives lived – and still live – in Lubang and experienced first-hand Onoda’s violent atrocities.

“They weren't just shootings, there were very violent killings that involved beheadings and mutilating bodies,” Stewart says in an interview with SBS.

Lack of funding means her documentary still hasn’t been released. But it’s a good cause. A myth like Onoda’s needs interrogation.

“We will never really know if Onoda knew the war was over or not. Regardless, he killed civilians. While I can't undo those deaths, I can change how we tell the story,” Stewart says.

----------

Stewart’s forthcoming documentary, ‘Searching for Onoda’: https://searchforonoda.com/

Stewart’s interview with SBS: https://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/mias-uncle-bled-to-death-she-wants-to-set-the-record-straight-about-why/qig3whkdb

Insights on Harari’s approach come from this excellent A. E Hart piece: https://www.documentary.org/online-feature/domitable-myth-three-depictions-japanese-holdout-soldier-hiroo-onoda

James Lattimer’s review: https://www.bfi.org.uk/sight-and-sound/reviews/onoda-10000-nights-jungle-lost-filipino-wilds

Read More

This movie could've been an email

I normally avoid watching C-dramas set during the republican era as they tend to be the most heavily lathered in government propaganda. 1911 is case in point.

The film tells the story of the 1911 revolution (or the Xinhai revolution as it's otherwise known). I'm not surprised that this particular event was the subject of such hammed-up propaganda given the revolution is key to the grander political myth-making of the modern Chinese state. That said, you can still do propaganda a lot better than this??

The storyline reads like my high school essays on Bolshevik Russia. It's a boring chronology of events with political commentary slapped across the top. The music and melodrama seems to indicate that you're meant to care about the characters on screen. But you don't.

It's normally a pretty safe choice to start a story in the middle of the action – in this case the failed Second Guangzhou Uprising – but without an emotional hook to the characters, mid action scenes exhaust their oxygen pretty fast. By following a Great Men of History approach, the main characters feel flat and 2D, their entire psyche presented in the form of political speeches or the flashing of guns.

By the end of the film, you're feeling pretty uninspired. There's a lot of monologuing where you start to think the character just likes the sound of their own voice. Jackie Chan is the only one allowed to wear a leather jacket for some reason. And the two normie characters who should've been the soul of the movie are really awkwardly tacked on at the beginning and end.

tbh, it's quicker and more interesting to read the wikipedia page.

Read More

#HottiesForGoodGovernance

I love bad boys. I especially love bad boys with sharp wit, dressed in black, and adorned with a fan to show that fragile masculinity is a foreign concept to them.

What I don't love is when a bad boy turns out to be not a bad boy at all.

Before I go any further, I'm setting PeachBlossomGoddess' review as pre-requisite reading because their review matches exactly my thoughts and feelings on The Double. The point on which I will extrapolate is why I think the drama ultimately undermines itself.

For me, The Double fails to follow through on what is a very powerful swing during the first half of the series. And this is for two reasons. The first, as PeachBlossomGoddess describes, is weak plot lines echoing those of other dramas of this genre.

The second reason, I argue, is the second half kills a boner. No, seriously, bear with me here. This drama is horny AF. In the first half, you have a FL and a ML equal in terms of looks and wit dancing around each other as they glide from suspicion to mutual trust to deep thirsting for one another.

The appeal of the ML derives partly from mystique. He has a sharp mind and, as explicitly stated, he is projecting himself in a similar direction to the FL. Although he doesn't ultimately give up his dom position, there's enough switching between the two to keep the power dynamic infused with sexual tension. At the initial stages of the drama, we don't know the ML's background nor his intentions. The fact he appears to be a bit of a lone wolf lends him an even sexier air; the idea that he isn't at someone else's beck and call.

Or is he?

It was a disappointment to find out that the ML, all this time, has been in cahoots with the emperor. I feel like you'd be disappointed too if you were crushing on a silver-tongued, hot and brooding colleague at work only to find out they're actually the boss' right-hand man. idk about you, but that gives me the ick.

Sorry but maintaining the status quo isn't sexy. I'm not saying everyone has to be a rebel or underdog in order to be attractive. However, if you're going for the Bad Boy Hottie approach, supporting the vanilla and (assumedly?) benevolent monarch kinda takes the edge off.

Honestly, this isn't an issue unique to The Double. It's probably safe to say that, to get government approval at all, the good governance narrative must endure in these historical C-dramas. As I've mentioned in other reviews, it's a common trope to have the FL and ML protect the emperor's power (or help the 'rightful' emperor ascend), even though at no point do we see proof that the emperor actually does anything beneficial for his people.

Which is why, by the end of the series, there's not much substance to the political plot. Oh goodie, #HottiesForGoodGovernance win again. I'm shocked. How grand, the ML and FL have mellowed and now have domestic bliss. Sly smiles and black coats be damned.

And y'know what? If it wasn't for Shen Yurong losing his cool right at the end, he could've been a great Bad Boy Hottie. Uxoricide aside, I'd personally love for a morally ambivalent (and conveniently good looking) scholar to come brood in my corner. Let's hang out, shall we? I know a great graveyard.

Read More

Finishes what Princess Agents (2017) started

I watched this drama purely for the sake of the FL and ML who most of us know from Princess Agents (PA). I was disappointed by what I saw as an unresolved ending to PA and so was very excited when the Legend of Shen Li popped up on my radar. On that point, I feel like the drama's creators had an easy job on their hands. For me at least, it seemed they could rely on the romantic chemistry pre-existing between the two lead characters (even if it was non-canon) and therefore develop a love story quickly and... weirdly?? The Chicken x Human romance gave me Bee Movie (2007) energy... Take that how you will!

In the end, I was incredibly satisfied with the romantic plotline. The rest of it, however, was pretty underwhelming. The side characters are poorly developed and the fantasy conflict elements are hodgepodge. Nonetheless, I still enjoyed it as an easy watch.

Read More

Just go watch Lost instead

Anatahan is a fictional retelling of the Japanese soldiers stranded on the Pacific island of Anatahan from 1944 to 1951. In both the real story and this one, they refused to believe the war was over.

This film features a Japanese cast and has dialogue all in Japanese, but the director (who also narrates the story in English) is a white dude who lathers the story with a heap of racist exotification and sexism. All in all, it's a pretty Western production.

As such, the story ends up as a crude Lord the Flies with the one woman on the island tossed around as part of the ongoing power struggle. The narrator and the other characters spend the entire film objectifying and harassing her (also content warning for domestic violence and rape, if you plan on watching this).

It's a shame because the premise of the story is an interesting one. Holding out on a stranded island for years on end has been the premise of many of a good piece of cinema. Yet this film flops. Badly.

Read More

It makes sense that a pen solves anxiety

After all, what Nervous Translation depicts so well is the eclectic reasoning of childhood. Following the character of Yael, I'm reminded of the way I made sense of the world at a similar age. Snippets of TV, bits of adult conversation, the intensity of school mathematics.

Yael's mum, Val, juggles exhaustion due to work, keeping her own private boundaries, and looking after family. She is real. We all know a Val or we are a Val.

Nervous Translation is a slice of life. I found the pacing to be a little too slow but, then again, the emotion did creep up on me near the end. At times, it verges on surrealism, sometimes with effect, sometimes less so.

A good film with a gentle touch on life's anxieties.

Read More

Body swap done perfectly

Normally I find body-swap to be incredibly cringe but I found myself enjoying it for the first time since watching Freaky Friday as a kid. Yu Shuxin and Dylan Wang really show off their acting skills. Because they do this very early on in the series, I was pulled in by the comedic element and kept watching from there.

The romance is sweet and although the FL/ML chemistry was strong, I never fully bought it. The support characters are fun albeit predictable.

But the real downfall for me was the plotline. I felt we were just starting to get somewhere in the storyline when the drama ended – similar to how I felt Princess Agents was cut short although at least this time it was a lot less jarring.

Read More

Political intrigue with a lil bit of unionism snuck in too :)

~Review of Part II only~

And here the plot thickens! We have emerged from the initial shock of invasion and now must deal with the logic of Arthdal. We are introduced to new characters and the storylines are separated for most of these six episodes.

Normally, I don't enjoy multi-perspective narratives because you almost always end up hating one storyline. But this was a rare exception for me – I thought they were interesting and well paced. It's a balancing act you don't see done effectively in cinema often enough.

Also big yay for the unionism :) We love worker solidarity.

As I mentioned in my interview for Part I, one thing I like about Arthdal Chronicles is how it treats spiritual agency. By spiritual agency, I mean the role of the spiritual world (rather than necessarily 'religion' because that's often associated with a man-made institution). This is the first piece of historical fiction I've seen to treat the spiritual world as a legitimate agent and as a political tool at the same time. Too often, historical fiction sees a belief in a spiritual world and then a political cynicism of religion to be mutually exclusive.

However, as seen in the characters of Tagon, Taheala and Tanya, they all have belief (of varying degrees) in higher powers but also will use those higher powers – and their religious institutions – for their own ends. I have a sneaking suspicion I'm probably the only person who's watched this series who cares about this point, but I'm a politics nerd, ok? (But if that does catch your interest, I do recommend reading Provincializing Europe by Dipesh Chakrabarty and where he critiques secular histories.)

Don't get me wrong, Arthdal Chronicles isn't perfect. One big downside for me was I started noticing in this section of the series that the music can be a bit lacklustre at times. I can't remember if it was in Part II or Part III but there were some awkward audio cuts too.

Read More

A standard revenge-romance watch with some poor taste (CW: mention of rape)

Normally, I don't care about watching rich people deal with rich people problems, but there was just enough happening to pull me through all eight episodes. The strong acting provided support where the plot failed to provide substantial meat on bone. I think the writers had a good preliminary concept here but just failed to bring it to its full potential.

However, what bugged me thoughout the entire show was the 'woman lies about being raped' trope. First, it falls into the sexist myth of 'if a woman claims rape, she is most likely lying'. Of course, this is not true. I don't know international stats, but in Australia, studies find, on average, only 5% of rape allegations are found to be false (and remember, most survivor/victims don't report and so aren't in the data). In other words, when someone says they've been raped, they're very very very likely to be telling the truth.

Second, the show refuses to grapple with the fact that someone can co-exist as a survivor/victim *and* as a bad human being. As far as characterisation goes, it meant the writers could draw an easy 'good/bad' line between the main characters. Thus, not only did the 'good' character not owe the 'bad' character any pity , but the 'good' character's own refusal to believe the rape claim goes unchallenged throughout all eight episodes.

Apart from that, I did enjoy this series as an easy watch. It was actually a lot of fun once I stopped taking it too seriously.

Read More

A wholesome and fun YA drama with some refreshing originality

I was intrigued by the premise of The Underclass: a school where everything hinges on academic rankings. I had no idea what BNK48 even was until I'd finished the the series and read the other reviews here so that connection wasn't a factor for me.

For me, the appeal was how the drama depicted the joy and struggle of teens figuring themselves out while simultaneously combatting unfair demands and expectations. It did so without being overtly didactic or condescending.

Although there were very recognisable clichés underpinning the entire series, there were also moments of refreshing originality in certain character dynamics and plot points. Most of the characters felt real (with the exception of the more artificial 'bad guys') and, despite the clichés, the school ranking system was actually only a slight exaggeration of my own school experience. I found a lot of my teenage-self in the characters.

That said, at times the ensemble cast felt a little unwieldy – there were perhaps one or two supporting actors too many – but the acting quality itself was of okay quality among the cast. Some of the production quality was patchy every now and then.

Overall, this is a fun Young Adult drama with a good mix of originality and reliable tropes to make it an easy watch.

Read More