Reviews

Never had Hong Sangsoo projected himself onto one of his films more so than Like You Know It All. I truly believe that Director Hong sees himself as a self loathing, destructive man child. This is a quite hateful film with any interaction Director Ku has with people ending in pain and suffering. Seemingly empty words and gestures that Ku doesn't think much of have a grave effect on those around him. Director Ku somehow within a month inadvertently allows a rape take place, crushes his friend’s wife's spirit and then exposes the boring marriage for what it is. And despite it all, nothing is gained. The only take away Ku takes from his encounters is that no one understands his films because he doesn't understand himself. The sweetest thing that transpired was the camera lingering on a playful couple in the pool while Director Ku starts to gain some hope in his life reading the note Ko Soon wrote him, which is scuppered when reality comes crashing down upon him. This is one of Hong Sangsoo's more beautiful films. It's only appropriate that it's also his most scathing.

Read More

What exactly was the point of this movie being made?
I saw the first one, while it wasn't bomb, it wasn't bad either. This one was just awful and made no sense.

What was the point of bringing in new characters we know nothing about? To add some spice?? I would care more had this been their story and then a third one come out with it being this.
Maybe, just maybe it would have made a little more sense or at least had a reason.

I really feel like this was made to try to get more money from the franchises. Mostly because at least the first episode had a story and plot among all the gore.... this was mostly gore.
Silent Hill meets Hellraiser, if you will.

I mean i get they wanted to bring their friends back, but they all "re-died" within the first 10 minutes. It's shit when you have to see your favorite characters die all over again. And because over half of the movie was just the first movie, dude.... really? I feel like so much more could have been in the place of that. I'm all for recaps, but when 90% of a movie is recap, it's pointless. In that time you could have told the other kid's stories.

This was a hard flop for me.

Read More

Perfect movie in one word.

It's the first romantic Korean movie for me to watch I guess! And probably the best romantic movie I've ever watched till now...

I thought the romantic Korean movies will be cringe, but I liked the actress since her role in "The negotiation" and I liked the actor I don't remember from which work... All of my doubts went wrong, and the movie was actually great and I could simple give it a 10/10

The movie's scenario is quite unfamiliar, and extraordinary, and the ending had a huge plot twist that I couldn't think of at all, I kept watching this movie for about 3 days... not because it was boring, but because I was excited into watching it that I treated it as a series... I wish it had a series somehow

The movie has also remembered me of a person I used to like and care about, because she looks like the actress a lot either in face or in her character that I can't even tell whether I got these sentiments and went sobbing because of the movie itself or because of this similarity and resemblance! But maybe both?!

The soundtracks are so soothing too just like the events and the scenario itself, and the acting is quite professional and flawless... This movie is quite re-watchable also , I think I will watch it someday, but I've to deal with my past memories first about the girl I like/d :D

Anyway, watch it guys, I totally recommend it for you, and if anyone reads this review - if you've any recommendations, please feel free to add and text me of those recommendations in the same genres as this masterpiece or anything else that comes up to your mind... I like the Korean fans' community the most.

Ah, and you might cry during watching it :D it made me cry in many moments, which is unlike me; it's very touchy...

Thanks

Read More

Very nice movie!

A very nice movie!
The low quality of the film and the bad sound almost made me give up. But I read the reviews and I didn't give up. And I'm very happy.
The film consists in a series of scenes, filmed separately, but related to each other. The one who had the idea to link and explain the filmed scenes at the end was very inspired. I loved the ending!!
I really liked the restaurant scene, when the chosen way to communicate was to write messages on those cards. Any way to communicate is better than nothing and when you can't talk, it's better to write. It was romantic, cute, full of emotions. And the actors really played wonderful this scene. In fact, they all did a good job.
The music was fantastically good! It totally surprised me!
I really liked the movie and I will definitely watch it again when I will want a dose of youth, well-being, beautiful people and love.
There are also outtakes during/after the credit roll. I would have liked to have a translation here too. But I still enjoyed watching them.

Read More

Funny and cliché and lolz!

Arcie is trying to get into the fashion world, but has to adopt their best friend's children after said friend is murdered by the evil gang Addictus Anonymous. The children's uncle wants to adopt the children as well, though. Instead of having a major custody battle, the mixed family ends up living together in the house of Arcie's boss who is away. Hilarity ensues! This movie was not what I expected. It follows a typical family comedy plotline, but it has enough randomness thrown everywhere that one can't help but laugh out loud! Sometimes the jokes got a little too random, but overall they land well. The main characters have big personalities and stubborn temperaments, the villains are nefarious and petty, and the side characters are simply shocked the whole time. It's a delight to watch!

Read More

Mr. Pacemaker, you are a dream!!

Sangha has been in the shadows and background of Jinwoo's life for awhile now, but he discovers him for the very first time as his "pacemaker". I loved this storyline, due to Jinwoo realizing that he really wanted Sangha in his life and in his heart, much more than for his professional career. I also loved that Sangha made sure that Jinwoo knew that he wanted him to want him to be in his life.

I really liked that Jinwoo's friend gave him a reality check about how Jinwoo needed to be able to make his own way in life, because he wasn't looking for a rich, handsome, and successful boyfriend to save him.

He just wanted Jinwoo to return his love and affection.

Read More

Trying to explain some point. Skip if you haven't watch, heavy spoiler!

This movie is more into psychological horror, it has interesting story but poor telling. And since i can't find any satisfying explanation i want to try explain some point. Excuse my raw explanation and untidy English.

So there are two main characters here, student Ha Young and vice principal Eun Hee.
As for Ha Young's story, her best friend Su Kyung was dead suicide (the very first scene) after being sexually harrassed by teacher Park and is ashamed of herself. She'd rather die than being insulted her for what happened. Ha Young can't take it and seek revenge trying to kill teacher Park but ended up being helped by Eun Hee.

Eun Hee's story is a bit confusing. Her trauma started in 1980, when she was a student at that exact same school. The soldier's appearance was related to Gwangju Uprising incident in 1980 (Try search it). The students all supposed to be at home, but at school there were still the security guard, Eun Hee, and Jae Yeon. The securiy guard is dead shotted by the soldier and then several incidents happened. Because of these incidents Eun Hee developed trauma that make her forget what happened and mixed her memory.
In throwback scene, it was seen Eun Hee was the one hiding inside the classroom while Jae Yeon was the one attacked by the soldier in the toilet. But it's actually the opposite (as stated by Eun Hee's psychiatrict 'It was you'). Hence, the one who was hiding in classroom and taken by the soldier's vehicle is Jae Yeon (because there is also a scene where Eun Hee visited unnamed grave, thats the missing Jae Yeon), and the one hiding on toilet, sexually harrassed, and stabbed on the hand is Eun Hee.

The murders was all done by Eun Hee. But the only murder she 'conciously' done is teacher Park, while the others was done by her unconcious self, as it was seen on the last part, they were killed by Eun Hee while wearing school uniform (indicating her old self seeking for revenge).
Principal was killed because she kept threatening others to keep silence about school's incidents (First incident in 1980 as Eun Hee's ex homeroom teacher and the second incident that i believe trigger Eun Hee to kill her is after her encounter with teacher Park's in his home).
Meanwhile, the headless uniformed person i think is the same person in the very first scene with the window incident (not the old security guard in throwback scene). I still dont really understand what happened to him, it could be accident but the last scene somehow indicates Eun Hee is the one killed him (but for what reason?). His head is inside the bucket full of disgusting creeping animals, while the body is hid on the roof with the soldier's nametag on his wrist. Maybe his dead is Eun Hee's way of revenge toward the soldier? because they are wearing 'uniform' (remember the scene when the soldier's uniform is blurred by black thing in late scene)

And the ghost that keep haunting Eun Hee, i think she's Eun Hee's portrayal of deep regret and guilt toward what happen to Jae Yeon, whos body never found, but in herself form. The ghost has half shoes (Eun Hee running away to toilet from soldier is in one shoes too). But why one eye stabbed? I dont really understand too.

Read More

highly misleading description

I only chose the 'spoilers' option to be safe, because I only watched the first 15 minutes.

So, what the review and the summary don't tell you is that the actual English title is "Fatty Princess loses weight for love". Yes, really. Funny how this didn't feature in any of the reviews or the summary.
If you look really closely at the poster, you can see our "Fatty Princess" as a blurry image, top left.

So, we start with one of the leads, not the fatty princess, BTW, on her wedding day, where she informs her husband that she
a) loves another
b) will never consummate, and
c) if he tries to force her, she will badmouth him to the Emperor.

Rather than making me all 'girl-power!' I just felt sorry for the guy, who had just as much choice over the marriage as she did (none) and now has to deal with the fact that, what - his family ends here? No, he can't get kids with a concubine because the wife was supposed to have kids first. Whatever, after what I'm going to describe next put me off to the extent that I dropped it early. Hope you got something out of this, guy.

And now we come to our 'fatty princess' - a fat girl stereotype portrayed by an actress in a fatsuit and wearing fat-face latex. She's fat because she's always eating, and she has her eunuch whipped when she puts on weight. The cook, who says he can't cook anything that will help her lose weight (but he can produce a magical hot soup which will cool you down in summer), tricks her into thinking she's lost weight by fiddling with the scales. Finally, a guard who's secretly in love with her tells her she'll lose weight if she chews everything 100 times.
We have a convenient time-skip of 3 months, in which fatty princess is fatty no more, having discarded her fat-suit and the latex fat-face.
Also, the guard who's always loved her, overhears the Prince she loves saying he only wants to marry her because her family will support him when he makes a bid for the throne, and punches the Prince in the face.

And I was DONE. There's comedy, and then there's this.

Look, there's some pretty images of food being prepared and served. But you can get that on Chef Hua, and not get the fat-shaming.

Read More

Parents take care of your children

The Closet (2020)

Since it's October, though I'd watch a few horror or suspense movies this month. And this is my 5th HJW movie this year.

The Closet is about a father and daughter who moves to a new house after a traumatic accident. Yup moving to an old abandoned house in the middle of nowhere is always a good idea. LOL.

So one day the child disappeared while the father was out in Seoul working. While searching for her daughter he meets a modern exorcist who tells him that a lot of kids who lived in the house have disappeared for years and he will help find his daughter.

The movie is only 1 hour and 39 mins and I think that's why the movie felt emotionally incomplete. We know what happened during the accident but we didn't see enough reasons why there was a strained relationship between the father and daughter, enough for the ghost to take her to her special world. It just felt like both were grieving and the father didn't know how to cope and raise his child alone. The daughter seemed sad but i didn't think she hated her father.

There weren't a lot of scary scenes, the ghost of the darkness are probably the scariest but the rest were just enough creepiness. We also didn't get enough background of the exorcist and his shaman mother. So far i've seen KNG play a fiery priest, now an exorcist and i think his new drama is also about exorcism.

The reason for the ghost was heartbreaking and it felt like they could have explored the main social message in the epilogue better to have a deeper impact to the people watching.

Rating: 8/10

Read More

A typical disaster movie (but that's not a bad thing!)

I was lucky enough to see this at an actual cinema here in the UK, and I'm glad I did.

It had everything you expect from a disaster movie, including grand heroic gestures, last-minute relationship reconciliations, and a rousing speech to convince a group of people to do the right thing. It also had some great acting from Zhu Yilong (although that was also to be expected) and just enough actual peril to keep me questioning whether he would survive or not.

Some of the plot aspects were a little formulaic, but that's pretty much the genre. Not a lot of re-watch value once you know how it's going to end though.

Overall, it was a fun watch and was great to be able to see a Chinese movie on the big screen.

Read More

Sweet and simple story

My first time giving a review here.
At first I thought Chenghan would be some kind of bad boy, but he's actually endearing. Might be too talkative if I meet hem in real world, but that's not really a problem, I guess.
Yuwei's also good. I love their banters.
Some people might be disappointed by the lack of skinship in this movie, but personally, the part where they confirmed their feelings with each other was nice and satisfying enough. Sometimes, a hug is better than a kiss.
The acting and dubbing could be awkward at some scenes, and I'm watching with English subtitles, which I'm not sure was 100% accurate because it left me confused at times (like, when did Chenghan actually realized that Yui was Yuwei? At their school, or when he came to Yuwei's house?).
I really love the background places. Especially Yuwei's room, it just looked so comfortable.
Not really sure how I felt about the ending. I just so abrupt and well, I thought at least we'll get a glimpse of their future or something, but no. It's just finished like that.
Overall, nice movie.

Read More

I have issues with the message

This is definitely one of the best Korean movies of all time. However, my issue is that the whole message of this movie is “don’t judge without knowing all the facts” which is not a great stance considering current events. No man deserves to have benefit of the doubt when it comes to r*pe and p*dophilia. Period. That’s the long and short of it. Yes Lee Yong Goo’s story is a sad and unfortunate one. Granted. But what the woman saw in the market could not be given a “what if that’s not what happened” treatment. Absolutely not. I refuse to even entertain the idea of r*pists having any form of sympathy. Or to hear their side of story. Nope. Absolutely not. So, yeah while I do feel for Lee Yong Goo and his daughter, I believe what happened to him was justified given the circumstances as well as his own confession.

Having said that, this movie had me sobbing like a baby!!!!! THIS is what “boys will be boys” should be 😭 these boys got me laughing like an idiot while bawling my eyes out. Also can we talk about baby Yea Seung for a minute?! What a brilliant little actress. The future of kdrama is in good hands.

All in all, 100% would recommend.

Read More

NEW CONCEPT WITH POTENTIAL ACTOR!

Well, if starting with the cast, Mr. Hwang Jung Min totally nailed his role! It really looked liked he was kidnapped.

The story started normally like he was kidnapped and slowly it unfolded that they were really tough bastards and then like any other kidnapping movie, he tries to run and confuse the assailants but his every move was nerve-wracking and at some points, he mimicked his famous dialogue from his famous movies in the very tense situation, that scenes were totally over the top.

Overall, all the actors did a great job but there was a little bit of problem with the police, first of all, it showed police as really weak and not able to catch them properly while the actor is powerful and gives the tough fight and the second problem was villain character looked little weak....

Otherwise, the suspense-packed movie with a little tense comedy...

Read More

This movie was so awesome even though it was confusing at some parts.

I really loved the story line and want to see more (so I'm 99% sure I'm going to watch the drama version lol.)

I loved all of the actors but i can't help but to be confused as to who the goddess was he was so obsessed with. And why Hell Girl and the other 3 were somewhat always around him??
Even with the main girl, she always saw Hell Girl before she even summoned her. So i don't really understand that.

I loved her and Haruka friendship..... at the start. But I never understood why she fought so hard for that friendship when she found out what kind of person she really was. Like come on.... she beats her own mother. Wtf even. -_- she even WANTED to be sacrificed. Why send yourself to hell over someone who doesn't want help?

Read More