Two women adrift in the world try and make sense of what is happening around them. One is an ex-convict trying to bring order to her life, while the other finds she has a desire to foment chaos as she struggles to reconnect with her roots.
Continue reading “PopCult Podcast – A Thousand and One/Return to Seoul”
Lady Vengeance (2005)
Written by Chung Seo-kyung & Park Chan-wook
Directed by Park Chan-wook
Park Chan-wook is a master filmmaker. If you read my review of Decision to Leave last year, you know how much I love this director. South Korean cinema is the most vibrant creative filmmaking scene we have right now, with a diverse array of directors making all sorts of movies that play to their strengths. Bong Joon-ho (Parasite) is fantastic at making biting social satires, Hong Sang-soo (In Front of Your Face) crafts gently paced slice-of-life dramas, Lee Chang-dong (Burning) dark stories of psychological trauma, and Park Chan-wook has mastered the art of telling tense & violent thrillers. Lady Vengeance was part of Park’s Vengeance trilogy, which started with Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (still on my Watchlist), Oldboy, and finally, Lady Vengeance. Throughout every film, he follows the response of a profoundly wronged person and explores the effects their quest for vengeance has on them.
Continue reading “Movie Review – Lady Vengeance”This special reward is available to Patreon patrons who pledge at the $10 or $20 monthly levels. Each month those patrons will pick a film for me to review. If they choose, they also get to include some of their thoughts about the movie. This Pick comes from Matt Harris.
Memories of Murder (2003)
Written by Bong Joon-ho & Shim Sung-bo
Directed by Bong Joon-ho
The serial killer phenomenon has been around for a long time but only occurred in South Korea for the first time in the mid-1980s. In 1996, Korean playwright Kim Kwang-rim wrote Come to See Me, loosely based on these first killings where 10 women & girls had their lives taken by the same person. Director Bong Joon-ho co-wrote the film adaptation, which touches on the actual events but dramatizes most of its elements. This would be Bong’s more prominent debut after writing & directing the indie feature Barking Dogs Never Bite three years prior. The film would be released in the heart of what film historians now call New Korean Cinema, an explosion of movies from South Korea that exhibited filmmakers with incredible technical skills but also nuanced, complex writing & characterization. While a director like Park Chan-wook (Oldboy, Decision to Leave) is known for gorgeously choreographed stylized violence, Bong is a director whose trademark (at least in my opinion) is his blend of horrific story beats and weirdly comforting dark comedy. It’s a delicate balance, but his movies always seem to pull it off.
Continue reading “Patron Pick – Memories of Murder”
South Korean cinema continues to deliver incredibly thoughtful movies about the human condition. And Coppola continues making bonkers movies that wildly vary in quality.
Continue reading “PopCult Podcast – In Front Of Your Face/The Rainmaker”
Decision to Leave (2022)
Written by Jeong Seo-kyeong & Park Chan-wook
Directed by Park Chan-wook
Part of me is surprised at the moderate reviews Decision to Leave has garnered from audiences. However, I can understand it if you focus entirely on the plot. This is an homage to Hitchcock that is very obvious from the start. The shadow of Vertigo looms large, and that’s not a bad thing. A good crime thriller is rare, and South Korea certainly knows how to make good movies. It’s a pairing that meshes perfectly. But yes, you’ll not be blown away by the story, at least on the surface. It’s still a tremendously compelling story. Where Decision to Leave blew me away was with the cinematography. Holy shit! Park Chan-wook is one of the greatest directors of all time, but you forget in between watching his movies. Then when you sit down and watch one, it doesn’t take long to be reminded you are in the hands of a genuine master of the form. There are shots in this movie that blew my fucking mind! Even a person simply driving from one location to another always looks interesting. The camera is always put in a spot you wouldn’t expect, and it always works.
Continue reading “Movie Review – Decision to Leave”
Squid Game Season 1 (Netflix)
Written & Directed by Hwang Dong-hyuk
I was skeptical when I first heard about the viral Netflix hit Squid Game. Anytime a show is that popular and popping up in so many corners of the internet, I can’t help but think it’s some shallow meme-ish nonsense. However, the fact that it was a Korean series caught my interest. Over the last twenty years, I’ve enjoyed almost every film I’ve seen from that country. Their filmmakers have a fantastic eye and are telling stories that are relevant beyond their own culture. So when I heard Squid Game was addressing issues of economic class, I was sold that I needed to see it, spurred on by the hilarious right-wing media tripping over their feet to argue it wasn’t a critique of capitalism (even though that is what the creator said) and that it was “really about communism.”
Continue reading “TV Review – Squid Game Season 1”
Oldboy (2003)
Written by Hwang Jo-yun, Lim Jun-hyung, and Park Chan-wook
Directed by Park Chan-wook
It’s hard to pinpoint just when exactly American audiences got turned on to South Korean cinema. This year’s Parasite did wonders in spotlighting the great working coming out of that country. But back in the early 2000s, Oldboy was a film that seemed to grab the attention of audiences and not let go. Seventeen years later, it is still a harrowing experience, a combination of fantastic fight choreography and a nightmarish baroque plot of betrayal and other terrible things.
Continue reading “Movie Review – Oldboy”
Parasite (2019)
Written by Bong Joon-ho & Jin Won Han
Directed by Bong Joon-ho
Bong Joon-ho is a filmmaker genuinely interested in issues of class and social structures. You can see that in his previous work, especially Snowpierce, Okja, and The Host, but there are elements of this in all his work. Parasite is the synthesis of all these ideas, a perfect summation of his thoughts on the class divide and human nature. This is a film made by a creator who is at the height of their confidence. Bong Joon-ho is clear-headed with a thorough understanding of the story they want to tell and the psychologies of the characters populating that narrative. It may sound grandiose to say this, but this is an example of about as close as we can get to having a perfect movie.
Continue reading “Movie Review – Parasite”Burning (2018)
Written by Jungmi Oh & Chang-dong Lee
Directed by Chang-dong Lee
Jong-su Lee is from a rural community north of Seoul but travels down to the big city to do odd jobs. While on one of these gigs he runs into Hae-mi, a woman he grew up with but only has faint memories of. They go out for drinks, and she explains how she’s going on a trip to Africa soon and wonders if he would stop by and feed her cat while she’s gone. Lee comes over to her apartment where they have sex, and then his life becomes distracted by his father’s arrest for assault and caring for the farm. When Hae-mi returns from her vacation she has Ben in two, the only other Korean she met while in Africa. Ben immediately captures her attention, and any feelings she had for Lee seem to have evaporated. However, Lee feels that there is something off about Ben, a man who makes money through mysterious circumstances and admits he doesn’t understand the emotions of other people. Lee fears that something terrible is going to happen to Hae-mi.
Continue reading “Movie Review – Burning”Okja (2017)
Written by Jon Ronson & Bong Joon Ho
Directed by Bong Joon-Ho
In 2007, Lucy Mirando, heir to the problematic Mirando Corporation announced the discovery of a new animal, superpigs. These miracle animals appear to be the world’s answer to the problem of hunger, and the 26 best are sent around the world to be raised by varying farming cultures in a bid to figure out how best to raise them. One of these superpigs, Okja ends up in South Korea raised by an old man and his granddaughter Mija. Jump to ten years later, and Mirando is calling in all the pigs for a contest that will kick off superpig meat coming to a store near you. These means Okja will be taken away, sent off to New York for “processing.” Mija is having none of this and sets off to reclaim Okja, unaware she is about to uncover the dark secret behind the Mirando corporation.
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