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yellowcherry
Reviews
Gaeul donghwa (2000)
I loved this series.
*possible spoilers*
"Autumn in My Heart" or "Endless Love" - or whatever you wish to call this series - is a masterpiece. This is the most moving and influential Asian drama I have seen. Even after watching this for the second time, I still was emotionally drained and cried my eyes out. It tells the story of a heartbreaking, tragic, and doomed love.
The cast is beautiful, to say the least. The music is lovely. Everything about this series has a certain type of grace and beauty.
This drama has great strength. I was reeled into the story, into the life of a girl who found out that her family wasn't really her family and had to watch her loved ones leave her behind. I pitied her and cried for her even though she didn't pity herself. Her life doesn't get much better, but her true love does come back for her. You will see angst, injustice, and utter tragedy. Mixed in the sad air is a true love that you can only wish to find. The ending left me speechless and stayed with me for days. I can never forget the story of Eun-suh and Jun-suh.
However, if you are a critical person without much of a heart or you don't get caught up in fictitious stories, you probably will not like this series. You would only see the flaws. Save yourself the time. A note of warning to others - don't watch if you don't want to be depressed. But if you DO want to see love in all of its innocence and two people who love each other to the end, watch "Gaeul donghwa."
A Beautiful Mind (2001)
This film left me disappointed.
My friends highly recommended "A Beautiful Mind," saying that it was a great movie that left some of them bawling at the end. However, I failed to see why this film has gathered so much praise and is being hailed as one of the best movies of all time.
Russell Crowe did perform well and convincingly portrayed a "crazy" man. However, I felt no emotion throughout the film and only teared up when I saw that poor imaginary girl cry. Anything can make me cry...but only the sight of the little innocent face was able to evoke my tears in this work. I observed the struggles and pain that Alicia Nash had to endure but the film still failed to emotionally involve me. Occasionally, I wondered when the film would end as it seemed to drag on. The screenplay didn't seem spectacular and the film could have done a better job conveying the actual importance of Nash's accomplishments. From just watching the film, I didn't really understand why Nash received the Nobel Prize or what it was that made Mr. Nash so special. Maybe Akiva Goldsman's intention was to focus on the "power of love" during difficult times. Nash's character needed more definition and development as the film's drama was just like any other old drama in other films. The only difference that this film had from others was that it had a schizophrenic based on a true character and a younger wife suffering from the marriage she entered. Basically, I view it as a love story with a total of three scenes of flirting and then a woman having to put up with her psycho husband - who ends up smacking her down by accident and nearly drowning their baby. That was it. Oh yeah, the woman sticks with him for forty years that the audience barely gets to see. As for the main character, he makes some hilarious remarks, scribbles furiously, observes pigeons, cuts up magazines, gradually descends into madness, fights the Russians in his mind, takes steps toward improvement, gets himself into a hospital, digs his way into his arm searching for a mysterious code implant, ignores his imaginary friends, and then wins the Nobel Prize. Great! Just great. There was just something missing in that mix that would have made it more appealing to me. If it was supposed to be capitalizing on the Nashs' struggles, it could have had stronger and more developed relations/scenes between John and Alicia. A little more background on both of the characters would not have hurt as it was already so long. At the end, I was alarmed that Nash had already became so old. I was worried that I had missed the good part and anxiously awaited the last scenes. Was the scene where he got all of those pens supposed to make me cry? Why was he so respected again? The film never really told me.
Overall, the film was ...average. The few moments of comedy was actually better than the slow and unengaging drama that made my head hurt. I don't know anything more about John Nash than I did before I viewed the film. It doesn't deserve to be in the top 250.
Bernice Bobs Her Hair (1976)
It's cute and good for a laugh.
Wishing to lift our spirits before jumping into a heavily themed discussion about "The Great Gatsby," my teacher showed our class this short and enjoyable story. She described it as a "chick-flick" and perhaps she was right. I found it entertaining and one could easily identify with the b***hy Marjorie or timid Bernice. Marjorie was the average girl who was popular and had boys aching to dance with her, while Bernice was her homely, boring cousin staying for a summer visit. Naturally, Marjorie felt she was superior to Bernice and felt like her vapid cousin's inability to socialize was ruining her whole summer. What followed a slow beginning was a light-hearted and funny transformation of Bernice. You will be shocked at the end.
The picture quality was rather poor and at times it was hard for a young child of the 80's like me to understand what they were saying. However, these unpleasant elements did not detract from my enjoyment of the story. The characters and plot were all believable. Although the ending was fitting and a splendid example of poetic justice, my whole class was left wanting to see more. See this film if you like to see film adaptations of Fitzgerald's and do not care for high-tech contemporary films.
I'd give it a 7/10...for now.