hagfish Reviews

Eunjangdo (2003)

A Culture Clash

[8/10 · 26 April 2006]

The Silver Knife is funny, though it has been compared to "Sex is Zero", and came up wanting, according to the party commenting, with whom I disagree. I think it holds its own pretty well, and I really like the cast.

This movie introduced me to Yun Da-hun's abundant charm. He is a very funny man. Another new face for me at the time I bought The Silver Knife, was the fantastic Song Jae-ho. As the father of Min-seo, he is impossible; an entrenched Confucian in heart and soul. He is dictatorial, and hard to get along with except when it comes to consorting with his peers---the other village elders. Then, all present are in total accord. That accord does not spill over into the family dynamics.

Min-seo lives with her family in Andong. The most precious family treasures, in the eyes of her Confucian father, are the Yeolnyeomun (gate of virtue) which is part of the historic site occupied by the family, and the eunjangdo (silver knife), both symbols of a woman's chastity. The Yeolnyeomun, a perpetual reminder, is located conveniently just outside the house.

At the age of twelve, upon reaching womanhood, Min-seo is solemnly given the gift of a small ornamental silver knife by her father, with the admonishment that she is now responsible for her continued purity. Virginal she is, and virginal she will remain. She (also solemnly), accepts the knife, and the obligation it carries. She takes her responsibility so seriously, that she even layers herself with extra underwear to prevent any possible opportunity for assault against her state of grace. Her schoolmates, on discovering this, chide her for it mercilessly, but she remains staunchly faithful to tradition.

Fast forward to Min-seo desiring to go to college, in, of all damnable places, the great wicked city of Seoul. From home to perdition in one small leap. Her father flat out refuses to allow it of course, saying among other things, "Seoul corrupts the mind".

Aided by her mother, who doesn't want Min-seo to live the life she herself must live, and by her brother who feels the same way, she manages to leave home. The departure scene is very amusing, with the mother in a physical grappling match against the father, who is nearly foaming at the mouth in rage. The term, "going ballistic" fits here nicely.

Min-seo's train ride to Seoul is not without incident. She handles it with great aplomb…and her trusty silver knife. Of course.

The sex scenes are all very, very funny.

There's a sexy dance contest, during which Oh Ji-ho once again strips down to the nitty-gritty, wearing only a dinner plate as protection from chilly drafts. There's a condom scene, which takes place in the back seat of a car that is utterly bizarre, and therefore priceless.

Oh Ji-ho is Ju-haek, the smitten boyfriend who is dying to get into the (now figurative) much layered underwear of the pristine Min-seo. He is the soul of chivalry and protectiveness coming undone in the grip of young lust. He plots and schemes alone, or with the help of his friends, trying to come up with a plan that will land him between the sheets with his ice princess. The situations arrived at are so ridiculous, you have to sit and laugh at them.

There are other characters always either getting it on, or trying to with mixed results, that are invariably weird and funny as hell.

This is over-blown comedy done with a heavy hand, and I can't think of any people other than the Korean filmmakers who could do it so well. They have a certain special kind of touch.

Toward the end of the movie, Ju-haek makes an impassioned statement that is quite powerful, decrying the tradition of the silver knife, which was as often used for committing suicide after dishonor, as it may have been to defend honor by turning it upon the man who attempted intimacy. Oh Ji-ho shines in this sequence, and you see his potential, as yet unexpressed elsewhere. (2003) There is also a scene of tenderness between Ju-haek and Min-seo that takes place on a bridge, which will touch any heart that allows itself to be reached by a simple act of caring that says, - this is love, doing this is what makes love real -.

If you are looking for a basically jolly movie with strange characters, a lot of sexual innuendo, and buffoonery galore (a specialty of Oh Ji-ho's), this is it.

Love Trilogy (2004)

Triangular Tribulations

[10/10 · 29 March 2006]

This film seems to have garnered very little in the way of attention here in the States. In fact, if you are reading this, you and I may be the only ones who ever do.

I am telling far more about the plot than I would ordinarily because of the obscurity of this film. Therefore the spoiler warning is required.

Love Trilogy… is about three couples who are touring Kunming in Yunnan province, China. One couple has been married for seven years, and is very strapped for funds. They are disillusioned, bitter, and quarrelsome. The husband (Francis Ng) drives a cab for a living, and has just lost his permit for falling asleep at the wheel due to exhaustion. The opening scene is shot through the windshield of his weaving cab, and at first seems funny. It isn't.

In spite of their money troubles the couple embarks on the journey which they've already paid for, arguing every inch of the way. Divorce is a constant possibility, and comes up during each quarrel.

The second of the couples has just recently married, and don't seem to have much in common. The wife, now pregnant, dreads telling her husband, who wants to be free, and does not want children. They too argue a great deal during this, their honeymoon trip.

The third couple is engaged to be married. They are as different from each other as night and day. The young man, Jino, played by Oh Ji-ho, is an idealist who dreams of visiting Shangri La, a place he's read about in the novel of that name. His fiancée has no interest in going there. He is a romantic egalitarian; she is rather shallow, materialistic, and snobbish.

The three couples are mainly ships passing in the night.... You see them collectively in some scenes but they are merely in the same place at the same time, not especially interacting with each other, though they ultimately do to a degree.

There is a scene where the three men meet in a bar, and engage in a conversation about women, with the two Chinese husbands likening women to Godzilla. It's one of the very funny scenes, with Jino, a Korean, recognizing the name, Godzilla, then making wild faces to describe him since he doesn't speak Chinese.

Oh Ji Ho makes great faces. He's an incredibly handsome man, therefore one mightn't expect such antic performances, but he hasn't let me down yet.

Love Trilogy has been taken to task on the point that the arguments between the couples are perpetual, and nasty. The critics grow weary of this. Being a cynic and highly experienced in the rough side of life, I see it as fairly natural behavior from people under the gun of their circumstances. Let's call Love Trilogy Cinema verite. That gives it permission to tell the truth.

Many of the Asian movies I've seen since becoming a victim of their allure have sucker-punched me in the solar plexus. This is one of them. The young wife wishes to end her pregnancy, and takes a dangerous dose of herbal medicine. The ensuing scenes left me wrung out and crying.

The actors do a phenomenal job often of conveying much distress. With or without reading the subtitles; which is hard to do with tears in your eyes; you understand every emotion you're seeing portrayed. That's what movies are about. They are showing us something. They make us laugh, or weep, or become furious. We root for the good guys, and if a villain is charming enough, for him too.

It's entertainment. Love Trilogy made me laugh, and cry, and get angry, and cheer all the characters on at the end. Jino winds up with another woman, who fits his life like a hand in a glove, as does he for her, and all is well.

I definitely recommend this movie. Don't listen to the critics, me included. Just see it. It is NOT a waste of time.

Enjoy!

Memories of Murder (2003)

Walking in Dangerous Rain

[10/10 · 29 March 2006]

Since a synopsis would be redundant here, I'll confine myself to praise alone.

Each positive comment that precedes this is accurate. I watched this movie yesterday. I couldn't take my eyes off it. Everything taking place on screen was riveting, from the simple act of walking down a dark lonely road in the rain, to a wild chase by three desperate detectives. This movie held me in thrall.

As a new viewer of Asian movies, I try to analyze the reason I tend not to be interested in western works any longer. I finally came to the conclusion that it has to do with the accessibility of the players. They seem to be people first, actors by choice, and stars, by the public making them so.

In Memories of Murder, I saw this human factor almost too painfully. By the end of the story, I was in tears. Even now, the mood prevails. It's been so long since these crimes took place, and I don't know absolutely that they remain unsolved, but I think it's the case, and I think about that, and how frustrating it still must be to those who worked on the case.

The actors have become the people in my mind, and the horrible sense of defeat that becomes palpable eventually, is heartbreaking. When one relates to the inroads made on the health; mental and physical; of the detectives, who are ultimately portrayed as tireless and completely dedicated to the case, you realize that you've watched something that is historic. You have seen the probable truth.

The way this movie draws you into it, so that you are walking through dangerous rain, with a warning shout in your throat, points to the brilliance of the director and the players.

It is difficult to say, "I love this movie", just as it is hard to say, I love Silence of the Lambs, because love is a peculiar word to use for such fare.

But yes, I love it for the fact that during it, I was in a small village in South Korea in a terrible era of sirens blaring, military dictatorship, and the hopeless pursuit of a serial killer. I landed back here in this time and place with a thud, only after turning off the DVD player, and going to the kitchen for a glass of water. While I was caught there mentally---I felt the desperation, and I felt the defeat and the sorrow of the detectives, who were essentially decent enough human beings when all was said and done.

There are not many movies that can time-travel you into their present. This will do it.

I most seriously recommend that you view the interviews with the director and the stars (all of them are stars of a special kind in my mind) in order to dispel some of the hold the story will have on you.

These are incredibly interesting people, and it's a sheer joy to see them smiling and peaceful. They're intelligent, educated and articulate. The younger members of the cast, the less seasoned, are so beautiful in their desire to do it right.

They definitely did it right. They were wonderful, and they thanked the interviewer. How lovely that was to see.

I watched the movie using the English subtitles rather than the English dubbing because I wanted the authenticity. The subtitles were very good.

Swordfish (2001)

Dreck meets The Matrix

[1/10 · 31 January 2006]

Wowie kazowie, what a lousy movie.

We have The Matrix's flavor and style to thank for this ugly flick, which at .75 cents brand spanking new, was over-priced.

The Matrix was a classy one-of-a-kind movie, which used terrible drab background coloration to make a point. It succeeded brilliantly in this. Brilliantly enough to bring about a long tiresome spate of doofus-like imitation everywhere. TV ads were copies of it, people aped the style of dress and presentation ad nauseum, like chimpanzees that had been conditioned by Pavlov…the whole thing was tiresome beyond belief.

And then there is Swordfish.

Since 486 other souls have already written about Swordfish, I don't feel it necessary to add a synopsis.

It starts out at the very beginning, as merely annoying visually, and goes downhill from there. The influence of The Matrix is unpleasantly obvious in the drab color scheme, which goes so far as to turn people green upon occasion (OUCH), and all the twiddly computer jazz we're supposed to be awe-stricken by.

Give me a break.

I have two names: John Travolta. Don Cheadle.

While I would by far prefer to see Travolta cavorting about as Tony Manero (Saturday Night Fever-brilliantly critiqued by user StarWarsDisco) it still must be said that he's always fun to watch. He's larger than life, and in his youth, was a very pretty boy. I respect his ability to work hard at a role, and he consistently gives me what I want. Entertainment.

I do not look for depth and profundity in movies (especially those coming out of Hollywood). And I am always pathetically grateful when, unexpectedly, I find it. In the main, I want to be amused and entertained. I want the nepenthe a movie can give me without any harmful side effects. Done, and done, time and time again by Travolta.

Don Cheadle is so solid, so good, and so competent, it breaks my heart to see him in this piece of tripe.

Also, honorable mention must be given to Rudolph Martin as Axel Torvalds.

That having been said, I will remark that Halle Berry's gratuitous semi-nudity, and excessive camped up performance as a manipulative sex goddess was so over the top in terms of bad acting, I was amazed enough by it to be able to stay awake 'til the bitter end.

The transparency of her character was so offensively obvious, I guessed what she was about within seconds of her appearance. Only the village idiot would have been tricked into imagining she was one of the "good guys".

This is a terrible film. There was a 12-minute short at the end, with alternate endings, and standard producer-director enthusiastic drivel thrown in for good measure. They were possibly the least tiresome 12 minutes of the movie.

The elected ending was weak and stupid. A little girl, who has been through unimaginable hell, has emerged sane, unscathed, and even able to be strong for Papa, remarking that, "it's going to be alright..." Oh yeah? And let's not forget Hugh Jackman, who grimaces, furrows his brows, and occasionally smirks his way through as the desperately devoted papa. Ho boy! A bad acting job if ever there was one.

Oh feh. This is an old flick, already forgotten. No need for it to be battered into the ground any further, by one who, incidentally, tends to be the Devil's advocate, and champion of underdogs where heavily panned movies/actors are concerned.

La Belle (2000)

A tragic story of love, or is it?

[9/10 · 7 December 2005]

Unlike many viewers of this movie, I found far greater depth than it is credited with.

Let us go past the obvious, which is that the film is assuredly erotic.

Examine instead, the fact that in this, it is also beautiful and intense. Mi in is a bath of sensuality we are submerged in by the director.

The point that is missed regarding this film is that it is surreal. I assume it was intended to be so. When viewed as surrealism, it reaches an entirely different level.

We do not know at any point if the story is a figment of the vivid imagination of the male character, a writer, or if it is really happening. We might hope it is imagination at work, because the final scene before the closing of the film is so heart wrenchingly tragic.

In this scene, he has set himself free from one demon, only to inherit another. Released from the physical body of the woman over whom he obsesses, and who has tormented him in every moment of his days, he must then live with interminable guilt and grief.

It was impossible for me to disengage myself from the film once it had grasped me, which it did in a very subtle way. By the final few scenes I was emotionally involved with the characters. The woman, while also pitying and understanding her, put me off. In the end she did not have my sympathy as deeply as the writer, who was impaled on this fruitless love, and held prisoner by obsession, whereas she was deliberately using him in a cold hearted way, while she was as obsessed and impaled as he, on an abusive relationship, and self-destructive course of her own. Many times she expresses the wish to die. To be dead. To be set free from her pain.

She is at times obviously mentally unbalanced, drunk, or hysterical, and yet deliberate in her actions. She lies with equanimity, flirts and seduces without conscience.

It must be stated here that the subtitles were moronic, ghastly, and unforgivable. This factor leads to unnecessary confusion. If one were able to understand Korean, the original language of the film, our experience of this tale would have been entirely different.

When viewed through the intellect first, without expectation, but with an open mind to the surreal, this becomes a little gem in it's own right. It goes without saying that it is a most beautiful film physically. The players are both exceptionally good-looking people. Both have very beautiful bodies. They are agile and graceful, and totally believable in the love scenes.

Since this story is presented as narrative frequently, using the voice-over technique, it must be remarked that Mr. Oh has a very pleasant mature speaking voice that brings enjoyment to the ear, while giving us a fine clue regarding the nature of the character.

The director did certain things with the sound track, other than supplying us with a remarkable musical background that incidentally stands high on my list of favored film scores. It is exquisite.

The very sound of the film otherwise--the clattering departures of the woman, her slamming of the door, her frequent shrillness, her noisy occupation of another's space, is jarring. All this, opposed to the introspective silence of the writer, is calculated and clever, simply because it works on the subconscious, and tells us so much about the characters, without saying a word.

If we look at the visual aspects without the sensuality, without the sex, we see a man with beautiful gentle hands tenderly nurturing a plant. A subtle, sensitive, poignant view into the inner heart, as well as the physical self. He lives in serene simplicity.

For a movie that was not well received by the Korean public when it was released in theatres there, it has certainly enjoyed longevity as a DVD. It is still in print, and sells for a hefty twenty plus US dollars on the Asian market.

I've seen comments elsewhere regarding the performance of Oh Ji Ho, in that it is not top rate. I would therefore like to point out that this film is his debut effort, having come from a career as a successful model.He was also quite young when he made the film. He was born in 1976.

Were this film to be made now, as he approaches the age of thirty, I feel the role would have been handled far better. He would have been more credible. The character he plays is older, mature, a professional writer of some standing. The interior struggle of the man needed clarification, which would have come from clear translation (good subtitles). We did not have that. Therefore we can't judge Mr. Oh's interpretation of the role very fairly.

If it were not for the subtitles, I would have rated it as a 10, simply because it is a daring plunge into a convoluted tale by a master director who was willing it seems, to take a chance, to present a puzzle that requires the thought process. A little much to ask of the average viewer going to see a film presented as erotic, and perceived as soft-core pornography.

There is a great difference between the utter stupidity of soft-core/hard-core pornography, which relies on the display of sexual behavior in greater or lesser degree, sans art, sans viable plot, sans any modicum of sensitivity, and any trace of the difficulty presented to the human race in the course of an agonizingly debilitating relationship based on sexual obsession and unrequited love, that can only end bitterly, leaving the dust of shattered, pulverized souls behind it.

It's a fine art film that happens also to be an elegant piece of erotica.