Change Your Image
xmasinswiss
Reviews
The Mist (2017)
Rooting for the Mist
I think think is probably among the worst groups of characters I've ever come across. Half across the series, as I began skipping forward through all the endless relationships conversations, I realised I wanted the Mist to just finish them all off.
Seriously, we have the most whiny and self-entitled "protagonists", we have to follow some completely uninteresting side stories, we meet the smoke monster from Lost, and so on. And because Season 2 got cancelled, we have no answers to any possible questions.
The creators of this series want to show us how fast a random group of adults turns into a murderous mob (a-la Lord of the Flies), I guess? Everyone is preoccupied with their own survival at the expense of everyone else. There's no coordination. No "society." Some folks try to establish "rules" which they immediately and repeatedly violate themselves. In other words, there's immediate corruption.
Do they want to show us that this is what's underneath a typical American community - mutual hatred, readiness to kill, disregard for another human life, insanity, corruption, and mistrust?
Most of the series takes place in almost complete darkness. You see vague shapes moving on the screen. Sometimes you hear the sounds of fighting. Some characters come across so similar (same whiny facial expressions) that a few times I didn't even realise the scenes have changes and I was watching different characters for a while.
Oh, and then there's fog. But it's just for background, apparently. It's just there, like the night in "From."
Sarinja-ng-Nangam (2024)
A Chewer Paradox
It's not a bad series, I actually like the character development and the chaotic "slice of life" feel of the filming.
And look, I know that South Koreans have invented mukbang - a video show of a person eating and talking into a mic. I know that this sound is culturally more acceptable in Korea and China than where I live (Western Europe and Japan).
But I happen to hate the sound of people chewing their food right next to the mic.
And in this series, someone always is loudly chewing something.
Dry squid. Chewing gum. Chips. Then a dog runs around slobbering over furniture.
The film makers seem to be absolutely fascinated with the sound of loud chewing and they use it as "mood setter." They even use slow-effing-motion and close-up zooming on a person's mouth when he is chewing a gum.
In result, I'm having to fast forward or mute large chunk of scenes where they focus on CHEWING.
I can't get over it. Apart from loud chewing, is anything else happening here? Probably. But I'm too disgusted to notice.
Just as I finish skipping through one scene and shaking off my disgust, and I try to settle back into watching anticipating a fresh scene, guess what happens? Someone pops open a bag of chips or rips open a pack of gum and gets busy CHEWING right into the mic.
There's a particular detective whose "feature" is always loudly chewing gum and blowing messy bubbles, loudly breathing through his mouth as he talks, smacking his lips, and making loud sucking noises through his teeth... why??? What purpose does this serve??? As soon as he shows up I start skipping the scenes. Makes me physically revolted.
-
Update: I tried to follow the story for at least 3 episodes. I now give up. There's more and more of that disgustingly chewing detective. He's actually one of the leads. It's unbearable.
2 stars.
Gyeongseong Keuricheo (2023)
What I learned from this series
This series has taught me so much. For example:
- When holding your enemy at gun point, is always a GREAT idea to launch into a lengthy and angsty monologue and bring your gun right next to the enemy's head, so he can easily recover from your previous blows and kick the gun out of your hands. Because who would ever want to shoot a cruel and dangerous enemy on sight? A long monologue is a must. Ideally while also turning you back towards the enemy so you could embrace the person dear to you.
- The Japanese army is an incompetent gang of thugs who can't shoot or detain anyone. It takes at least 150 Japanese soldiers running in close formations to pursue one Korean hero. Also, these 150 soldiers can never hit a target despite firing at hurricane rates, while every shot made by a Korean hero kills its target.
- 8 Japanese samurais armed with swords can never stop a single unarmed Korean man wearing an expensive suit and leather shoes. Likewise, a tied up Korean woman can successfully and casually fight at least 10 fully armed Japanese soldiers.
- A mattress provides a perfectly adequate cover against 150 Japanese soldiers shooting at you almost point-blank in a narrow corridor.
- In the middle of a hot pursuit, the 150 Japanese soldiers or a monster would always be kind enough to pause and wait politely while the Heroes have a romantic chat, or a discussion about their next steps, or a hug.
- The Japanese occupation was apparently benevolent apart from one or two psychopaths running inhumane hospital experiments. Koreans own rich businesses, attend lavish parties, their cities are clean and full of normal daily life. The well-dressed and perfectly groomed resistance fighters struggle to articulate quite what they are fighting for since things are good!
- 10 minutes is really an hour when the two main characters feel the need to gaze romantically at one another among the mess of a gun fight. In one scene which is supposed to take "10 mins sharp, not a second more!" our heroes take their sweet time hugging, chatting, making ropes, moving furniture and so on - While the 150 Japanese soldiers are marching 20 meters down the corridor. And marching. And marching. Only to be suddenly stood in formation in a completely different room. Because who needs continuity?
- A small shoulder bag of dynamite can turn a massive multistory building with deep dungeons into a fireball, killing hundreds - apart from our heroes of course, who are right next to the explosives.
- A person can recover from deep sword cuts, being beaten up repeatedly and shot at, dropping from hights, and so on by having a nice nap.
- When resistance fighters join a stealth operation requiring quiet movement, they begin dancing with swords on rooftops, putting up large posters advertising they're from resistance, leaving the doors open, and so on - all to be discovered as easily as possible.
- Japanese people either yell or whisper menacingly. They can't talk like normal people. Also, they feel compelled to talk among themselves in Japanese in thick Korean accents, and randomly just in Korean.
- A monster fight or a shootout kills dozens of other people in seconds, but when it concerns the 5-6 members of our core cast, monsters go into stupor, bullets become blanks, and the time slows down. Why? Because our core cast members are unkillable. We know this from Episode 1: nothing bad will happen to them.
So ... love the series. Endlessly learning new things! Not annoyed by the repeated silliness even a little bit.
The Lazarus Project (2022)
Kill everybody you see?
It seems the primary instinct of literally everyone in this series is to kill.
Kill the nameless "enemies." Kill "friends." Casually kill bystanders. Kill civilians, children, men, women. Kill the paramedic who saves your friend; the only self-reflection being which part of his body to shoot and why.
All in the name of some "greater good" - which everyone defines for themselves.
Does this series show, quite honestly, the psyche of a modern western individual? Kill anyone who doesn't share their personal views. Kill everyone so the person they like, lives.
The show goes hard south from the very first episode, when our protagonist readily kills hundreds of people for a woman who has dumped him, and cheated on him, at the very first sign of him showing weakness and asking for help.
"Don't bring your problems to ME! Go GET some help!" the self-centered brat shouted, shutting the door before his face as he stood there, mumbling.
And then he goes and triggers a nuclear war over this self-absorbed, self-righteous woman who (I repeat) dumped him in the worst possible way when he was trying to help her and when he himself needed help.
I guess it's intentional that the show has not a single "positive" character. A bunch of murderers who smugly put an openly fascist government in power in an ex-soviet republic to further their goals ("oh, we'll kill then too later"), and who smile cutely while sawing off someone's hand or cutting out someone's eye simply because they needed it for the scanner - showing no care for the person they're casually mutilating.
The movie just keeps going south from there, as everyone gets caught in a cycle of endless mutual murders, trying to achieve whatever each one of them wants. All alliances are situational. All loyalties are fleeting. Trust is unthinkable by default.
It's only fitting that it all ends in an endless looped shootout, and the most vicious murderer wins the top job - the one who has betrayed everyone several times over.
So why 5 stars and nor 1? For the honesty.
Memoriseuteu (2020)
Over complicated
While the show is reasonably original and well acted, at some point it simply becomes too complex for its own good.
So many villains, motivations, killings, lost memories, red herrings, that by episode 12 watching this show became a chore. In some scenes, actors literally have to give lengthy verbal explanations about what the heck is going on. Some aspects confused me because in some scenes a character would have supernatural abilities and in other scene suddenly not.
It's choke-full of actively unpleasant characters, so it's not like watching it gives much joy anyway.
The two leads are fine, although I'm not a big fan of this Korean obsession with dolling people up. I just can't take it seriously when two perfectly made up and dressed individuals in expensive ballroom shoes are trying to present themselves as hard-boiled detectives.
Having said that, it could be worth a watch.
Ssaikopaeseu Daieori (2019)
Underrated and Good
I had to idea what to expect but was surprised with how good this was. The male lead delivered an outstanding performance -- in a couple of series I've seen him play characters with personality disorders or several characters at once, and he always delivers.
In fact, the entire cast delivers above expectations.
The plot is unique for Korean cinema, and I loved that there's no maudlin love story. The comedy works surprisingly well for such a grim story, too. The stereotypical Korean characters (screaming demon of a mother, unbearably stupid "comic relief" personages, open-mouth-eating-and-farting-middle-aged-men, and the like) are thankfully missing.
The only thing I found really frustrating was that no one asks the most obvious question. I mean, seriously, they start wondering about the most obvious thing 12 or 13 episodes in. That's the very first question I would have asked, and watching them not do this was infuriating! :)
I realize they needed it for the plot, but still.
Train (2020)
Unexpectedly Nice
I didn't expect to like this series at all, but decided to watch it as it has the same lead actor as "Psychopath Diary". I wasn't disappointed and found this show entertaining.
This show has a relatively unique plot (similar to "Tunnel" or "Signal" but this time across universes). Unlike the American "Fringe" which also deals with multiple universes, this series stays very human and character-driven, and doesn't go off into a technical apocalyptic dystopia like so many US shows.
The lead character cast is strong and their performances are outstanding.
I like how they made the point of little decisions, when accumulated, leading us on vastly different life paths.
The show does suffer from a few unfortunate tropes though:
- Endless flashback to literally the same memories, and overlapping episode endings/beginnings. I found myself becoming good friends with the "skip" button. There's probably a few episodes worth of literally 100% repeated footage.
- The standard thriller tricks of a character going to explore abandoned buildings at night, in the dark, after learning that the armed criminal is there, without telling anyone where they're going or asking for backup. This cliche appears so much because that's what normal humans apparently do, right?
- A bit over-dramatic for my tastes at times. These endless hard stares, criminals monologuing for minutes on end before pressing the trigger, protagonists turning their backs on wounded enemies to cry and hug so the enemies could attack them again or escape, statements full of pathos, it's all here.
Overall, an excellent experience which could have been made much tighter by eliminating 90% of repetitions.
Haepiniseu (2021)
Another "People Worse than Monsters" Flick
Seeing all the 10/10 reviews, I had overly high expectations. And indeed, the series started in an exciting and interesting way. Strong female lead, police characters to propel the plot, zombies, a luxury setting... what's not to like?
Well, it went downhill almost immediately. I have 3 main gripes:
1. Incredibly stupid choices by literally everyone apart from the little girl. Just one unbearable example: an older brother opens a door into a staircase potentially infected by zombies. Then he turns his back (!) to the danger (!) and starts bragging (!) how brave he is standing there (!) Of course he gets bitten immediately. Sadly, all characters are stupid like this. Maybe it's done for comedy, who knows? Looks stupid.
Don't get me started on the military and their utter stupidity on every step, or on everyone's insatiable thirst for endless meetings. Just sit at home and eat the food provided by the military... use the bathroom... sleep... but then there won't be 12 hours to film, right?
2. The "bad" characters go out of their way to be disgusting, morally corrupt, murderous, thieving and backstabbing. Like in a bad comic book.
3. The cure is available the entire time... but no one in the entire country has the basic smarts to realize this.
Net, better main leads than in Sweet Home Season 1, but filled with unimaginable stupidity.
Seuwiteuhom (2020)
Pains me to Give it a 3...
... but it has to be done. I watched Season 1 in a binge, it was captivating, fresh and terrifying. The monsters made perfect sense in the story's universe, meeting them was intense, and I felt sorry for quite a few monsters and humans.
Enter Season 2.
Military-style shoot-them-all-up mess with people and monsters running around and screaming. I got lost in the multitude of uninteresting characters, in random plot lines, in who likes/loves who and who wants to kill who and why. The stupid monster fights were boring because I was totally uninvested emotionally, so I just skipped them. Monsters became some strange zombies and robot-like transformers, howling somewhere in the distance and randomly attacking in large packs? Why?
Overall - 10/10 for Season 1, -7/10 for Season 2.
What a horrible continuation of an outstanding beginning. Looks so amateurish it's painful.
The Last of Us (2023)
What's with the hype?
After seeing these high review scores, I tried watching it. I'm struggling to get through the very first episode.
So far, it's the most clichéd and boring story ever told. Some dystopian future, as is typical for the American cinema (do Americans ever dream of a nice future?). Some brutal military dictatorship. Some system-fighting noble rebels. Some zombies. Yawnnnn.
And all this told slooooowlyyy. As if this slow pace adds any meaning to the shallow tale.
I'm not sure I have the stamina to keep watching this.
It was nice to see Anna Torv again though, I like this actress. 4 stars for Anna. Not sure I like the other two leads, they seem so clichéd I can't engage.
I haven't played the game mind you, so maybe for the original game lovers this story makes more sense.
Fringe (2008)
Pure entertainment
I quite like this old show, now on season 4. Most of all, this is pure, sheer, fun-based entertainment. This is so rare these days, maybe only Asia is still producing uncomplicated and agenda-free fun like this.
The show definitely has its low moments - the most striking is the absolute lack of mutual attraction between Peter and Olivia who "have to" play a couple and they sorta trudge along with the need. I understand Anna Torv was actually married to her first partner in the series so it probably was not easy for her. Her chemistry with that guy was fantastic. But, still...
Also there are some massive continuity issues. For example, the two universes are markedly different, yet somehow populated by the exact same group of core characters. Previously dead characters casually appear again as if nothing has happened. I found it naive and funny.
Oh, and careful watching it over breakfast. They revel in showing the most disgusting stuff full screen and in great detail.
But I don't care about any of that. The core concept is fun, pure and imaginative. I'm being entertained.
PS. Season 5 is just silly. It didn't need to exist, but I'm of course happy the actors got paid.
Invasion (2021)
Sleepy Lullaby with Japanese Nudes
I'm doing my best to get through episode # 2.
Zzz.
This review comes from a guy who loved the Soviet movie Solaris (where no action happened at all, only dialogues), so I'm not a "shallow action loving teen" like some people have preemptively called those who find this series boring.
You know why I enjoyed watching Solaris? They've set clear expectations and delivered exactly what they promised.
Here, they seem to promise us a Sci-fi alien invasion story, but instead load us with a myriad of slice-of-life, uninteresting, stereotypical routines of uninspired characters.
I realise that the story creators wanted to show the impact of an alien invasion on typical families (or something), but it's really too much.
Why do I have to sit through a hour of mundane conversations, domestic fights, inauguration speeches, rocket launches and what not, of so many people I don't yet give a flying eff about?
It seems the movie makers know they're boring their viewers, so they keep adding naked Japanese ladies at regular intervals and sexualising mundane exchanges. That was the most eroticised rocket systems check I've ever seen.
Some people they've spent the entire episode showing us are already dead, so what was the point of spending so much time on these characters? So we feel a sense of loss? All I feel is a sense of time wasted trying to stay awake to learn their stories. Which aren't even relevant to the plot.
And we keep getting introduced to more and more new characters. While an invasion is happening, I guess - somewhere off-screen, not here. In the background, far away.
Now that they've killed some characters from Episode 1, they're showing me a bus full of some random British kids bullying each other, I guess the bus will crash and we'll need to waddle through their survival story? While watching a group of random US soldiers somewhere in the Middle East coping with chaos, I suppose? And a group of some Japanese scientists? They also showed us the deep US South and mentioned Russia's RosCosmos, so I have to learn their stories too?
I guess not me. I'm out.
The music is nice. And the cinematography.
Tetris (2023)
Quirky Little Movie
Surprisingly nice movie which I didn't expect. The international adventures of Mr. Rogers were fun to watch.
My only gripe is the gray-filter scenes from Moscow. People relieving themselves and begging for food in the Moscow streets... police beating up passengers in the airport right on arrival... assault rifle-armed soldiers at the entrance to an electronics institution... the cartoonish KGB beating up the institution leader - and right at his workplace... an idiot-looking KGB leader publicly demanding a massive bribe... a car chase where a phone call would do... please. Propaganda should have some limits of reason.
I grew up in the USSR and lived in Moscow at that very time. You guys are laying it on so thick I felt nauseous.
Other than that, it's an exciting movie to watch and the team has done a fantastic job.
I knew some of the Tetris history and this was a pleasantly exciting trip down the memory lane, if a little genre-ambiguous. Except the laughable western-fantasy "Moscow" of course.
Devs (2020)
I like SciFi and Quantum mechanics...
...but not this series.
And to think that I paid for a Disney+ sub to watch this--what a waste of money.
Unlike many, I actually liked the lead actress. It's also cute that the name Amaya comes from her real-life niece who plays the little girl, the object of the antagonist's traumatic obsession.
Unfortunately, most of the story doesn't make much sense, neither quantum nor binary. Some scenes are just silly, like the child progeny dam suicide or the last episode where everyone goes "Hold on, and what are we supposed to do now? Ahh that's right, that's where you shoot me. Go on then."
I know they wanted to explore some "deep" (really, no) concepts, but the way they did it... argh. There's no suspense, no true depth, no logic.
For example, why wouldn't anyone at all try to act differently versus what they see on their magic quantum screen? Just try? At least once? As the plot shows, the free choice is perfectly possible and even easy.
And then, we get almost entire episodes with meditative acoustic chanting, colors and generic shapes changing on screen, a dead rat under some machine which leads to nothing, a ridiculous Russian spy subplot which leads to nothing, the constant mentions that our protagonist is Chinese which leads to nothing, and so on.
I may have read (and written myself) too many LitRPG books for the ending to be painfully predictable. Obviously predetermined, one might say, but with lazy writing and not much creativity.
They didn't even try to build an unavoidable chain of events leading to the resolution. People just, well, go ahead and do stuff which is convenient for the plot with zero explainable motivation. Like, why did Lily go to the labs, despite clearly not wanting to? "For Jamie", she says, but really? It makes zero sense. Why did she and Jamie wait around in her house, knowing the killer was after them? Again, no sense. Why did the "security pro" want to kill them, although he saw Lily was now friendly with his own employer? Zero sense.
I had my expectations so high after reading all the glowing reviews and watching the pilot episode. But the story turned out to be empty.
Severance (2022)
Office from Hell
Loved the show. Found it quite relatable after working in Human Resources for a major US corporation for 30 years.
The work/life balance conversations, the stupid "rewards", the wellness sessions, scheduled "office parties" with finger food where you can't think of what to talk about anymore, some colleagues literally sitting at the same desk in the same pose for 15 years, managers who pretend kindness but don't give half a darn about you, numbing work at computers on cyclical "projects" day in and day ou to hit the quotas...
The corporate money is good though. Can't argue there.
It's a pity the Hollywood actors are still on strike, so we won't see Season 2 for a while.
The only gripe I have with this show is that it's SLOW. I get it that they wanted to show the soul-crushing routine, but from the get-go I started skipping ahead. A guy crying in the car for 2 minutes... a guy walking the corporate corridors for 5 minutes... a guy changing shoes... people having a meaningless chat at a "food-free party" for I don't know how long because I skipped that scene...
Other than that, with the skillful use of the "forward" button, the show is highly watcheable.
Him-ssen yeo-ja Do Bong-soon (2017)
Cute Young Woman Surrounded by Abuse and Incompetence
The lead female is cute and she's a great actress.
The two male leads in the love triangle are the typical doll-boyz from any other Korean drama, who look good and dress good, but are kinda wooden.
All other characters are simply annoying, and sometimes massively disgusting non-entities (one personage drops his dentures into a pool of urine and pops them right back into his mouth??? Just how disgusting do you want to get in a "comedy"?).
I don't know why they had to cram so much stupidity into this series. All of it is unnecessary. I have to write this off to cultural differences: Given how popular this series is, a lot of people are obviously enjoying it.
They could have made it so much better. I mean, even the "case of the week" format would have been better. Instead, our impossibly cute and endlessly strong heroine just wonders about her life, with no goal, no job, no brains, with nothing to her personality beyond cuteness and strength, striving for nothing, leaving no impact.
And what of the constant mutual abuse? Her mother verbally assaults everyone apart from the rich guy, beats up her husband until he's literally blue in his face (is it comical?), all the bosses verbally assault and beat up their subordinates, schools and workplaces are full of abuse, and so on. Really shows Korea as an abusive and unhealthy society. I didn't find this "comical" but rather sad.
The plot falls apart in the later half, we know there's a criminal but no one seems to really care.
Net, give the character a goal, a motivation we could sympathize and relate with, give us a real villain, tell us a coherent story instead of just throwing a bunch of slapstick prancing on the screen.
Oh, and cut out that self-important, patronizing, yelling, abusive "mother". Just saying "eat well" sometimes doesn't make one a good parent. Argh, she infuriated me no no end.
First, I started skipping scenes with the idiotic neighbors wearing neon pink and green because they were adding nothing to the plot. Then I started skipping scenes with the idiotic and disgusting thugs for the same reason. Then I skipped every scene with the headache-inducing mother. Then I skipped the scenes with the idiot policemen. At that point, the brainless cutesyness of the "romantic" scenes annoyed me. And then there was nothing left to watch.
A series which considers pain, broken limbs, abuse and harassment to be comical? Not for me, sorry.
Strong Girl Nam-soon (2023)
Yes, it's the Same "Universe" as Strong Girl Bong-Soon
Let's get the obvious thing out of the way. The superpower is exactly the same as in the earlier series. Women in a given family are genetically wired to be immeasurably strong unless they do something bad. Only here it's dialed up a few notches.
They even have Bong-Soon's cameo in one episode, which I thought was a nice touch. They're shamelessly capitalizing on the earlier success and I'm all for it.
You can expect similar slapstick humor, "comical" fights, charming characters, and so on. It's refreshing to see that the mother here isn't a constantly yelling banshee like in the 2017 series (her annoying, judgmental screaming still rings in my ears 6 years later), and overall they have less of those unbearably stupid "comic relief" characters like the ever-complaining neighborhood ladies and the inept thugs who bump into one another in absurd ways and shriek.
I am at Episode 4 (latest released as of today) and I find the series enjoyable in an escapist, mindless sort of way.
I hope they continue in this style and the series doesn't switch genres midway as the Korean shows do sometimes.
The protagonist has the potential to become annoying with her cutesy/childish antics, but for now it's all good fun.
Can't wait for the next episode! Well done, team (so far)!
Update - as the show goes on, the humor becomes repetitive. A small childish young woman beats up huge angry men in "comical ways" or shocks them with her superpowers into a "comical" open-mouthed stupor. Still, this version is much easier to watch than the over-the-top, unbearable 2017 version.
Marco Polo (2014)
A Nice Historical Fantasy
As much as I enjoyed the storyline, I can't help but notice a million major inaccuracies. Unfortunately for me, I majored in Chinese language and history so I had to almost constantly roll my eyes while watching this.
For example, the geography... Cambulac (Beijing) doesn't look like Mongolia. What a surprise, huh?
Also, the main enemy capital wasn't as nearby as the series depicts. And it fell before Marco Polo arrived.
Also, Cocachin wasn't even born when Marco Polo arrived to the court of Kublai, and here she's a major character. She was wedded to a mongol khan in Persia, not in Kublai's court in Beijing.
And a Wudan monk, a blind master of kongfu able to defeat dozens of sighted warriors, and a never-ending fountain of "eastern wisdoms"... Wudan monks didn't appear until much later and their goal was to fight Mongols, not help them...
The "Cricket Minister" was a corrupt politician criticized for being unable to organize the Song defenses, and here he's a Marvel-type villain... he never killed Empress Dowager Xie in real life, who remained with the child Emperor Zhao Xian (whom, you guessed it, Kublai didn't kill! Instead, he grew up and traveled a great deal.)
And an instant polyglot, Chinese sword-wielding, kongfu fighting, engineering-minded, womanizing, irreplaceable European world savior Marco Polo? Where do I even begin...
Argh, I can go on and on.
Still, the storyline is mostly entertaining and didn't really get boring throughout the episodes. As long as you treat it as an alternative world fantasy, that is.
PS: I'm not a prude, but I really didn't appreciate sudden transitions to adult scenes. There I'd be, dialing up the volume in a tense scene where everyone mumbles (of course!) only to have wild moaning and naked bodies all over my screen the next second! Why were those scenes even needed? They add nothing to the plot.
Also, the directors have a bizarre fetish with killing nude women. At least 3 women die or fight for their lives in the nude... this just feels dirty.
The Thin Red Line (1998)
Watched on fast-forward
I don't know what I expected, but I ended up skipping massive chunks of this movie.
I can only watch a guy silently staring back on nature for so long.
Beautiful nature, for sure. Beautiful cinematography.
The battle scenes were quite disjointed for a supposedly war movie (or peace movie)?
I knew that war is horrible and inhumane before starting to watch the movie, by the way. I didn't need random scenes of kissing and random pseudo-philosophical mumbling to realise this.
Can't imagine sitting through 3 hours of this in a theater. Glad I was watching a digital copy.
Now I need to type 200 hundred more characters. Now I need to type 200 hundred more characters.
Mubing (2023)
Felt like work
Watching these 20 hours felt like a full working week. I know my opinion won't be popular here but there we go.
I did like the actors - in fact, I know most of them from other Korean dramas and they're great.
The beginning of the series was nice, although I found myself trapped in a typical high school drama with the typical rampant bullying from thousands of other Korean stories, typical loves me / loves me me not, and so on.
Then the story, with no warning, abandons the three kids and goes into a multi-hour flashback telling full, increasingly gory back stories of every parent and then some.
In the end, it cuts to present and plunges us into a convoluted, overly long, 3-hour "final fight" where the same people endlessly revive. I was literally skipping ahead, saying "not another fight between these two, they've fought at least twice already!"
And then the stereotypes...
- Lying, treacherous Americans? Check.
- Brutal North Koreans, all living in bleak labor camps? Check.
- Russian mafia, speaking with the thickest American accent in the shadow of a giant Lenin statue? Check.
I was so glad it when it was finally over.
Maseukeugeol (2023)
Thriller with a meaning
I quite enjoyed this thriller. It wasn't at all what I expected from the description, but I liked the actual story better.
Intense, bizarre, and bloody. But there's also quite a deep message behind all this insanity. It was refreshing to watch a relatively unique series from Korea, vs the usual staple of typical 3-4 plots and character sets we get from there.
This series takes the Korean cliche of "screaming banshee of a mother" to a whole new level.
And now I need 150 more characters. Does anyone know why some reviews get away with being short? Why do I have to type so much text every time I want to review a movie, is beyond me.
Homunculus (2021)
Sorry for the low rating
I like unusual movies and wanted to like this one.
But the r*pe scene with an underaged student (to "cure her of her demons") did it for me. I couldn't engage on the rest of the content.
I've lived in Japan for a long time, in fact enjoyed the same restaurant where the momie opens, so I have some understanding of the Japanese culture and usually "twisted" attracts me.
But sexual violence towards a minor... wayyy beyond my boundaries.
I get the core idea, I don't mind the indie feel, I get the descend into madness and trauma resolution, I just couldn't see the logic in the story. The ending is simply unsatisfying too.
Nigeru wa haji daga, yaku ni tatsu (2016)
Surprisingly Fun to Watch
Enjoyed this simple, unpretentious (inner joke!) comedy more than I thought I would.
All the actors did a wonderful job - well done, team!
The plot is straightforward and fun. Nothing unexpected would happen here, you know exactly what to expect. A few nice side-stories add variety.
I don't really have any criticism to offer, the show sets the expectations clearly and delivers on them. I loved that it doesn't take itself seriously and has some funny day-dreaming sequences.
The only thing is, it's "very Japanese" in terms of actors play style. A bit more exaggerated in intonations and gestures. I don't mind this, but to some audiences this may seem "artificial."
It also helps that the clear Japanese they speak helps keep my language skills up! Picked up a few fun phrases from the dialogues for my own use :)
Otto no chinpo ga hairanai (2019)
Frustratingly Good
I see a lot of reviewers are frustrated after watching this show. The story shows a typical Japanese couple with typical mindsets, going through typical communication issues. The reason for these issues is quite unusual though.
Having been married to a Japanese woman for 20+ years, I recognize quite a few exasperating patterns illustrated here :) the avoidance of communication, the long silences, the inability to get to the point. In my case, we managed to find ways to communicate openly and frequently after a few years. This show threw me right back to my first years of marriage.
I'm still mad with the couple's failure to visit a doctor and even articulate the issue to one when they eventually did decide to seek medical help, after decades of suffering. This "oh well, this can't be helped so I'll just endure quietly instead of actively seeking a solution" attitude is so recognizable I wanted to yell at them!
So overall, the series does a great job showing the typical patterns of behavior. Well done. Which is why it could be so infuriating to watch.
Kingyo Tsuma (2022)
Loved the story, and chose to see the ending differently
The storyline surprised me in a positive way. I didn't expect to enjoy the show as much as I did.
One thing which bugged me was the English translation. It kept adding unnecessary things which the characters never said, like "my love," "honey," "love of my life..." This really presented some relationships in a more confusing way than in the original. Luckily for me I guess, I understand Japanese, but I was sorry for those who don't because they're missing a lot of nuance due to poor translation which cheapened the story.
I'm not the one to judge the individual relationships, but the ending bugged me. The couple overcame so many obstacles, got accepted by everyone including Haruto's family, and then ... in tears ... they just separated forever.
Why? There was zero reason for this.
I choose to believe that in the last moments, Haruto ran to meet Sakura in the secret place where they had promised each other to meet on that fireworks night, and where she already sat waiting.
Otherwise, the ending invalidates the entire story.