Hours of Waiting for a 2 Hours disappointment.

This Review is going to be long, but please be patient and read it before watching.

This movie was one long awaited movie for me and i have been waiting since the end of December for its release, since the original manhwa is badass in jokes, romance, friendship and maturity, but i was still doubtful over its quality since Netflix produces it, and my doubts were true, it was indeed crap and a disappointment to the Manhwa.

Basically they picked out the main leads story from the manhwa, and created a SM documentary out of it. And since i am a guy who hates documentaries, i had to skip through most of the movie to finish it.

Now this is my comparison of movie with its hundred times better manhwa. The manhwa had many great things which was lacking in the movie.
1. The manhwa was light hearted, no heavy SM, and each and every chapter was funny. No drama, no seriousness, but entirely mature was the best thing. But when it came to this Netflix movie, it was flipped over and the funny tone was switched off after first few minutes. Maturity was there, but the movie lost the tone of the manhwa, and it was frustrating.
2. Characters - Sure to crumple into that two hour slot, Netflix had to cut out many parts, but looks like Netflix had omitted the entire manhwa after adapting first few chapters and created their own story, and as Netflix goes, it was dark and bad. In the manhwa, there were great characters like Male Lead's friend, and a woman who works in the bar that male lead owns, the SM community that male lead is part of, second male lead and several others were omitted for the movie. If Netflix adapts a manhwa, it should do it properly, not like this, eating half a piece of cake and dumping the rest. Rather than all these good characters, they added few boring characters, and i couldn't even bother knowing it. If the movie slot was too small, they could have gone for a drama and did it good, but half assing would always be bad.
3. Basically this movie had swapped out comedy and bromance for darker concept. It's not like i discriminate dark SM, and to be honest i liked NANA TO KAORU, but here darker SM is not necessary, and comedy is only thing required. The swapping of genre made it dull and uninteresting. The relationships was dark and crap and the entire plot was dark.
4. The male Lead's character. This is another thing Netflix crapped it. Male lead in the manhwa is 100 times better than movie. In manhwa, male lead was strong willed, funny and always had a mature approach to relationships. But in the movie they followed the regular kdrama male lead with trauma concept. Why, why the hell should you do that??? Why should you swap good characterisation to cliche crap character.

Overall, this movie is a total disappointment. I am not a fan of those dark crap things Netflix makes, and looks like they won't come out of it soon. Either they make childish dramas similar to BOYS OVER FLOWERS, or very dark dramas like DARK DESIRE. They should learn to draw a middle line and make dramas in that line, where it will be more realistic to watch. For MDL users, i would recommend you read the manhwa rather than the movie. The movie is totally bad that i can't recommend anyone. Looks like WEBTOON picked this manhwa, but still if you want to read ahead, 121 chapters are already out.

Re-watch value - I missed this one. Watching it one time itself was a headache for me, so i don't think i will watch it again. This movie taught me that I should never believe Netflix with its adaptations.

And overall rating of 5.5 is generous from me, and i would have given it 5, but one extra for my manhwa.???

Read More

The best Japanese movie I have ever watched

This movie far exceeded my expectations. Usually Japanese dramas and movies have the crappiest acting and romance ones have unrealistic direction, but this was quite different which seperated it from the rest.
Story : You have to close your sense of detective thinking while watching this movie. The story lacked logic in many scenes, but logic isn't the goal of this movie. It is basically story of a shut in man who falls in love with a woman through a peep hole.but one day he witnesses a horrifying incident through the peephole, and what happens after that forms the rest of the story. Don't go in and watch it for a thriller movie. This movie is a pure romance movie, and you might find a few jump scares here and there. There isn't comedy here, but the sweet romance calms up the movie. So , this movie is not a thriller movie, but a romantic one. The story is one of its strongest points and I have watched several thousand movies in fifteen languages, and never have I come across a movie with this kind of story.
Acting: this is another strong point to the movie. All actors in this movie showed flawless acting skills, and this is the first japanese film I enjoyed after watching many crapy ones. None of the actors felt cartoonish, and though I never felt sad feelings, it is not required in this movie as it is a weird movie. The slashing and fighting seemed bad, but since I am not a fan action scenes and skip them usually, I was able to overlook it. The romantic feelings were really good, and the actors didn't speak mind voices which were irritating in other japanese dramas.
Music: I never usually listen to songs in movies, but the sound effects in this movie were good. I didn't notice any faults, but neither was it memorable.
Re-watch value: I never re-watch movies and shows, but this movie is definitely a one time watch for everyone. Because once you know the twists in the story, you would be bored to watch it.
Overall: for viewers like me who hate tragedies, this would be a very good movie. And compared to other japanese content, I liked this very much. Hope japan makes many shows and movies with realistic acting. A spectacular night watch???

Read More

A different take on Rich woman story where the Female lead is actually soft hearted.

This was my third or fourth hongkong movie, I think so, and honestly the movies i watched before this one either had a crappy story or crappy acting or crappy acting or crappy dialogues, which made it a borefest. So, i had some initial doubts on whether watching it or not. But I'm glad that i proceeded watching it as this movie was refreshingly pleasant to watch. So if you are like me who are hesitating to watch, go ahead and don't miss it.

Story
This is another take of the trope of rich woman poor man love story, which was rarely done in chinese, korean and other asian cinema. Being a male, i usually preferred watching any movie having this trope, but sadly most of the movies had over the top idiotic stories, with arrogant and rude female lead and a male lead contrary to it. But this movie took a straight u turn and made the female lead kind hearted. The female lead is the heir or rich business conglomerate, and is a spoilt child, who doesn't know the value of money. Unbearing of her immense expenses, her family and butler hatch a plan to make her understand the difficulty of earning money. What happened during and after the plan forms the later part of the story. The story, though very old was very good, and the male and female leads were structured properly without over the top irritating characteristics assigned. Though unbelievable at some points, it had the vibes of jdrama, with natural stories, and hooked me on until i completed it.

Acting
This was another thing this movie farred well compared to all other hong kong movies. The acting was natural, and the female though looked crazy at some times, pulled off her character really well, that made me forget all the unreality points in the plot. The male lead too did his role quite well, and their chemistry was pulled well.

Music
Well, i never care about the music in the movie, but the cantonese or han language spoken by the actors in the movie was sometimes irritating which reduced my score in the music category.

Rewatch value
This movie is perfect for rewatching. I watched this movie twice and i'm fully aware of the story but still the quirky won't bore me out.

Overall
This movie is interesting take on rich poor man story. I watched this on kissasian which had a crappy quality, but who cares, as long as the movie was good i wouldn't mind watching it even in 144p. Though the voice was bad, don't regret skipping this movie.

Read More