The strangest movie I’ve seen in my entire life

I watched this movie just because I really love Kim Beom as an actor and want to see his whole filmography. I did not know what to expect and was super baffled going into this movie by the other reviews that are all saying this movie makes no sense, because to be honest, a lot of times when I see reviewers say a story made no sense, the story did make sense but people just struggled with comprehending a complex but otherwise fully explained plotline. But nah, the other reviewers are right in this case LMAO. I truly have no idea what’s going on in this film. This movie is proof that acting cannot save a film if the writer and director (which in this case it was the same person, and the person never made another film after this, which isn’t shocking) don’t know what they’re doing. I kind of feel bad for all actors involved because they probably thought the premise sounded interesting and wanted to give a new filmmaker a chance with no precedent to work with in order to gauge the person’s talent beforehand. I also feel bad for Kim Beom because he really deserves to be the main lead, but in a story better than this one.

What’s sad about this film is I can kind of see how it could have been interesting if it only had a better script and director. The storyline is essentially a tragedy of someone who was otherwise probably intended to be a decent person experiencing a downfall and point of no return due to excessive unconditional love. I can see some semblance of a motif and meaning in this film with the phrase “fly high” and the little angel we see in the story, representing Sibum’s rise in the gang at the cost of his humanity and acting dreams. The mood-setting, the dark and gritty atmosphere, and the emotions of Sibum are all immersive, it’s just that the point A to point B of the storyline makes no sense and there’s little to no fleshing out of any plot points whatsoever. It’s not REALLY an authentic silent film in an artistic sense, but the scripted dialogue is so bare that the actors cannot even work with it enough to make the plot progression any clearer. There is not enough explanation at any given moment for what is going on. That being said, you can generally deduce a loose idea of what is going on, but there is a sense that the writing almost feels unfinished. It feels like someone wrote a few sentences explaining the concept for the story instead of creating a fully crafted plot full of details and then just started filming on a very loose and incomplete outline. You can grasp at straws for what is happening and its meaning or what the writer may have intended, but not a single idea in this movie was fully fleshed out. Scenes did not go on enough, there wasn’t enough exposition or development, we’re just thrown into dramatic events without any proper build up, which makes all the characters’ actions seem sudden and excessive. It really feels like someone’s school art project instead of a proper film that someone reviewed and was like “yes, this is it, this is finished, let me release this to the world.” I understand now why the reviews are all confusing and why my own review is also probably confusing is because the problems this film has are somehow not problems I've ever seen any other film have, therefore it is difficult to articulate them.

That being said, the film is visually pretty and I’d still recommend Kim Beom fans to watch it in order to see his whole filmography if they want, if not just with subtitles off LOL. Kim Beom looks very beautiful in the lighting and styling of this film and I would love to see him film a modern day, good story with this kind of dark and gritty visual.

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Extremely straightforward and simple storyline

I usually have a lot to say about most stories I watch. I tend to get deeply and passionately engrossed in fiction and want to talk about the story in depth with whomever I watched it with after completion, or I struggle to write concise reviews because I have such strong feelings about the story. That is not the case for The Guest, and it’s because I have no particularly strong emotion about this show. I would recommend The Guest depending on your approach to how you engage with fiction. If you watch for simple entertainment value plot-wise then move on quickly to the next show rather than for extreme immersion and connection with characters, this might be the show for you.

I found the plotline of The Guest to be incredibly straightforward, simplistic, and somewhat predictable. Simple stories aren’t always bad, and predictability doesn’t always have a massive bearing on writing quality. But I do think this story was simplistic bordering on feeling like the script was like what you might expect from a children’s show but with dark visual/subject content. Basically, this story deals with dark topics like exorcism and demons, and it has grim lighting at times, but it mostly lacks the depth necessary for emotional connection to the characters or for the theme of the story to feel dark or insightful. Dark things happen but the story doesn’t treat them with huge depth, and dialogue is often quite repetitive and shallow. I went into this watch having heard a lot of people call this kdrama “very different” and “unique” but I really do feel that it’s just dark in visuals but without being very rich in commentary or meaning. It’s a show you watch to see things happen, not to be touched or psychologically mind blown. I feel like this warning is warranted, given that people who tend to like this show’s genre tend to lean toward favoring depth and heavy psychological themes and may be disappointed.

One of my biggest complaints with the story is I was anticipating a very interesting and strong friendship to bloom between the three protagonists. While I appreciate the nontraditional gender lineup for the main characters and that the female character was not a love interest for the men, I was expecting much more development, growth, and camaraderie between the characters. It felt like not much more was fleshed out for the characters beyond their initial backstory, feeling guilty toward one another because of their shared involvement, and feeling an obligation to protect one another to lessen that guilt, which felt more like internal conflict than evidence of true closeness. I was looking forward to seeing more dimension to the characters and bonding over their character traits and liking each other as people for who they were, but they are not developed much beyond their premise. (The scene where Yoon buys Hwa Pyung food and left it for him while he was sleeping was probably one of the most genuine signs of care we saw in the story outside of appearing to want to protect one another out of moral obligation; I would have loved to see more scenes like this.) Relatively more development is poured into each of the main characters’ relationships with their pre-existing social circle outside of one another, such as Gilyoung’s relationship with Bongsang, Hwa Pyung’s relationship with Yook Gwang, and Yoon’s relationship with Father Yang.

Overall, if you tend to like more simplistic watches and are interested in the relatively more unique visuals and concepts of this storyline in terms of the exorcism, it may still be worth checking out. Another reviewer described The Guest as an “easy watch” and I would say that is pretty accurate; you will be able to have some fun at guessing how the plot will unfold without having to think too hard and the content is not as emotionally heavy as a different writer could easily have made it. Many people seem to have a soft spot for this series because of the originality of its premise for a Kdrama, so definitely check it out if you think it is up your alley.

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Criminally underrated masterpiece showcasing the horrors of warfare & bigotry

I am so astounded at how underrated this film is when it honestly deserves to rack up big time on awards and is an absolute must watch. I’m not usually a big movie enjoyer and I am disappointed by most films I watch, but this film is a masterpiece and I think on par with big-name films like Parasite. I find it unfortunate that it seems to only be EXO-Ls who have watched it to support Kyungsoo with few outlying viewers. I think this film would get more accolades it deserves if there were simply more eyes seeing it than there are.

One of my biggest issues with war movies is they’re constantly used as propaganda to fulfill an agenda of favoring one side over another. Depending on the nationality of the writer, there’s often going to be a massive slant to paint one side as the hero and one side as totally evil. There’s also often little humanization for the innocent civilians and casualties. In doing so, these films desensitize the horror of war and we forget there’s a name and life and passion behind every human being who is lost to the war. This film does justice to everything that war movies so constantly mess up. It humanizes the civilians and it showcases how love and passion can transcend borders, nationality, language, political ideology, gender, and race and bring people together despite our differences. Simultaneously, it showcases how war is often fueled by ignorant leaders and racism that takes the lives of those aforementioned humans who have a name, life, and passion.

This film utilizes its contrasting tones and genres masterfully as a weapon for an ulterior motive, which is something movie critics who faulted these opposing storytelling elements seemed to not understand. I will admit the ending of this film is extremely heavy, and I really had to sit with it and think to reach acceptance. When engaging with fiction, we often jump to conclusions that upsetting events in a finale are bad writing, but that’s not always the case; not all fiction exists for escapism. This story is so heartbreaking in order to get its point across. Sometimes art makes us uncomfortable on purpose. In this case, Swing Kids’ grim ending and contrasting tragedy and comedy was meant to bring attention to a cruel reality. It does not matter how well we know someone, how happy they seem, how passionate they are about something (in this case, tap dance), how much growth they’ve made, how much we love them. War takes and it takes and it takes, and no amount of love we have for a person makes them exempt from being casualties. This film did a disquieting job of humanizing all of our main protagonists from different nationalities and walks of life and showing their love and shared passion for tap dancing, but with the chilling reminder that these jolly people who made us laugh and who we rooted for ARE the casualties we lose to war and racism in reality.

I would also like to take a moment to appreciate Kyungsoo and Jared Grimes’ incredible work in this film. From what I understand, Kyungsoo learned to tap dance for this role, and Jared Grimes learned to act for this role. You would not know that the two of them were treading such unfamiliar territory from their impeccable performances. Stellar film overall.

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