Reviews

Three vivacious boys and the mountain they live on

Hang in There, Kids! was written and directed by Taiwan's first female indigenous director, Laha Mebow. The film features three mischievous boys who live on a picturesque mountain and are about to graduate from the 6th grade. Though they go about their days in a joyful, care-free manner, their smiles hide very real pain.

Watan who is an orphan living with his grandmother is the de facto leader of the group. He is overjoyed that his high school dropout brother has returned from Taipei to help with his grandmother's farm. Watan also harbors a not-so-secret crush on his afterschool teacher, Lawa, who is confined to a wheelchair. Chen Hao lives with his aging single father and longs for his absentee mother. The last of the group and the shortest is Lin Shan who wants to be an NBA player like Jeremy Lin. His father drinks too much and belongs to a band that struggles to find gigs in Taipei.

Whether pinching Watan's grandmother's veggies or Chen Hao's dad's peaches to sell illegally on the road or running away to spend the night with a French couple on the mountain, the boys always find joy in the moment. Despite their troubles they look for fun and adventure wherever they are. A fieldtrip to Taipei with their class gives each of them a chance to discover or share something important.

Music is woven throughout the film whether it is a naughty ditty the boys sing, a father's heartfelt apology and love for his son, or a woman's song of love and life after a crushed dream. The songs are skillfully used to not only enhance the emotions in a scene but also to tell part of the story.

The three boys carry the weight of the film on their small shoulders as the conflicts in this slice of life film are minimal. Watan's brother becomes involved with marijuana growers looking for land, Granny needs new teeth, and there's the small meaningful disclosure of the teacher's former life, but it's not like there are huge plot revelations. Most of the film is played out through the boys' daily lives and their search for a mother, a father, or a gift of love to a teacher. The boys' natural and energetic performances brought to gentle life the telling of their stories. If ever there was a setting that could be billed as a co-star it would be the scenic, mysterious mountain the boys traverse during their adventures.

There was a peaceful mood to this film. Even with the familial problems, the boys were close and tactile with each other and the other adults in the film. Lawa may have been in a wheelchair, but her heart soared to the children she cared for and the mountain around them. A sense of community and pride defined the story and the Sqoyaw people within it. Hang in There, Kids! was 90 minutes of friendship, family, and a little heartache. The mountain had its dark side but there was always something to discover. "What do you know? Maybe great things will happen." This tranquil, touching film about childhood is one to try if you enjoy this genre.

5/26/23

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A short and to-the-point flip show.

A fair amount of this black-and-white short film leaves the viewer to soak in the ambience of Hokusai's work, asking us to view history through his eyes as well as the eyes of the poets of his time. The narration doesn't say very much, but when it does it's very pointed, drawing our attention to the everyday lives of the working class and the timeless bitterness towards the wealthy class overtaxing them to pay for "hired guns" (in this case, samurai).

The few live action sequences do a good job of demonstrating what the woodblock printing process is like and how it can be used to highlight the perspective that Hokusai strove for, yet I can't help thinking about how much impressive depth is lost in the absence of Hokusai's vivid colors.

Overall, it is a decent sampling of what Hokusai's portfolio has to offer and worth a look if you're curious.

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Love lost and found

So I kinda like the movie more than the drama. Well, the drama was already good but I was craving some happy moments between leads which was not tinged with sadness and here, that happens. The crumbs they serve here are in big chunks and gawd I am all there for it. I would happily say this is more like a continuation because otherwise, it wouldn't make sense of how LJW thinking of HYX when she teleported to the past, also the two timelines they show simultaneously. It was so sad but MJJ was alive so I liked it even more!! I liked there was not much killing n all lol, also we got a better ending than the drama! although extended ver showed still. This ending is way better to soothe my heart.

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car action movie worth watch with badass female lead

Special Delivery[2022] -8,5/10 kmovie

if you liked The Transporter series with Jason Statham you will like this one too.
Its action based movie with alot car action and female driver as main and child as package to be delivered.
After seeing this movie I guess I will check out some of other Park So Dam dramas.

plot - FL is best driver for special delivery which specialize in delivering anything worth money to destination without being caught. Once FL leads gets job to deliver father with son, but father got caught before meeting point and kid is pursued. FL pick up kid and got dilemma what to do with him.

genre - action, cars

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I'd probably go crazy if I heard those birds scream everynight.

I think this film was packed with too much symbolism which I could not pick up on (e.g. the birds). It was honestly an ok film, I just can't find anything to really appreciate about it.

I think the ML's writing could've been explored a lot more. I keep thinking about him talking about his novel and him just describing what happened in his relationship. Like, completely conspicuous. And for the ML, I would've liked to see her past relationship a bit more as well. And also a bit more of their relationship beforehand when they were just mere acquaintances. We only got one scene from when they were just acquaintances/friends. It would have been interesting to look at, what I would describe as the ML's obsessiveness, a bit more.

It felt quite depressing and gloomy at times despite nothing in the present day was bad. In fact, they shared quite a lot of good moments together. I did find it to be almost hopeful at times.

I will say that I totally skipped over the sex scene, and the make out one the next morning which the FL resists at least twice before she just gives in.

I would definitely watch it again to see if I could actually pick up on anything new. Especially because of how good the acting was.

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To be honest, I don't fully know how I feel about this film.

The concept was quite enticing, but completely predictable. I already knew what had happened and also how it was going to end quite early on. And it was quite on the shorter side. I do think they could've tried to expand it just a bit and made it slightly longer. And even though I saw a lot of it coming, I was still very interested to see whether it would end in the way I had predicted.

There was quite a bit of symbolism that I did not understand. There was a blue feather which the MC does explain, I just don't remember what he said about it. There's also a painting involved. And I'm sure if I knew the painting, I would understand the film much better. There was also some stuff around motherhood from two different perspectives - a mother, and someone who doesn't have a mother.

Some moments/things I want to mention:
- towards the beginning, the MC says something like, 'your otaku son is really weird yanno. He only ate curry. Who does he thing he is, an Indian?' It caught me off guard so I had to rewind it so I could laugh for a two minutes straight. (I am ethnically Indian btw)
- +1 for the otaku son having the same DS as me
- +1 again for the otaku son's mother crocheting in the film. I had my own project next to me so I picked it up so we could crochet together lmao, but we hold our hooks differently.

I found it quite uncomfortable at times, but I liked that. But it wasn't out there enough for me, personally, I enjoyed the process of watching it, but I don't have much to discuss beyond that.

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Amazing!

I initially did not want to watch a movie that contained so much fighting and battle scenes. I prefer dramatic romance or comedic romance but I was drawn to it because I am a big fan of the Leading Male actor, Jo in Sung. I am so happy I did. What an amazing group of actors and story line. The heroics of several of the characters brought tears to my eyes and it is a movie that I will probably never forget. The second Male lead, Nam Joo-hyuk was also terrific. I just finished watching him in another movie, "Remembrance", which is also outstanding. All in all, a terrific job by all the actors, writers and entire movie crew.

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Absurd, twisted and deliciously dark family saga.

The gap between the poor and the rich is depicted with sharp humor, unexpected twists and a lot of darkness in Bong Joon-ho's Parasite. It's a lovely black comedy about the most twisted household since Dogtooth.

Despite unemployment and poverty, Ki-taek and his family manage to keep their spirits up. Mom, dad and two soon-to-be-grown children are crammed into a shabby basement in a run-down alley, constantly looking for odd jobs and free wifi. The family doesn't have much, but they have a nice cohesion, cordial jargon and ambitions for a better life.

When the son Ki-woo receives a tip about a job with a rich family, the possibilities for an extra income open up. With a forged university diploma, he gets a job as an English teacher for the Park family's teenage daughter. Also living in the luxurious villa is a businessman, his housewife, a quiet guy who mostly expresses himself through drawings, and the housekeeper who keeps everyone in order.

Ki-woo soon seizes the chance to arrange a job for his sister, Ki-jung, as the boy's "art therapist". He advises Mrs. Park of "a talented acquaintance," who is "probably very busy," but he will do his best to arrange a meeting. On false credentials and with made-up names, both siblings have soon tricked themselves into employment with the wealthy family.

How long can they keep up the lies, and how far can the charade go? This is just the beginning of a twisted scenario that Bong Joon-ho (Snowpiercer, Okja) has so masterfully directed. Here is the DNA of both the Sune family and the absurd Greek Dogtooth (2009) from Yorgos Lanthimos. While Parasite feels completely original, never predictable, and impossible to put into a single genre box.

Comedy and tragedy go hand in hand through Bong's twisty corridors, and you never know what awaits around the next corner. Parasite is a film that is best experienced without knowing anything in advance. It's an entertaining story that grabs me early on with its delightful humor, and then just tightens its grip more and more as the film goes on.

Not entirely unsurprisingly, the director also talks about the gaps between those who have money and those who have none. You can see the film as a commentary on a society where the poor take desperate measures to climb out of their misery, and where the rich turn a blind eye to what is happening in the outside world. Bong Joon-ho has made one of the best movies of 2019, and I'm loving every second of it!

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Lots of action but messy script.

When Squid Games Lee Jungjae takes the director's chair to give his version of what the machinations of the South Korean security police in the 80s might have looked like, there is no shortage of impressive action scenes. Lee Jungjae and Jung Woosung in the lead roles make up a charismatic duo, but on the whole, Hunt is unfortunately a fairly messy film experience...

The year is 1983, 4 years after the fall of dictator Park Chunghee. But the new president is also a dictator, which provokes protests from the South Korean immigrant population in the United States before his visit. “Drive him out,” they shout, and when the South Korean officials wonder why they can't just drive the protesters away, Park Pyongho (Lee Jungjae), the head of the foreign affairs unit of Korea's Central Intelligence Agency (KCIA), patiently replies that they can't in the US (and gets the somewhat sarcastic answer that the protesters have very strong opinions about the homeland after abandoning it…).
 
The introduction shows the difference between the free country in the West, and the censorship and corruption back home. Because soon Park Pyungho is back in South Korea, where protesters are beaten and tortured, where corruption is high, and where you don't know who you can trust. Especially not as it is revealed that there is a North Korean spy within the KCIA, someone who goes by the code name "Donglim".
 
Park Pyungho is tasked with identifying the spy, but the same task is also assigned to Kim Jungdo (Jung Woo-sung) of the KCIA's domestic unit, which gives rise to an intense power struggle. Park Pyungho is a veteran of the agency while Kim Jungdo is a newcomer from the Korean Army. Park Pyungho comes across as the more sympathetic and righteous of the two men, especially as he condemns Kim Jungdo's use of torture in his interrogation methods. It turns out that he has his own experiences with these as Kim Jungdo previously interrogated him, which left him with permanent nerve damage in his hand.
 
Lee Jungjae is a lovely anti-hero (for sure, there are male melodrama ingredients here, the reluctant legal fighter who suffers the heavy injustices of life, and selflessly risks his life, accompanied by melancholic music). A tough guy who installs a corrupt leader within the unit, and protects the young and beautiful but secretive college student Yoojung (Go Younjung). He seems to have taken to her since her father was killed, but their actual relationship remains unclear for most of the film. Here we get some sort of explanation at the end, but everything else leaves us with question marks.
 
Because the spectacularly well-choreographed action sequences aren't always narratively supported enough to justify them. Much of the violence is unprovoked, and serves no narrative function. You almost get a little sense of what a German crime drama would look like if it was accidentally mixed with splatter. A traditional film adaptation cut together here and there, with interspersed violence from ear files to mass shootings and car chases and everything in between. The plot becomes difficult to follow.
 
This makes the movie experience a bit frustrating after a while. Spectacular action sequences and close-ups of the charismatic Lee Jungjae are not enough to fully sustain interest throughout the film's 2 hours and 11 minutes. Crime dramas and spy films work best with methodically planted clues that, while surprising, move the story forward - A story you can follow and understand.
 
Hunt carries too many secrets, too much unprovoked violence, and too dark motives. The characters may be moving in a time of psychological terror, where everyone around them is a potential enemy, but the script that conveys this must still be the audience's friend.

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I love Yoongi so much and seem to forget sometimes how amazing he is and this documentary just reminded me of that fact again. Just like Hobi's "J-Hope in the Box", this documentary felt like an amazing insight into the process of creation and music making. Yoongi is always hard working and critical, but his music is always on point and perfect. His hard work and sleepless nights and frustration when something doesn't work out the way he wants really paid off; "D-Day" is an amazing album from start to finish! Seeing the cameos of his celeb friends like Steve Aoki and Halsey was really cool too because it's always nice to see when BTS and its members gets appreciated for who they are rather than just their brand. So, to see that they seem to have some genuine friendships in the western music market is great! I also loved seeing Jimin's two seconds of screen time, that guy is always there to support his members, i love him so much :(. My favorite part of the documentary had to be toward the end with Sakamoto Ryuichi. You could really see and feel that Yoongi was talking to an artist he deeply respected and to see him be appreciated and praised by said artist was very heartwarming; the song they worked on together ("Snooze") is one of my faves on the album anyway, so this bit made it even better. The live performances of some select songs made the documentary a little more dynamic (Hobi had clips of the festival to show, but Yoongi hadn't gone on tour yet), and I just generally love seeing this dude perform. Overall, great documentary, great artist, great music<3

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Is there any like it?

No there isn't! Such a sweet and heartfelt drama that has me in tears each time I rewatch. Out of all the romance I've read or watched, this is probably my favorite of all time. It shows how you don't need much to love someone, and how affection doesn't always need to be shown with hugs, kisses or just skin-ship in general, even so, you can still tell how much Taiyu cared for Zhenxin. Seeing feelings develop here and there through a comfortable relationship where two share the same braincell is just so cute and refreshing, it has its own uniqueness in a way, not needing many words or contact exchanged to absolutely melt our hearts and have us absolutely sweating from our eyes. (Crying)

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Junji Ito's manga Uzumaki was a masterpiece... the movie not so much.

I have and read multiple times the original Uzumaki manga by Junji ito. I love Junji Ito's works and Uzumaki is a good story. The movie was a hard watch.

I started watching it with high expectations, and that's probably where I went wrong. They left out alot of the story, but thankfully kept some of my favorites parts. I personally dont think Shuichi's actor fits the character but that's not to much of a problem.

By no means is this a perfect adaptation. I encourage you to watch it yourself and see what you think. I hope you find it much more enjoyable than I did.

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