Reviews

A Great Battle indeed!

As the movie name suggests, this 2 hour movie is about the 2 month battle between the 5,000 army of Commander Yang in Ansi vs the 200,000 army of Chinese emperor Taizhong.

Not sure how accurate the war strategy depicted in the movie, but while watching with my friend, we were thinking, if we were Yang, how can we defeat a strong army with few troops and limited resources? The answer is a lot of strategy, courage, and faith. We did think they could have done more to defeat the Chinese army, like using fire and pushing the ladder much earlier but i guess they delayed these for a more epic scenes.

This movie boasts of an ensemble cast so they tried to have some story for each one, like Samul's trust in Yang, the rivalry between the Hwalbo and Poong, the tragic love story between Paso and Bekha, and love between Woo Dae and his mom. Jumong's bow added a mythical touch to the story (like King Arthur and his sword or Thor and his hammer).

Rating: 8.5/10

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I can't stop tears. The movie is awesome and the actors' chemistry is very noticeable. I don't always get affected by stories of this kind, but this movie affected me a lot because of actors' acting and the way the story is handled from the perspectives of three heroes and in a sequence that is more than wonderful. I really recommend watching it very much.

The only thing that will not let me watch it again is the amount of sadness that is in my heart now 💔💔

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Even if you dont understand what the "scientific" side is about, this is still heart wrenching.

Now let me start by saying that i dont have much knowledge about the factory and govermental side of the story. They did an amazing job at explaining the crucial parts to the story so you dont get lost trying to find an answer. Comparing this to other (natural) disaster movies ive seen its quite realistic. I dont know much about how radiation and the factory worked since i am NOT a professional in the field of this stuff. So i cant go around criticizing any potential unrealism. Altho even if there are mistakes (of which i didnt notice any) it wont surprise me since ive seen a lot of (natural) disaster movies being criticized by professionals in the field of the disaster explaining the mistakes in the movie. So ill be talking bout how great of a MOVIE it is. Not how much it makes sence scientifically. To start off lets talk about the story. Perfect in every aspect. The chronological order was on point and the scenes were also portrayed very nicely so you wont get confused in the slightest. The acting was so surreal and heart wrenching. There was only ONE slight (potential) mistake i noticed. SPOILER ALERT (search for END OF SPOILER to continue reading)!!: At the end where he was waiting in the room full of explosives. At first he was struggeling to breathe because of the radiation but when the story got emotional he was suddenly able to breathe normally. Now i put potential before mistake because i dont know whether pain killers can cause your air ways to function properly after taking the pain killer. I have a feeling that pain killers dont affect your air ways so thats why i want to point this out. END OF SPOILER. Now the music. To put it simple; nothing wrong with it. The emotional music was perfect. Rewatch value has to be high up there. I wanna bet ill cry again after i watch this for the second time. Amazingly emotional movies just keep tugging at your heart strings like that. Now of course i recommend this movie. Its simply amazing. I dont often see (natural) disaster movies that have an extreme emotional side to it. They are often thrilling but this was both thrilling and emotional. At first it seems not too threatening but when you think about it it gets very scary real quick. This really doesnt have to be visually terrifying for it to scare you. Radiation is terrifying.

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Great if you're looking for a fun, clichéd film

SPOILERS!

SHORT REVIEW: This is a really fun movie to pass the time because the leads have great chemistry, and it's a fun, cliché plot. I also really loved how open this film was about sexuality. I found that really refreshing.

LONG, WHINY REVIEW: I can't help but find it frustrating that the main girl stays in her relationship with her scumbag boyfriend when she's clearly unhappy. I don't care if you've been together for 5 years and want to marry, if your relationship has reached the point where you're cheating, break up!! And the way the male lead went out again straight away with his ex once it seemed clear to him that the female lead would never leave her boyfriend...I just can't relate to such neediness. I mean ffs, there's nothing wrong with being single, people!

Also, this was only a small moment in the movie but I really didn't like the weirdly casual reference made by one of the male lead's friends to paying for prostitution. He makes some whiny comments about how he's sick of paying for sex because you only get fake moans etc., and he wants the real deal. I understand that the attitude towards prostitution may be different from what I'm used to in South Korea, but I'm not up for such trivialisation of prostitution.

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Worth it if you're looking for a fun, clichéd film to pass the time

SPOILERS for both this film and another Korean film, My PS Partner.

TL;DR - This film is just the ticket if you're looking for a fun, clichéd romance with a charismatic lead, but if you don't want to see cheating being justified, then stay away.

This film was fun to watch even with all of its clichés, particularly because of the male lead, but I'm not going to discuss the fun or the clichés because I want to hone in on other aspects of the film that annoyed/interested me.

So this film gave me vibes of a PG version of My PS Partner. I had the exact same problem with this film that I had with My PS Partner, which is, why is cheating being presented as justified? At least in My PS Partner the girl cheats when her boyfriend is a scumbag and had already cheated on her. Here, the female lead's cheating is acceptable because she is bored in her 10 YEAR RELATIONSHIP and is tired of the lack of serious commitment on both ends. So of course she cheats and ONLY THEN breaks up with her boyfriend of 10 years. I'm sorry but I don't approve of a character being presented as sympathetic when she's cheating under such circumstances. If you're so unhappy in your relationship that you want to cheat, then break up first ffs! This really got under my skin.

Yoo Yeon Seok (plays the male lead) made this film for me. He's got great charisma, is so attractive etc. Moon Chae Won (plays the female lead) was fine, but there's something about her acting (perhaps her intonation?) that marks her out as a mediocre actress. I don't know if she was better in Flower of Evil or if the vibe of that series suited her more, but I thought her acting was worse here.

It's also worth noting another significant similarity with My PS Partner, which is the sort of Hollywood vibe you get when watching this. The slickness that comes from the style of editing and the plot, plus the frankness surrounding sex - I can't help but see the overlap.

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Completely forgettable mediocre watch, though perhaps a good time-killer

SHORT REVIEW: This movie is fine to pass the time, but completely forgettable. I kept pausing while watching to do other things and eventually forced myself to finish the film because I was so disengaged, particularly in the second half.

LONGER REVIEW: I think the actors were well cast and had really good chemistry, but my God am I sick of female leads in Japanese dramas/films who are so incredibly one-dimensional. Of course, yet again we have a female lead here who is extremely shy and friendless, but opens up to the guy she likes. She is of course either really quiet and sweet or, when worked up, shouting her lungs out. These female leads feel like a copypasta at this point. Just a few days ago I saw another Japanese film (From Me to You) with a female lead who also fits this exact description.

SPOILER...I thought the wedding scene was slightly ridiculous. So you're getting married out of nowhere, with no officiant, when it's questionable whether you're even old enough to legally marry...Perhaps the "wedding" was dress-up? Which I think would only make the scene more stupid. Anyway, a thoroughly mediocre watch.

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Kinda hate the ending

Well at first the story is quite okay, I do understand the flow of the story. The casting is so good and I clearly remember the other boy, he is also the main lead in the movie called jonjou, honestly I enjoy that more than this one but the cast in Taiikukan baby is much better, just my opinion. The ending is not the ending Im expecting, I kinda hate jun's friend, lol such a bother. I just hope that the two swimmer ended up together cause they relly hold a good chemistry. Overall It's still worth it to watch but if old movies isn't your thing, i dont really know if you're going to like this...

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Only the last segment is worth watching!

Prologue "Tell Me Your Name"- Seo-Hee (Choi Hye Kyung), Nam-Hee (Kim Kkot Bi) and Kim Lan (Han Ye Ri) hold tarot cards and told to chant their names as a magical spell. Once their names are spoken, special events unfold.

NOTE: Whoever wrote the profile on AsianWiki got the order and names of the segments wrong! I am using what is used by the majority of sites for this movie...

Only a prayer and good writing could have saved this movie!

Tarot 1 [6:00] "The Hand that Calls"- Lan (Han Ye-Ri) and two of her best friends are ordered by their seniors to get into an abandoned school building. Lan steps into a classroom in the abandoned building where a kid died without anyone knowing. The dead may not want to be alone and she can't leave the basement.

First, almost nothing in this segment is scary: the students go into the old school during the day; there is electricity in the old school building; th girls seem to die from falling a whole 3-4 feet (fortunately, none of the girls belong to any school sports teams, or they weould be off with injuries always!); no one seems to be worried when any girl disappears; and the shyest girl turns out to be the ghost!

Tarot 2 [37:05] " Stay With Me"- So-Young (Shin Ji-Su) is popular among her peers and the teachers. When So-Young learns that her best friend Nam-Hee (Kim Kkobbi) is pregnant, So-Young tells Nam-Hee that she should keep the baby and they will raise the child together. However, a tragic accident happens and So-Young loses touch with Nam-Hee, for a while.

Tarot 3 [1:11:10]"Haunted Boy""- Park Chul-Min (Lee Tae-Ri) is a high school student. He can also see ghosts, but tries to pretend he doesn't see them. Chul-Min then sees a cute girl ghost named Seo-Hee (Choi Hye-Kyung). Seo-Hee can't forget her first love and asks Chul-Min for his help.

The cast, main and support all did an amazing job with this movie; however, without good (scary) music, a good script from good writers and good cinematogarphy, nothing can save the first two stories of this movie...only "haunted Boy" is worht re-watching.....Sorrhy!

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Movie version is better than the series version

Overall: The 80 minute movie version focuses on Bank & Golf instead of the many characters in the bloated 270 minute 9 episode series (I dropped the series due to numerous random characters and not understanding or caring what was going on). This is set 5 years later from the movie My Bromance (2014) where I hated the ending but the retcon in this is so stupid. Watched on YouTube.

Content Warnings: none

What I Liked:
- acting from Fluke & Fluke
- Golf did apologize several times and Golf's dad apologized once to Golf
- Golf saying that he wants Bank to be happy even if that means Golf and Bank aren't together
- Golf & Bank's appropriate couple shirts towards the ends and also their sweet moments

Room For Improvement:
- that is the stupidest/non logical retcon I've ever seen. Why would Golf or Bank's friends ever agree to that? Golf could have at least had amnesia (after the brain operation) and the parents shipped him abroad and then made up the lie that he died.
- Bank is so calm when he learns the very shocking news that the love of his life is not dead and his loved ones lied to him for 5 years, I thought he would drop the phone at least
- Bank's lack of yelling, breaking some dishes, really anything at people who lied to him for 5 years!!!
- the love triangle was totally unnecessary and per usual, I didn't like it
- dismal set design, the bookcase/cupboard by the stairs didn't have anything it it, it looked like the house was not lived in
- the hardcoded subtitles went missing in a few parts

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I can say that it's one of the best bl storyline I've ever watched.

At first I was really confuse how their story will end up but the last part just gave me chills, The story is very simple yet so good, the story touched my heart and the acting is really good. The flow of the story was good though I didn't like some. I really love how the relationship of the two develop. I thought the story will focus on the present but I didn't notice that it took almost an hour watching their story, They gave us an open ending so it's normal for us to ask a continuation of their story, I badly need that. I dont know why the ratings is low but Imma give this series a 10/10, It didn't waste my time. I hope there's a continuation for this.

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Like the first move, a precious and underated jewel

I didn't write a review about the first movie because as soon as I finished I immediately started the second one haha.
Well, let's go to the main point.
About the movie:
The plot is simple, funny, very light and and made me laugh a lot. Of course they had those super exaggerating parts with extra blood and all but within the movie environment were like expected.
The ML did such amazing work in his acting, his poker face was hilarious, really overwhelmed.
The action and the performance of the fights were very well done in my point of view .

I won't prolong, so if you like or need to spend some quality time, without much complex triangles and all that cliche stuff I recommend this (and the first movie first of course haha) to you.

I hope that I could convince you and of course that you like/enjoy the movie as I did.

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Everything about this movie was amazing. I cried so much and it was honestly probably the best Chinese movie I've ever watched. There were so many emotions and I loved how there was a lot of extreme stuff but it was realistic at the same time. It showed a lot of struggles and had me crying every few minutes. The end confused me a bit but that was just because I'm kinda dumb. I watched this a year ago so I don't remember everything clearly but I do remember that it had me sobbing while watching and then sobbing all over again after it was done because the movie was over and it would take me really long to find a movie that good again. You should definitely watch it if you haven't already.

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Great vibes and story, but needs more

I felt like the allegory here was really captivating and I actually loved the entire vibe of the movie — I know there have been complaints about the CGI and VFX but I had no issue with it; it actually fit in with the vibe of the movie really well.

I really liked the theme of betrayal as well, but for some reason, I felt like it didn't really have the same impact that it tried to have. I kind of have mixed feelings about the dual timeline style — I did like how things were revealed later on, but the way it also played out also seemed to dull some of the power of the reveals.

I don't love the plot itself and how social/political decisions were partly romance-driven; it always seems to cheapen plot developments to me.

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