Reviews

Back To Darkness

This is a collection of four short, depressing films, as the title itself suggests: There Is No Salvation! However, even though they are short films, they feel quite long because there is almost no dialogue, and the scenes often remain static, requiring the viewer to fill them with their own interpretation.

All the stories presented here are ambiguous, and it is never entirely clear what is really going on. In the first part of each segment, the challenge is to figure out what the story is about, and even the endings do not provide definitive answers, leaving plenty of room for reflection and personal interpretation. Since there is very little dialogue, the film relies heavily on visual impression and the depiction of action, though this could have been executed better. Still, I appreciate that the film does not lead the viewer by the hand, but instead allows them to reach their own conclusions. There are also several striking and unsettling scenes by which these films will likely be remembered.

Of the four films, the first one ended up being my favorite, although the last one also leaves a strong impression. What they all have in common is that they depict unusual, perhaps even symbolic situations in which people search for some kind of salvation—and whether they find it is revealed by the title of the entire omnibus.

The final story includes English subtitles, but despite having only about ten spoken lines, there is still a gramatical slip in one of them, where the main character says: “Hlep me!” If only people in desperate situations would remember to cry out to God.

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A Lesson on Plants and Life

For what it is, it is a nice indie movie. A simple story about a friendship between a little girl and an old man (a Silkworm and a Bee). The English title is not very representative of the movie, so I prefer the original Korean title: 비밀의 화원 – Secret Flower Garden, because the movie is more about plants and flowers than animals. Still, we can say that it is simply a movie about nature and life in general, and the plants and animals serve as an allegory for life.

There are also drawings and songs, so I would say that the movie uses a lot of subtle elements to connect the story and stir emotions. The fundamental purpose of the movie is to teach us to be more gentle toward all life, because we depend on it. We are all connected. I liked the message, so I liked the movie too.

P.S. I even noticed an image of Jesus in one short but meaningful frame of the movie.

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Our Neighbours

The reason I watched this film is that it is a new release. I didn’t know anything about it, and I was surprised by the simplicity with which it was made. It contains only eight scenes, each set in a different location: in a parking lot, on a road, in an apartment, in front of a building, in a park, on a mountain, in a dead-end street, and in a café. These are all places where city dwellers meet.

What is interesting is that each scene lasts a little under ten minutes and consists of a single shot in which the camera does not change, although it sometimes moves slightly so that it doesn’t feel completely static. In each shot, there are two people engaged in some kind of argument. So across the eight scenes there are sixteen characters in total. All the actors were unknown to me, but I can say they performed their scenes very well, since it is not easy to film a ten-minute scene in one take.

The scenes are both realistic and absurd at the same time. They portray situations that constantly happen around us in cities, yet they express a certain unnaturalness caused by the urban conditions of life. This is not a standard film, but it offers an interesting portrayal of city life that many of us can relate to.

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The Portrait of a Director

According to koreanfilm.or.kr data, only 597 people have seen this movie, which makes me one of the few who have seen it. This is, of course, an indie film, and it certainly isn’t for a general audience, but it has its own beauty and attractiveness.

At the center of the movie is a film director who meets and talks with people in preparation for his new project. The conversations resemble those in Hong Sang-soo’s films, where characters simply converse naturally, with meaning that often remains unspoken. I liked the short moments of instrumental music between the shots and the beautiful natural scenery, but I couldn’t really grasp the theme of the movie through the acting. Maybe the film simply portrays the life of a movie director.

There is also the symbolism of the title: *Utopia*, or even better, in the original Korean: 몽유도원, an old traditional Chinese and Korean utopian concept of finding a hidden paradise. In this movie, the characters share their dreams and visions, mixing reality and fantasy, and pointing to art as something that helps us go beyond basic existence.

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Sound Recording

The movie starts with loud city noise and a quiet human humming. This is an effective start to a simple film that searches for the voice of a lost young actress. The whole movie has a melancholic tone, despite the youthfulness of the girl. Also, as much as I think I understood the dialogue, I don’t think the film explicitly explains what happened; instead, it leaves things open to debate and interpretation. The actors are appealing and I liked them, but their portrayal felt somewhat limited. I wanted them to engage a little more.

So, this is not a mainstream movie for the general public, but rather an independent film for movie lovers and lost souls who happen to stumble upon it. The movie did succeed in making me hum, which I hadn’t done in a long time, so that’s something.

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offensively bad

there's good dramas with sophisticated plots, there's good dramas with simple plots, and then there's bad dramas that try so hard to be sophisticated that it makes them 10x worse. this is one of them.

this drama is a disgrace against all women, lesbians, and queer people. the women of this drama are put through perpetual abuse, sexual assault, etc., for the sole purpose of dramatisation and/or character development for the male lead. this is a well studied phenomenon known as the 'women in refrigerators' trope, i highly recommend reading up on it.
as for the queer aspect, just because they included a lesbian character doesn't mean we should be applauding the writers for representation. this drama exploits the hardships of sexual minorities for nothing more than shock value. throughout the entire story, sangah is mentally and physically pushed to the limit, but no attempt is made to send any meaningful message with any of this.

towards the end i began to wonder, who are we even supposed to be rooting for here? taeseob is just as manipulative and power hungry as the elites he strived to take down.
they try to frame taeseob and sangah as equally evil and equally sympathetic, which is NOT the case. sangah wasn't responsible for the murder, and even if she was, it would've been justified. she can't be blamed for cheating either as she was coerced with drugs. taeseob on the other hand, as admitted by himself in the first episode, only saw sangah as a means to climb up the social ladder. sure, you could argue he fell in love with her later, and he did try to 'protect' her overall, but he wouldn't have gone to such lengths to protect her image if it wasn't crucial to his own reputation. not to mention him forcing himself onto her after their big fight which is completely irredeemable. mind you he was already irredeemable to me when he did nothing to help jisoo.

the last episode is its own disaster:
- slow motion montages were excessive and anticlimactic, whole episode could've been 40 minutes if they cut those out
- everything played out way too smoothly all of a sudden
- the focus suddenly shifts onto politics and we're expected to keep up with all these names and lore that were only mentioned in passing in previous episodes
- the "cliffhanger" they left to tease a second season felt sooo forced and rushed

overall, a low quality drama that takes itself too seriously, much to its own detriment.

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Great but the ending is rushed

If you’re looking for lots of skin from a BL then this one is not for you. If you’re looking for great chemistry and plot then this is probably right up your street.

The story follows two young neighbours who hold each other in high esteem who get separated by circumstance when Theo is shipped off to live with his grandmother in Paris leaving his best friend Akk behind.

They meet again years later when Theo’s grandmother dies and they immediately strike up a friendship with unrequited undertones of desire and love.

Theo selects a book that he’s read and makes a comment in one of the blank back pages and over time the two investigate who responds to the comment that he wrote. We meet 4 other main support characters who all profess to be Enchante, the person who responded to the comment that he left. We also find out the reasoning behind them lying and telling Theo that they are the person he is looking for.

The ending was a very frustrating as it is very rushed- we don’t really get closure for the 4 pretenders nor is the reason why Theo decides to break Akk’s heart particularly believable either (but they are reunited).

The production values excellent even though the now famous home from Cutie Pie (as well as a couple of other BLs I have watched) appears yet again!

The chemistry between Theo and Akk is so believable and had me smiling like a loon in some of the scenes where they’re rough housing.

The other actors are also very good (and rather pleasing on the eye which is a bonus) and add depth and substance to this drama.

Would I watch again? Probably not but that doesn’t stop this from being a great little drama and one worth a higher rating than given on this platform.

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вони такі хороші

якщо ви любите флаф з елементами дурості (і зовсім трішки сліз, якщо ви чутливі як я), вам сюди. я колись чула «love should be fun», і тут щось типу того.

мені подобалося спостерігати як повільно, але впевнено Шін теплішає та буквально розквітає з ним. коли він почав усміхатися, я тупо розтанула. він в кінці став таким ніжним 🙏🏻

я обожнюю обох ггшок усім серцем, А МАРС І ДЖЕМІ, ТА ВИ ШО 💅🏻 друзів ггшок я теж дуже люблю, можна мені таких, Вейв мій кіт (я хз як ім'я його персонажа пишеться українською)

я їх ТАК ЛЮБЛЮ, вони такі солоденькі іаіаіаіаіаі. я би вам цим усі вуха прожужала щодня, від мене усі би відписалися, тому я тихенько в нотатках кричала.

а актори 🙏🏻 мені дуже подобається їх гра, я навіть не знаю як описати свій захват від них.

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Excellent time travel story and great leads chemistry

Much better than the usual short dramas. This is a time-regression story, but with her returning to her own body, which is different within the genre. Regarding the actors, it's always a pleasure to watch Quan Yilun; his good looks and acting ability are excellent. Sebrina Chen is delightful; she's a wonderful actress, beautiful, and she makes the most of the story.

They share one of the best kisses I've ever seen in a short drama—intense, long, realistic, and passionate.
The story concludes well , which is a relief.—spoiler alert: at least in the future .
The cinematography is excellent for a short drama, with very carefully crafted costumes and details. I think you'll enjoy it a lot; it's well worth watching.

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STORY: A short drama to watch without expectations. It features the typical clichés: FL is rich, ML is unlucky with sick family members and financial difficulties, an instant crush that FL calls "destiny," and SML is mean and jealous.
The only thing that's different from the usual is the poker game. Card games bore me to death, luckily it takes up a few minutes in the last episode (skipped).

CAST: Pleasant in appearance with decent acting. I found the romantic aspect forced, not helped by a corny/cheesy script.
The FL tried to make her more enterprising than average but for fear of exaggerating they still inserted cringe moments: don't look at me, I'm blushing... So annoying!
ML who "says he feels inferior to her" but it behaves the opposite way with playboy moments. It felt like I was watching a comic for teenagers.

I found the production to be low budget, the most annoying thing I noticed was in the external shots: they removed the natural background noise when the actors spoke and immediately put it back, so that we hear this continuous difference. Embarrassing.

MUSIC: I don't even remember it.

In conclusion, I would only recommend it to fans of the protagonists, a mediocre show that I would have preferred to avoid.

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GOOD ONE

what I like
comedy
romance
chemistry
the first half really good , there's enough romance
what I don't like
the 2nd couple issue dragged too long , their story is literally nonsense when the main leads did everything to stop divorce and then death they still get divorced?
the one who was behind this was her brother,I realised he is as soon as he mentioned Money and gambling habit
after this ends there's some 10eps left focused on FML death ? both sad crying FML wanting to breakup because she is going to die and he will be alone but don't really breakup just argue
and when her death issue is there suddenly the ml issue pops up him being transferred and the reason he shifted to her house ,they find out who did that and in process of making him confess the ml from 2022 future dies ? i disliked that ? you didn't have to kill him ? still ending is better the 2021 ml falls for her too and they just get together after that happy ending , after the 2nd couple issue ended and the ml issue started I just skipped the eps since they continuously working on finding the person who did that to ml , I skipped last few eps but I still like it , it's rare for CDRAMA to have a couple like this and romance like this

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I thought I would binge it, yet savored it instead

It's been a while since I cried so much watching a drama. For me, it had the perfect balance between heartbreaking and heartwarming. There was such a juxtaposition between ML's life and FL's life, you would think that these two could never make a relationship work. ML is from a loving and happy home, and it seemed like life was just handing him everything he wanted without effort. On the flip side, FL's home life consisted of being foisted off on one relative after another. No one wanted her, and no one loved her. I think this made her emotionally stunted, always trying to protect herself from being abused/left again.

I loved the mix of high school and current times. The writer did a good job of slowly revealing more and more of the ML and FL history. When their high school breakup is initially shown, it didn't make much sense to me, and I thought the FL was unnecessarily cold. However, as the drama went on, we saw how she was trying to protect herself when she had no one else to protect her.

I absolutely loved discovering how he loved her, in the many ways he tried to protect her, and all the efforts he took to just see her in her world, a world that he was not a part of. I thought initially he was being awfully cocky toward her, making it sound like he thought she was chasing him, but I think he thought (and rightly so) that she was very skittish and he didn't want to scare her off by coming on too strong. He always seemed to be looking only at her, yet she had difficulty making eye contact with him. It felt like self-protection.

I thought the writer making her leave him seemed out of place, but again, we saw the difference between her being in the sunlight with him and being in the dark alone.

Her entire family was a complete nightmare. It made sense that her character was emotionally withdrawn. She just wanted to keep her head down, remain unnoticed, and get through life the best way she could. Kudos to the writers for not putting in a redemption arc for her family, that would have made me mad.

I loved their scenes together, as teens and as adults. They made each other better versions of themselves. I thought their chemistry was on point. Some very good kisses.

For me, C-dramas tend to be too long and drawn out. My fast forward button got a complete rest while watching this. A lot of people might find this drama to be unrealistic in the romance department. But for the romantic in me, it ticked all the boxes.

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The Human Cost of the Signal

With Humint, Ryoo Seung-wan returns to the territory that suits him best, and it shows. The geopolitical thriller shot through with physicality, with the kind of moral pressure that settles into bodies before it ever reaches dialogue, this is his natural habitat, and the film announces it from the very first sequences. The result isn't flawless, but it possesses a quality that's become genuinely hard to find in contemporary spy cinema: it still believes in space. In the weight of environments. In the dramatic value of a door left ajar, a corridor, a face held a second too long. And above all, it believes that action isn't decoration but a form of storytelling which, in 2026, is far from a given.

The plot, on paper, is almost classical: a South Korean agent moves through Vladivostok following the trail of a criminal network that crosses drugs, human trafficking, and state intelligence. On the other side there's a North Korean agent, then an ambiguous official, then a woman trapped in the most dangerous role of all that of the informant. Around them, Vladivostok doesn't function as an exotic backdrop, it's not the Russian city dropped in for international flavor but as a moral landscape: a border place, gray, frozen, porous, where everyone watches everyone and no one is ever truly safe. This is where Humint scores its first real point. The city isn't a postcard: it's a hostile surface, full of concrete, hard spaces, corners with no cover. And it's partly from this that the film generates its sustained, almost physical sense of danger.

On the screenplay level, Humint operates on a recognizable mechanism: four main characters, four different ethical trajectories, and at the center the figure of the informant as both narrative and moral detonator. What's interesting is that Ryoo doesn't build the film as a purely strategic chess match but as an accumulation of human debts. The debt to the person who puts themselves on the line for you. The debt to the person you love and put in danger. The debt to the State, which demands obedience and gives back cynicism. In this sense, Humint is less a film about intelligence operations per se than a film about the human cost of intelligence — about that precise moment when people stop being "assets" and go back to being human beings: unmanageable, vulnerable, irreducible to protocol.

The writing, though, doesn't always match the precision of its themes. And it's worth saying so plainly. In the middle section, the film tends to thicken its web of interests, blackmail, chains of command, double-crosses, and lateral moves with a taste for complication that at times slows things down instead of intensifying them. It's not a problem of density , you can follow the threads , but of dramaturgical hierarchy: certain pieces of information arrive with the weight of a revelation, and then produce no real emotional turn; certain subplots seem more functional to keeping the mechanism running than to actually developing the characters. In other words, the film has more energy than synthesis. You feel it. It's no coincidence that part of the critical conversation has praised the film's spectacular ambition while flagging a certain weakness in dramatic substance relative to the action apparatus and that's not an entirely unfair observation.

That said, it would be unfair to stop at the flaw, because Humint constantly recovers ground in the way it stages what it has written. Ryoo Seung-wan understands something elementary and precious: every character has to have their own physical grammar. It's not enough to fight; they have to fight "like him," "like her," according to a rhythm and a posture that tell you who they are. And indeed, this bodily differentiation is one of the film's strongest elements. Manager Zo, whom Jo In-sung plays with an almost elegant restraint, always acts as if trying to keep violence inside a clean, contained line; Park Geon, by contrast, carries a more nervous tension, more intermittent, more exposed to emotional fracture; Hwang brings to the screen an administrative coldness that is itself a threat, with no need to raise his voice; Seon-hwa introduces a vulnerability that isn't passivity but the capacity to choose within the narrowest margin of survival. These aren't just characters: they're vectors of different energy. And when the film stops explaining and simply lets them move, it finally starts to breathe.

The direction is the real center of the film. Ryoo comes from a cinema that knows the pleasure of the gesture, but here he largely avoids pure choreographic display for its own sake. The action sequences land because they're legible, articulated in space, never reduced to accelerated cutting designed to simulate intensity without actually building it. You can tell where you are, who enters from where, who sees what, who risks being cornered, who has the positional advantage. It sounds obvious, but it's almost revolutionary today. Even more interesting is the way the director alternates wider shots and compressed close-ups: on one side, the hostility of the world; on the other, the face as the only real battlefield. This dynamic between geographic openness and emotional constriction gives the film a near-classical elegance. It's no surprise that more than one observer has read Humint as a natural continuation of the path begun with The Berlin File and Escape from Mogadishu: the frame changes, but the same faith in the international thriller as a moral device — not just a spectacular one — remains.

The atmosphere work is very strong as well. The cinematography pushes toward cold, metallic, matte tones without ever making the film visually monotonous .There's an intelligent use of surfaces, empty spaces, and architecture that conveys the sense of a life lived under constant surveillance. Costumes and interiors help suspend the film in a slightly displaced temporality: contemporary, yes, but never ostentatiously dependent on technology. It's a shrewd choice, because it allows Humint to sidestep the risk of becoming a thriller of screens, pings, software interfaces, and digital exposition dumps. Here, intelligence goes back to being, literally, human: bodies, sources, glances, lies, shifting loyalties. This is also why the film, when it works, generates a tension that is more tactile than cerebral.

On the acting front, Zo In-sung carries the film with remarkable presence. He doesn't work through overexpression, and rightly so: his character lives inside guilt, discipline, a reluctance to fail again, and the actor translates all of this into a controlled physicality that occasionally lets a crack show through. Park Jeong-min provides an effective counterpoint, shifting the register toward something more ambiguous and emotional. Park Hae-joon delivers the kind of administrative hardness that always works in spy cinema: evil that doesn't need to raise its voice. Shin Sae-kyeong, finally, had the most delicate task and instead manages to preserve her own opacity, her own concrete fear, her own capacity for decision-making all the way to the end.

Humint is not its director's definitive masterpiece, and anyone looking for a perfectly engineered, airtight, zero-redundancy spy mechanism will find things to complain about. The screenplay has some redundant passages and a middle section that isn't as sharp as the opening promises. But it would be foolish to write it off on those grounds, because the film possesses a concrete, muscular, almost artisanal quality that many far more "orderly" thrillers simply don't. It stumbles occasionally in its own complexity, but when it finds its footing again it hits hard in the direction of the action sequences, in the control of space, in the construction of tension, and in that idea, as beautiful as it is bitter, that behind every piece of intelligence there is always someone who pays the full price.

If a single blunt formula is called for: Humint convinces more as cinema than as screenplay. But since cinema, fortunately, is not only screenplay that's more than enough to make it a robust, adult, imperfect, and genuinely interesting thriller.

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