“Wall to Wall” Netflix Poster

Director: Kim Tae-joon
Cast: Kang Ha-neul, Seo Hyun-woo, Yeom Hye-ran, Kim Hyun-Jung, Jeon Jin-Oh, Park Sung-Il, Yoon Jung-Il, Kim Yoon-Jin, Lee Jong-Goo, Na Ho-Sook
Running Time: 118 min.

By Paul Bramhall

Wall to Wall, or 84 Square Metres as its Korean title directly translates to, fits into that distinctly 21^st century genre of homeowner anxiety. In Korea such productions usually find themselves set in one of the myriad of towering apartment complex villages, where multiple faceless residential towers provide a backdrop for everything from stalking to murder, all set within that one place we should feel the safest – home. The likes of 2013’s Hide and Seek, and 2018’s double-bill of Door Lock and The Witness, have all effectively used apartment spaces to create a sense of tension, and Wall to Wall takes a similar approach in its story of a new homeowner becoming increasingly frustrated with his neighbours.

Played by Kang Ha-neul (Yadang: The Snitch, The Pirates: The Last Royal Treasure), an effective opening plays out in montage to bring the audience up to speed on his life, the events which briefly flash up onscreen culminating with the purchase of said apartment. Now with a precious piece of Seoul real estate to call his own, it’s soon revealed it came at a cost, with the decision taken to call off his own wedding, and his loan status completely maxed out. Essentially broke, Ha-neul spends his time stealing food supplies from the office pantry to avoid buying his own, uses a camping light rather than use any electricity, and stubbornly refuses to turn on the air conditioning even at the height of summer. All of these inconveniences pale in comparison though to his biggest source of frustration – the noise from the upstairs neighbours, of which the banging and running around is almost constant.

The sophomore feature from director Kim Tae-joon after 2023’s underwhelming Unlocked, both of which he also wrote, like his debut Wall to Wall also comes courtesy of Netflix, making him the first Korean director for whom all of his work has released exclusively to the streaming giant. There’s a recurrent theme so far in the two movies he’s made, with Chun Woo-hee feeling trapped by her phone in Unlocked, and likewise Ha-neul feels like he’s trapped by his own apartment in Wall to Wall. With interest rates on the rise his repayments are becoming more and more unmanageable, to the point that he finishes his office job only to spend the evenings on his bike making food deliveries. Coming home to a flurry of Post-it notes on his door from the downstairs neighbours complaining about the noise, the case of mistaken apartment sends Ha-neul on a mission to find the real culprit, starting with the neighbour directly above.

Greeted by Seo Hyun-woo (Nocturnal, Thunderbird), his tattooed and heavily scarred character is enough to take the wind out of Ha-neul’s riled up sails, however the plot thickens when Hyun-woo also reveals he’s constantly disturbed by noise from his upstairs neighbours. The biggest issues though seems to be that any time Ha-neul brings another character into his apartment, usually in an attempt to prove he’s experiencing the same noise from upstairs as his neighbours have pinned on him, the only sound is one of silence. It’s a subtle but powerfully effective way to demonstrate that Ha-neul isn’t the most reliable of narrators, and just how much of his perspective that we watch the movie through is reflecting actual reality?

From a director standpoint sophomore features are always interesting to watch, and personally my approach to them is usually dependant on my feeling towards their debut. If it was a strong debut, are they able to build upon it for their 2^nd feature (Jeong Joo-ri’s A Girl at My Door and Next Sohee being a classic example), or alternatively, if the debut wasn’t so strong, have they been able to take the learnings and apply them to make an engaging 2^nd feature? I was hoping Tae-joon would fall into the latter category, and by being placed into the headspace of Ha-neul through the constant sound of footsteps overhead and his strained mental state, Wall to Wall proved he definitely had. Not that preconceptions should play any part in a review, but I’d initially been worried it was going to be another tale of greedy homeowners preying on the poor, which we’ve seen far too much of from Korean cinema in recent years.

Instead we’re thrust into Han-neul’s world as his enquiries see him navigate the apartment hierarchy. Coming into contact with the Resident Representative and penthouse owner, played by Yeom Hye-ran (Cobweb, Special Delivery), she reveals that the Post-it note happy couple living under Ha-neul are only renting, and would be happy assist in ensuring they leave the complex at the end of their tenancy. It’s an interaction that raises the question of if it’s happening at all, or is what we’re seeing a reflection of what’s going on in Ha-neul’s imagination? While the latter is the far more interesting approach, unfortunately, it happens to be the former. In fact not only did the conversation actually take place, but those sounds of someone constantly stomping and banging around overhead? They all turn out to be for real as well.

So, if we’re not following a character’s descent into madness based on his perceived noisy neighbours and suffocating financial pressure that see him living more like a squatter than an apartment owner, what exactly are we left with? The answer isn’t one I expected, if only because it made me feel like I’d been gaslighting myself, but to summarise it in a nutshell – Wall to Wall isn’t a psychological thriller at all, but rather, it’s another tale of greedy homeowners preying on the poor. To say that Tae-joon’s script jumps the shark is probably an understatement, taking a sharp turn into increasingly ridiculous territory, as Ha-neul suddenly has to deal with a psychotic freelance journalist eager for content, and rich homeowners attempting to get richer through the most nefarious of means.

The comparison with Unlocked is inevitable, which similarly derailed in the latter half thanks to changes in plot direction that stretched believability, and Wall to Wall suffers from the exact same issue. If anything the issue is exasperated in this sophomore feature by the fact it requires the audience to backtrack, re-visiting certain moments that (at least in my case) felt like a certainty to be taking place in Ha-neul’s head, and accept them as reality. None of it works. By the time it reaches its stab happy finale, the promise of the claustrophobic first half feels completely squandered, instead relying on familiar tropes that we’ve seen plenty of times before.

As a director and screenwriter Tae-joon makes for a frustrating proposition. Both of the movies he’s helmed come with a unique angle that’s initially executed with plenty of promise, before devolving into overly familiar genre tropes that fail to convince. As the audience there’s a certain level of infuriation seeing ideas which start off strong, only for them to take a nosedive once you’re already too far in to go back. Compared to those movies which are clearly not going to be worth your time from the first 15 minutes, allowing you clock out early, it’s a different feeling all together if you come to the same realisation only when the end credits are rolling after almost 2 hours.

With that said, for anyone who’s lived (or does live for that matter!) in an apartment complex, there’ll be certain moments in Wall to Wall that feel relatable, essentially taking some of the minor inconveniences communal living can come with and magnifying them to insufferable levels. Out of all the entries in the homeowner anxiety genre, it’s still Hong Kong’s Dream Home from 2010 that feels like it towers about the rest, committing to its concept with joyful abandon that still allows it to feel relevant 15 years after its release. As for if anyone will still be talking about Wall to Wall 15 years later, I doubt anyone will be talking about it just a few weeks after its release.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 5/10

The post Wall to Wall (2025) Review first appeared on cityonfire.com.

“Nocturnal” Theatrical Poster

Director: Kim Jin-Hwang
Cast: Ha Jung-Woo, Kim Nam-Gil, Yoo Da-In, Jeong Man-Sik, Im Sung-Jae, Lee Hye-Soo
Running Time: 100 min.

By Paul Bramhall

Nocturnal dares to ask the question, what if Ha Jung-woo hadn’t become a mainstay of Hallmark channel style ‘based on a true story’ movies in the 2020’s, and instead went back to the kind of gritty roles he frequented in the late 2000’s and early 2010’s with productions like The Yellow Sea and Beastie Boys? The answer is a welcome one, with the harsh Korean winter serving as the backdrop to his recently out of prison ex-gangster, now attempting to get by as a day labourer working construction. Of course the rules of the genre mean that he can’t lead a peaceful life for long, and when his younger brother turns up dead in one of the local karaoke bars, he dons a heavyset winter jacket, throws a steel pipe in his rucksack, and begins traipsing around town looking for answers.

From the opening scene of Jung-woo strolling away from a bloody beatdown, decked out in a dishevelled suit and with blood dripping from the aforementioned pipe, director Kim Jin-hwang’s sophomore feature feels like it announces itself as a throwback to a time when Korean cinema had a harder edge. After helming a number of short films Jin-hwang would make his feature length debut in 2016 with the crime thriller The Boy Who Cried Wolf, however in the intervening years he’s only cropped in a handful of minor acting roles, with the release of Nocturnal making it almost a decade since he last directed. Like The Boy Who Cried Wolf, the script for Nocturnal also comes from the pen of Jin-hwang, and the plot settles down to focus on Jung-woo’s search for the girlfriend his brother was living with, played by Yoo Da-in (Tastes of Horror, The Suspect), who’s disappeared without a trace.

What gives Nocturnal a unique slant is the introduction of a character played by Kim Nam-gil (A Man of Reason, Memoir of a Murderer), giving the production a similar sophomore opportunity for he and Ha Jung-woo to reunite after co-starring in 2020’s The Closet. Anyone who’s a regular reader of my reviews will know I’m not the biggest fan of Nam-gil, as I often find he comes across as miscast in the roles he ends up in, a fact which is ironically offset by him also being the star of one of my all-time favorite Korean movies in the form of The Shameless (although I remain convinced that’s because he was acting alongside Jeon Do-yeon!). Here he plays a novelist, and his latest novel – titled Nocturnal – involves a character’s murder that closely resembles the demise of his brother, pointing to Da-in as the culprit. When it’s revealed the pair were acquainted, Nam-gil also scrambles to find Da-in, hoping to locate her before Jung-woo.

While Jung-woo’s reasons for finding Da-in are clear – to find out if she was responsible for his brother’s death, and if so, send her off to meet him – Nam-gil’s are less so. We know he met various attendees of lectures he was hosting to gain inspiration for his novel, and it was during one of these meetings that Da-in revealed how she’s regularly beaten and abused, and of her dream to be able to kill her boyfriend because of his ill treatment. But did she and Nam-gil end up in a relationship together, or does Nam-gil simply feel guilty for using her wish fulfilment story as the basis for his novel? Or is there a third reason – perhaps he was the one who killed the brother so that they could be together? The ambiguity behind his role in the story works effectively, however it also frustratingly concludes in a distinctly anticlimactic fashion.

I’m always keen to avoid spoilers when writing reviews, although my exasperation was such at this part of the plot that I’m going to go out on a limb, and suggest what I’m about to say isn’t a spoiler. The part about Nam-gil playing a writer of a novel that essentially predicts Jung-woo’s brothers death ends up having no bearing on the plot whatsoever, and is dropped altogether in the last third. We don’t even get to find out what the relationship was between Da-in and Nam-gil, he’s left to just silently fade out of the picture. It’s almost as if it was written as a brief sub-plot (even though the movie also takes its title from the novels name!), but in the final product came out as a prominent part of the narrative by mistake, making its sudden irrelevance to what unfolds come across like a glaring omission.

In retrospect, that leaves the heavy lifting to Jung-woo, and there’s an undeniable pleasure in seeing him back as a crumpled and world-weary antagonist prowling the back alleys of nightclubs, low rent karaoke joints, and late-night diners. I don’t know if it was because of the presence of Kim Nam-gil, but the locations of Nocturnal more than once reminded me of The Shameless, with the greyness of the Korean winter almost making the bitter cold feel tangible. As a character Jung-woo makes for an intriguing proposition, with Jin-hwang initially painting him as someone who’s understandably out to seek revenge for his brother’s death, perhaps from guilt that he was the one who brought his brother into the fold of the criminal world in the first place. He may not be the most likeable guy to grace the screen, but his motivation is relatable.

However as the narrative continues, it becomes harder and harder to sympathise with him. Even after learning what a lowlife his brother was, constantly strung out on drugs and regularly beating his girlfriend, he still pushes forward blindly seeking revenge, despite it becoming clear his brother may have gotten exactly what was coming to him. If it was an intentional move to introduce a main character who becomes more difficult to root for as the plot progresses, then it was a bold one, and for the most part Jin-hwang pulls it off. However there’s also no denying that Nocturnal feels like it should be Da-in’s movie rather than Jung-woo’s, as a karaoke bar receptionist who finds her abusive boyfriend dead, and goes on the run as the boyfriends brother, the novelist she may or may not be involved with, and the police begin to close in on her. It’s just a shame that in its current form her character her very little to do beyond running away.

While far from being action heavy, there are a couple of skirmishes that feel refreshingly old school. Technological advances have seen camerawork during group melees become increasingly dynamic in recent years, but it can also tend to lack weight, case in point being many of the action sequences found in the recently released Netflix series Mercy for None. Here there’s a grounded scrappiness to them, with an initial skirmish seeing Jung-woo and his trusty pipe going against a group of lackeys shot with a sense of brutal immediacy. Taking as many hits as he dishes out, there’s a sense of realism from Jung-woo’s choice to take out his attackers as effectively as possible – which for the most part involves hitting them in the face with his steel pipe. A clear case of quality of quantity, when the violence does hit, it resonates. Plus I think this may be the first time for me to see a frozen fish brandished as a weapon (very effective!).

It’d be a crime not to mention Nocturnal’s stellar supporting cast, with the always reliable Jung Man-sik (I, The Executioner, Revolver) cast as the gang boss that Jung-woo used to be a part of, and who his brother had continued to work for while he was inside. Similarly Seo Hyun-woo (Escape, Seire) and Lee Seol (Hard Hit, The Divine Fury) reunite from 2022’s underseen Thunderbird, this time as a pair of cops who are also looking to find the culprit behind the murder.

As the credits rolled on Nocturnal I couldn’t help but feel it was a deeply flawed movie. Important plot threads I’d expected to be resolved were simply dropped, and the narrative leaves the audience with a main character who you root for less and less. However at the same time I also can’t deny the fact that I enjoyed a lot of Kim Jin-hwang’s sophomore feature, with its story unfolding on dilapidated streets and old school marketplaces, there’s a sense of grittiness to it that gets removed in the sheen applied to so many recent Korean productions. Perhaps a case of enjoying it for the movies it reminded me of more than the movie it is, Nocturnal has the ingredients for greatness, but seems like it doesn’t know quite what to do with them.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 6/10

The post Nocturnal (2025) Review first appeared on cityonfire.com.

“Revelations” Netflix Poster

Director: Yeon Sang-ho
Cast: Ryu Jun-yeol, Shin Min-jae, Shin Hyun-been, Han Ji-hyun, Kim Bo-Min, Kim Do-Young, Moon Ju-Yeon, Bae Youn-Kyu, Oh Chi-Woon, Woo Kang-Min
Running Time: 122 min.

By Paul Bramhall

The journey of Yeon Sang-ho as a filmmaker has been an interesting one. Gaining attention amongst cineastes in the early 2010’s for his gritty feature length animations like King of Pigs and The Fake, it was his transition to live action filmmaking that brought him to international attention, with the 2016 zombie movie Train to Busan. However in the years since he’s continuously struggled to find a consistent cinematic voice, with his switch to live action seeing him pivot from the grounded, reality-based nature of his animated features, to more fantasy, sci-fi, and supernatural infused flights of fancy. The major studios seem to have the same concerns, as with the exception of 2020’s Train to Busan sequel Peninsula, all of his subsequent work has exclusively gone straight to Netflix.

In fact it’s a safe bet to say no other Korean filmmaker has debuted on Netflix as much as Sang-ho has. Whether it be directing feature length productions like 2017’s Psychokinesis and 2022’s Jung-E. Helming drama series adaptations like Hellbound (the first season in 2020 as well as the second in 2024) and 2024’s Parasyte: The Grey. Or even stuff he just wrote the script for, like 2024’s 6-episode series The Bequeathed. All of them landed on Netflix, and in 2025 his latest feature length production once more skips a theatrical release, with Revelations similarly debuting on the streaming giant.

Interestingly Revelations is probably the most grounded work story wise that Sang-ho has done since his 2013 animated feature The Fake. The plot tells 2 parallel stories that gradually start to overlap with each other, with the first being of a pastor running a dilapidated church in a rundown part of Musan. Played by Ryu Jun-yeol (Believer, Alienoid), to say he has a lot on his mind would be an understatement. For a start his suspicions about his wife cheating on him look like they may be true, and exasperating his stress is the discovery of a mega church that’s being built not far from his own. His mentor is responsible for the new church, which should make him the natural choice to be selected as the pastor to run it, however it seems religious politics point to the mentor’s son being the preferred candidate. To top everything off, a convicted sex offender has just been released from prison and has moved into the local neighbourhood.

Played by Shin Min-jae (Smugglers, Killing Romance), when Jun-yeol’s daughter goes missing on the same day he unknowingly tried to sign up Min-jae to become a church member, Jun-yeol becomes convinced it’s Min-jae who’s responsible for her disappearance. The 2^nd plot involves a detective who’s recently been reinstated to the violent crimes division after some time off, played by Shin Hyun-been (Beasts Clawing at Straws, The Closet), whose sister was one of Min-jae’s victims. Haunted by visions of her sister’s ghost, Hyun-been seems to spend more time popping sachets of prescription pills and tracking Min-jae than anything else, however when both he and a young girl who attends Jun-yeol’s church go missing, she makes it her mission to get to the bottom of it.

It’s not a spoiler to say it’s Jun-yeol who’s responsible for the disappearance of Min-jae. After following him in his car up a remote mountain road, the pair end up in a tussle, with Min-jae slipping down the mountain and cracking his head open on a rock. Uncertain of what to do next, when lightening illuminates a nearby mountainside Jun-yeol is convinced he can see the face of Jesus, taking it as a sign that he’s doing the right thing. What unfolds is probably best described as a mix of Bill Paxton’s 2001 horror Frailty meets Kim Seong-hun’s 2014 thriller A Hard Day, as Jun-yeol becomes increasingly convinced that God is sending him signs, whether it be in the shape of the clouds or graffiti on a wall, so decides to cover his tracks. Meanwhile Hyun-been sees a chance to redeem the fact she couldn’t save her sister if she can get to the missing girl before it’s too late, but with minimal leads and the suspect missing in action, it won’t be easy.

In writing the synopsis I realise on paper it actually sounds like all the ingredients are there for a compelling supernatural tinged thriller, however Sang-ho has somehow managed to inject precisely zero narrative thrust into the 2-hour runtime, making it an exhaustingly plodding affair to get through. As a director and scriptwriter he’s dabbled with religious themes before with his series Hellbound which suffered from the same issues, and yet somehow that was granted a 2^nd season (which to me at least, is a bit like drinking an expired bottle of milk that’s been sitting in the sun for a week, then saying you’d like to have another one). Both are adapted from comics he also wrote, and perhaps it’s their translation to the screen where something becomes lost.

By far the most disappointing aspect of Revelations though is the question of who’s responsible for the missing girl’s disappearance, which for a good half of the runtime Sang-ho convincingly leaves the audience completely in the dark. It comes as something of a damp squib then, when it’s revealed it actually is Min-jae who kidnapped her, despite it seeming like an all too obvious narrative choice to have the actual kidnapper be the sex offender who’s just gotten out of prison. It seems to be a trait in Korean cinema that the thought of a prisoner becoming rehabilitated from the crimes they committed is unthinkable, so as soon as they’re released the expectation is they’ll be up to their old tricks in no time at all. Kim Joo-hwan’s Officer Black Belt, that also debuted on Netflix the previous year, suffered from the same issue, and here it simply feels lazy, with the built-up intrigue effectively being unintentional.

Despite the heavy-handed nature of everything onscreen, thankfully Jun-yeol offers up some entertainment value as the pastor who increasingly starts to lose it as the narrative progresses. If I had to guess, Jun-yeol’s inspiration for the role would be Aaron Kwok in Roy Chow’s 2009 slice of Hong Kong insanity Murderer. We’re not even halfway through and he’s already become a sweat drenched mess, yelling at his wife in the car to confess her sins, while belting out borderline hysterical prayers to the congregation when he holds a prayer meeting for the missing child. He admirably remains fully committed to the role no matter what ridiculous places it takes him, and by the time he’s wielding a steel pole while a tied-up Min-jae sings hymns at him in an abandoned golf resort, things have gotten pretty ridiculous.

Hyun-been is similarly committed despite the script at times working against her. The biggest issue is the ghost of her sister, played by Han Ji-hyun (I Bet Everything, Seobok), whose appearances feel like they should be quietly menacing, but instead end up coming across as gratingly annoying. Is this the first time for a ghostly apparition in Asian cinema to be an annoyance? Possibly. The biggest issue is her appearances mostly consist of her whining about why Hyun-been didn’t save her while she was alive, which starts to feel repetitive. However the coup de grâce is when she shows up in a scene where Hyun-been has been left alone with Min-jae, and descends into the kind of hysterical yelling usually reserved for scenes where a family member has learnt about the death of a loved one. For some reason, ghosts and hysterical yelling just isn’t a combination that works.

In the end it’s difficult to ascertain what the point of Revelations is, even with a Murderer-esque exposition dump from a psychiatrist towards the end who explains all about how everything is connected to past trauma, it fails to convince that everything that’s come before was worth watching. Consistently dull, frequently misguided, and narratively empty, the only revelation I hope comes from Sang-ho’s latest is that he re-assesses his direction as a filmmaker.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 2/10

The post Revelations (2025) Review first appeared on cityonfire.com.

“Hi-Five” Theatrical Poster

Director: Kang Hyeong-Cheol
Cast: Lee Jae-in, Ra Mi-ran, Oh Jung-se, Park Jin-young, Ahn Jae-hong, Kim Hee-won, Shin Gu, Yoo Ah-in, Choi Eun-kyeong, Na Jin-su, Jin Hee-kyung
Running Time: 119 min. 

By Paul Bramhall

Where audiences suffering more from superhero fatigue in 2025 than they were in 2022? It’s a question worth pondering, since the 3 years in-between is how long the Korean superhero comedy Hi-Five has sat on the shelf. Delayed from its original release after actor Yoo Ah-in was charged will illegal drug use in 2023, since his release from serving a five-month prison sentence in February 2025, it would appear the completion of his punishment has also served as the cue to release the past productions he was involved in. The Match hit screens in May 2025, a drama which cast Ah-in alongside Lee Byung-hun and had originally been set for release in 2023, and a month later Hi-Five also hit the screens, which had originally been planned for release even earlier in 2022.

Whatever your views are on Korea’s approach to celebrities who commit misdemeanours, its always a relief when a completed movie that was potentially going to have its release cancelled finally sees the light of day, particularly when the director at the helm is Kang Hyeong-cheol (Swing Kids, Sunny). Much like Choi Dong-hoon, Hyeong-cheol is one of Korea’s most consistent filmmakers when it comes to mainstream entertainment (and they also both share a Tazza connection, with Dong-hoon directing the 2006 original Tazza: The High Rollers, and Hyeong-cheol directing the 2014 sequel Tazza: The Hidden Card). Debuting in 2008 with the comedy drama Scandal Makers, Hyeong-cheol’s style of filmmaking has proven to be consistently popular with local audiences, and his latest bears all of his typical trademarks.

Involving the recipients of a recently departed superhumans organs, the mysterious donor’s abilities soon start manifesting themselves in their unsuspecting new hosts. Lee Jae-in (Hard Hit, Our Body) plays the taekwondo loving outsider whose new heart imbues her with immense strength and speed. Ahn Jae-hong’s (Time to Hunt, Missing You) struggling screenwriter finds his new lungs enable him to blow gale force gusts of wind. Yoo Ah-in’s (Burning, Seoul Vibe) pompous layabout has a pair of new corneas that allow him to control electro-magnetic waves, able to send texts and control electricity with the click of his fingers (or toes for that matter). Kim Hee-won’s (Unlocked, The Merciless) factory foreman has a new liver which gives him the power to transfer others wounds to himself, and finally Ra Mi-ran (Intimate Strangers, The Mayor) received the donors kidney, but insists all she’s noticed is her improved skin.

There’s something admirable in Hyeong-cheol’s approach to the superhero genre, blatantly refusing to bother with any kind of time-consuming backstory, and instead having 4 of the 5 organ recipients conspire to meet each other within the first 20 minutes. Intrigued by the appearance of a tattoo on their wrists (except for Mi-ran, who’s stuck with an unflattering tramp stamp on her lower back to comical effect), the 5 eventually come together, go to a chicken restaurant, and try to figure out what use their respective powers are. The lack of grandiosity is one of Hi-Five’s greatest strengths, subverting the usual epic feel that the superhero genre has become increasingly lumbered with, and instead opting to filter it through Hyeong-cheol’s lens of feel-good comedy.

The quintet’s research leads them to realise a sixth organ is possible to be donated, which its revealed has gone to a revered cult leader who’s been laying comatose on his deathbed. Kept alive by his greedy family, upon unwittingly receiving the donor’s pancreas, he suddenly wakes up and sets about resuming his role as a self-declared God, only realising when he gets into an argument with a former associate he has the ability to drain any living things life force by touch. Played by veteran actor Shin Koo (YMCA Baseball Team, Bluebeard), the more life force he absorbs the younger he becomes, eventually transforming into former K-pop idol Park Jinyoung (Christmas Carol, Yaksha: Ruthless Operations). Naturally, once he realises the other donors have inherited superpowers of their own, the temptation to absorb their powers for himself becomes his top priority, giving Hi-Five its all-important villain.

The delayed release means there are likely to be inevitable comparisons with the 2023 superhero themed 20-episode series Moving, despite it being originally planned to be released earlier, however thankfully Hi-Five still stands on its own. There’s a likeable chemistry between the 5 leads, and the pace rarely lets up, making it a brisk 2 hours (especially for those who are drama series allergic like myself and struggle to find 20 hours!). The lightness of tone suits the narrative perfectly, with a highlight being a vehicular chase sequence involving a car full of the cult leader’s lackeys in pursuit of Mi-ran’s humble yoghurt cart, being pushed to ridiculous speeds by Jae-in while the other 4 cling on for dear life. The action feels like a Looney Tuns inspired mix of Arahan meets Kung Fu Hustle, and what other movie in 2025 is going to revive the Rickrolling phenomenon, with the whole sequence set to Rick Astley’s Never Gonna Give You Up!?

An unexpected highlight comes in the form of Oh Jung-se (Cobweb, Killing Romance) as Jae-in’s overly protective taekwondo teacher father (an observation the productions marketing department must agree with, since it’s his image that replaces Ah-in’s on the poster). Clueless to his daughter’s new abilities, and unknowingly putting himself in harm’s way more than once, a scene where he uses his taekwondo skills to take on a small army of cult followers feels like classic Hyeong-cheol. Executed with unseen assistance from Jae-in, who uses her powers to lend a helping hand, the wholes scene feels like a throwback to the more slapstick style of comedy Korean cinema leaned into during the 2000’s.

Another element of Hi-Five which feels like a throwback is the occasionally awkward mix of comedy and abrupt departures into rather dark territory. It’s a very Korean cinema-specific trait to blend light and breezy narratives with dark tragedy (see Officer Black Belt – light hearted buddy comedy vs. violent paedophiles) or histrionic filled melodrama (see I Can Speak – cranky old woman learning English comedy vs. forced prostitution during the Japanese occupation), and while Hyeong-cheol’s latest doesn’t go as heavy as either of these examples, it still rears its head enough to be noticed. In particular the circumstances around what led to Mi-ran’s organ transplant are a particular downer, and it’s the same circumstances which are used for a post-credits scene which will either raise a smile, an eyebrow, or possibly both.

Events eventually lead up to a finale that pits the 5 against Jinyoung, who comes with an advantage of having partly absorbed the powers of Yoo-in and Hee-won. Like any modern superhero movie, the fact that CGI is at a point where literally anything imagined can be portrayed is both a blessing and a curse, and somewhat regrettably the final showdown eschews the smaller scale comedic feel for an attempt at an epic battle between the 2 sides. It’s competently executed, and who doesn’t want to see some superpowered taekwondo? However at the same time the sight of bodies flying across the screen at hyper speed and buildings taking on structural damage feels like something we’ve seen plenty of times before, and the whole battle goes on for a tad too long. On the plus side though, we do finally get to understand what Mi-ran’s superpower is!

Overall these are minor issues in what’s a highly entertaining slice of popcorn cinema. We do get occasional glimpses into the origin of the powers, with a couple of brief scenes showing a cave from ancient times that houses a mysterious being, however these are never elaborated on to mean anything significant, leading me to speculate if Hyeong-cheol intended Hi-Five to be a franchise starter (in which case, the Ah-in issue may unfortunately have derailed any chance of a sequel). Whatever the case may be, as a standalone piece of superhero cinema, I’ll take Nine Girl, Tank Boy, Fresh Girl, Bluetooth Man, and Battery Man any day of the week over yet another cookie cutter Marvel or DC outing. In an era where superhero productions often drown out the voice of the director at the helm, perhaps the biggest compliment I can give Hi-Five is that it feels like a Kang Hyeong-cheol movie through and through.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 7/10

The post Hi-Five (2025) Review first appeared on cityonfire.com.

“Big Deal” Theatrical Poster

Director: Choi Yoon-jin
Cast: Yoo Hae-jin, Lee Je-hoon, Byron Mann, Son Hyeon-ju, Choi Young-Joon, Kim Ki-Hae
Running Time: 104 min.

By Paul Bramhall

Watch any Korean movie from the last 30 years, and it won’t be too long before the ubiquitous green soju bottle (usually several of them) makes an appearance, the alcoholic beverage that’s remained the number one best selling hangover inducer in the world for almost as long. While soju has always played an integral part in Korean cinema – from the tipsy conversations of practically every Hong Sang-soo movie ever made, to the comedic mishaps in the likes of Daytime Drinking – Big Deal is certainly the first production that can label itself as a soju themed financial drama.

Spanning 6 years from 1997 to 2003, the plot takes its inspiration from the real-life story of Jinro Soju, which was acquired by Hite with a little help from Goldman Sachs in the late 90’s (check the back of any soju bottle in your local Korean restaurant or Asian supermarket, and chances are you’ll find it was made by Hite Jinro). For obvious reasons, in Big Deal the name of the soju brand is the fictional Gukbo, with the narrative opening in the midst of the Asian Financial Crisis. With Gukbo facing bankruptcy, the company president tasks the loyal financial director to work with a consultant from a global investment firm, with the latter promising they have the strategy to get Gukbo out trouble.

The CFO is played by Yoo Hae-jin (Yadang: The Snitch, Exhuma), bringing his typical mix of cheerful amicability to the role while hiding a sad past, with his unwavering dedication to the company costing his relationship with his wife and daughter. His dedicated company man is played off against the consultant he’s paired with, played by Lee Je-hoon (Escape, Time to Hunt), who after living overseas for 10 years views working as simply a way to make money, and can’t quite fathom why Hae-jin is so passionate about securing the future of Gukbo. But secure it Je-hoon he does, finding a way to offer the company a 5-year reprieve from debtors, while hiding the fact that behind the scenes he’s using his access to Gukbo’s financial records to set up a takeover by the investment firm he works for, the plan being to then sell it off for a significant profit.

Financial thrillers are a tricky proposition (see Herman Yau’s A Gilded Game for the perfect example of how not to do one), however in recent years Korean cinema has occasionally looked to the Asian Financial Crisis era for inspiration, with 2018’s Default also set during the period. While Default told the bigger picture of Korea’s negotiations with the International Monetary Fund when the country was on the brink of bankruptcy, comparatively Big Deal feels like a more intimate portrayal, instead using the crisis as a framework to focus on the relationship between Hae-jin and Je-hoon. Indeed there are times when the movie it most recalls is Pretty Woman, just minus the woman part. Je-hoon and Hae-jin’s relationship echoes the dynamic between Richard Gere as the detached businessman buying up faltering businesses, and Ralph Bellamy as the traditionalist, unwilling to let go of the company he’s dedicated his life to.

Does the world really need a Korean take on a side story from a 1990 Hollywood romcom? The odds feel stacked against it, however for the most part Big Deal works as an engaging character drama. It also feels like a distinctly Korean topic (a comment I also made about The Match that was similarly released in 2025 – could it be the Korean film industry is shifting back to more local tastes after years of targeting the global market?), as there’s no escape from the fact it’s the story of a soju company experiencing financial trouble, and the question of if it can be saved or not. It’s not going to be immediately relatable subject matter for overseas audiences, and there’s a lot of the inevitable soju talk of how “the taste is bittersweet, just like life”, however Hae-jin and Je-hoon make for a likeable pair, and their onscreen chemistry works well.

Outside of the pair though other characters don’t fare quite as well, with a supporting cast that occasionally dips into caricature territory. The number one guilty party is the casting of Steven Seagal regular Byron Mann (Belly of the Beast, A Dangerous Man), who plays one of the Chinese American executives in the investment firm Je-hoon works for. Wearing a smarmy villainous grin for the entirety of his time onscreen, liberally using the word “f*ck” in every other sentence, and generally hamming it up to pantomime like levels, there’s a glaring lack of subtlety to his portrayal that makes it impossible to take him seriously. As a trivial side note, while Big Deal marks Mann’s debut in a Korean production, he notably played the bad guy in the Park Joong-hoon starring Hollywood movie American Dragons from 1998.

The directorial debut of Choi Yoon-jin, who previously wrote the scripts for 2013’s Steel Cold Winter and 2014’s Office, for his first time helming a production Yoon-jin is also expectedly behind the script of Big Deal. There’s some welcome humor interspersed amongst the talk of bonds and creditors, with one particularly fun poke at how many feel soju brands all taste the same, as Je-hoon struggles to describe the taste of one of Gukbo’s latest concoctions. Due to his character having lived in New York for 10 years, the script understandably gives him plenty of lines in English, which unfortunately come across as a little too phonetic to feel authentic. While I always admire actors tackling a language that isn’t their own, when the result is that it reminds us precisely that it’s an actor delivering lines in a language they’re not used to, for the audience it breaks the immersion in the story, and that’s sadly the case here.

Despite these minor issues though, for the most part Yoon-jin displays an assured hand for his first time in the director’s chair, and shows a welcome level of restraint in keeping the runtime to a brisk 104 minutes. In a climate where it often feels like everything needs to be shown rather than simply suggested, it’s admirable that we never have to sit through any flashbacks of Hae-jin back when he was still living with his wife and daughter (and I confess I was expecting them!), instead letting his facial expressions show the regret he feels. There’s a simple joy in seeing an actor be allowed to act, and trust that their acting is enough to tell the story without explaining it through exposition (or throwing in pace deadening flashback sequences), and it’s refreshing to see such an approach in a directorial debut.

Admittedly some of the symbolism feels a little on the nose, none more so than how the likes of the company president and villainous lawyers all insist on sipping glasses of whiskey rather than soju. At one point I wouldn’t have been surprised if one of them declared “soju is too much of a working-class drink for our educationally superior tastes!” Thankfully the implication is kept visual, and at least most of the whiskey sipping is done by the stellar supporting cast. Son Hyun-joo (The Phone, Hide and Seek) is suitably entitled as the self-serving company president who inherited its riches from his parents, with almost every line he speaks related to how he can make himself richer. While his character may be two dimensional, he still imbues it with a few distinctive quirks, with the constant opening and closing of his Motorola flip phone to express frustration fleshing out his character in a way the script fails to do.

Surprisingly Big Deal opts for more of a low key ending over any kind of corporate histrionics, a decision that works in its favour, with Yoon-jin using a post-credits sequence to show the passing of time from the closing scenes, one which offers up a satisfying coda on the simplicity of finding happiness. Transcending the financial drama label to end up more as a story of friendship and life lessons learnt, much like a bottle of soju after a long day at work, Big Deal hits the spot. Best of all, it’s only the former that leaves you with a headache the next day.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 7/10

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“The Match” Theatrical Poster

Director: Kim Hyung-Joo
Cast: Lee Byung-Hun, Yoo Ah-In, Ko Chang-Seok, Hyun Bong-Sik, Moon Jeong-Hee, Jo Woo-Jin, Kim Kang-Hoon
Running Time: 115 min.

By Paul Bramhall

More than 10 years ago I reviewed a Korean movie called The Divine Move, which at one point I described as consisting of “an abundance of scenes with characters playing Go, and then beating the living daylights out of each other”, the implication being that the latter made the former scenes more palatable. While I’m now slightly older, it’s debatable if I’m any wiser, so when I heard there was going to be a movie about 2 of Koreas most famous Go players – Cho Hun-hyun, and his student turned rival Lee Chang-ho – it didn’t necessarily spark that much interest.

The movie in question was The Match, and my lack of interest quickly changed when it was revealed that Lee Byung-hun (The Man Standing Next, Ashfall) had been cast as Hun-hyun, an actor who’s remained someone I’ve religiously watched anything they appear in since the early 2000’s. The casting announcement was followed by Yoo Ah-in (Burning, Veteran) being attached to play Chang-ho, and suddenly my curiosity was piqued. As it was, it would stay piqued for a while, since its original release date of 2023 was ultimately pushed out to 2025, the result of Ah-in being charged with illegal drug usage in October 2023.

While similar activity in Hollywood would be frowned upon, in Korea it’s a whole other level, with such offences usually resulting in permanent banishment from the entertainment industry. Ah-in was recast for the 2^nd season of Hellbound, his scenes in the drama Goodbye Earth were practically all removed, and both of the completed movies he starred in – Hi-Five and The Match – were placed indefinitely on the shelf. Thankfully, after being released from prison following completion of a five month sentence in February 2025, it seems like the studios are feeling a little more at ease to put the movies out there that have Ah-in’s name attached to them, with both Hi.5 and The Match finally given a release in May (albeit with a noticeable lack of any publicity). Of course if you’re reading this in 2035 rather than 2025 all of this will be completely superfluous, but reviews aren’t anything if not products of the time they’re written.

Indeed there’s a certain feeling of being displaced in time watching Ah-in on the screen in 2025. His last role was in 2022’s Seoul Vibe, one of the worst Korean movies of the 21^st century, so to go back to a role that really left an impression you have to look to 2020’s Voice of Silence, a whole 5 years ago. Thankfully The Match is a production that knows how to utilize his talents, and if it does turn out to be his last role, it’s at least a worthy one. The plot is, by its nature, more compelling due to the fact it’s based on a true story. Cho Hun-hyun spent the 1970’s dominating the sport of Go, and in 1984 he took the 9-year-old Lee Chang-ho under his wing as a live-in student. The opportunity to learn from the best saw him become professional only a couple of years later, and in 1989 the then 14-year-old Chang-ho met his teacher in the final of the 29^th Chaegowi, coming out the victor and launching a year’s long teacher-student rivalry.

The plot focuses on Byung-hun’s meeting with his to-be student when he’s still a boisterous and boastful kid growing up in Jeonju, played by Kim Kang-hoon (Metamorphosis, Exit), who the locals believe to be a Go prodigy. When Byun-hun sits down with Kang-hoon for a game he ultimately walks away unimpressed, but when the latter solves a question Byung-hun had posed before leaving, it leads him to rethink his decision. It’s a nuance in the world of Go that would be lost on those unfamiliar with the culture surrounding the game, but what made the decision for Hun-hyun to start teaching Chang-ho such an unusual one was that Hun-hyun was still at the top of his game, whereas normally a teacher would take on a student when they’ve already retired. Of course it’s also that same decision that led to one of the most unique rivalries in any sport, with teacher and student going head-to-head for close to 15 years.

The Match is the sophomore directorial feature of Kim Hyeong-joo, who debuted as a director with 2017’s The Sherrif in Town, and he already shows an assured hand through his ability to make the games of Go (and there’s a lot of them!) compelling enough for audiences to be invested. CGI is occasionally used to effectively present the stones being placed on the board one by one in quick succession, accelerating the outcome of the game, but without compromising the performance of the actors. Other times the camera finds unique ways to frame the players, such as filming from underneath a transparent board, so that it’s possible to see the players face between the stones. At the heart of it though, we’re still watching 2 people play a game of Go, and there are no acid spraying tables that douse the loser like in The Divine Move 2: The Wrathful to liven things up, so to that end audience mileage may well vary.

More than the game itself though, The Match feels like it belongs to Lee Byung-hun, his character being one who goes from having his world shattered, to one who’s able to pick himself back up and get back in the game. Like all of the best sporting dramas, it’s the story of human resilience, and even if a game of Go may not get the adrenaline pumping like a game of soccer (Dream), table tennis (As One), or even baseball (YMCA Baseball Team), the principle remains the same. Where Hyeong-joo gets it right is the mix of drama between the 2 leads, and the way it’s framed in such a way that allows for the games of Go to become extensions of that drama. There’s a tangible sense of awkwardness when Ah-in first beats Byung-hun, then they have to return to living under the same roof together, the live-in student having now beaten the very person who’s provided for them since they were a kid. The change in dynamic is tangible.

The plot structure isn’t flawless though, admittedly suffering from a common trait in Korean cinema, in which if it’s known a character is going to face adversity later on, the time spent portraying life prior comes across as overly saccharine. In the early scenes it feels like everyone is a little too cheerful and amicable, creating a somewhat detached feeling from reality, almost as if the future hardships are being foreshadowed with a sledgehammer because, really, can life feel this breezy and pleasant!? I’m not sure I have the answer of how to do it better (and I guess if I did, I’d be directing movies rather than reviewing them), but when the emotions don’t feel authentic, it makes it difficult to relate to the characters beyond two dimensional caricatures. I distinctly remember Lee Chung-hyun’s 2020 horror The Call suffering from the same issue when it had to portray scenes where essentially ‘life is good’.

Overall though this is a minor gripe in what feels like one of the most distinctively Korean movies to grace the screen for a while. From the smoke-filled Go rooms to the plastic tent pocha snack stalls, it’s perhaps by virtue of it being about the game of Go that The Match refuses to rush itself, instead adamantly sticking to its own good-natured lane. The supporting cast are also stellar, with Moon Jeong-hee (Hide and Seek, Deranged) as Byung-hun’s wife who finds herself in a tricky situation under her own roof, and Jo Woo-jin (Harbin, Kingmaker) as a fellow Go competitor who befriends both Byung-hun and Ah-in at different moments in their journeys.

The closing scenes reveal that both Cho Hun-hyun and Lee Chang-ho remain active in Go competitions to this day (as well as showing photos that reflect just how much the casting of Byung-hun and Ah-in nailed their appearances), a reassuring coda to know they’re still doing what they love. Quietly unassuming, The Match is one of those movies that gradually pulls you in without you even realising, but by the time the end credits roll, you’re glad it did.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 7.5/10

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“Next Sohee” Theatrical Poster

Director: Jeong Joo-ri
Cast: Bae Doo-Na, Kim Si-eun, Jung Hoe-Rin, Kang Hyun-Oh, Park Woo-Young, Park Hee-Eun, Kim Yong-Joon, Sim Hee-Seop, Park Yoon-Hee, Yoon Ga-I
Running Time: 135 min.

By Paul Bramhall 

It can sometimes be a tough job being a Korean cinema fan, with some of the best directors often taking years between the movies they release. Oh Seung-wook made audiences wait 9 years between 2015’s The Shameless and 2024’s Revolver. Lee Chang-dong kept us hanging for 8 years between 2010’s Poetry and 2018’s Burning. Even a director as popular as Park Chan-wook left 6 years between 2016’s The Handmaiden and 2022’s Decision to Leave. Jeong Joo-ri, a former student of Lee Chang-dong who made her debut with 2014’s Bae Doona starring A Girl at My Door (which Chang-dong notably produced) looks set to follow a similar path, with her sophomore feature Next Sohee finally arriving in 2022.

Once more directing from her own script, Joo-ri has also re-teamed with Bae Doona (The Drug King, Tunnel), however Next Sohee for the most part belongs to actress Kim Si-eun as the titular Sohee of the title. Here given her first starring role after minor supporting turns in the likes of The Negotiation and Boys Be!! (along with plenty of K-drama work), Si-eun completely owns the role as a teenager attending a vocational college in rural Korea, one that offers a pathway to fulltime employment through placement in an ‘externship’ program. Despite dreaming of being a K-pop dancer, when she’s given the opportunity to be placed in a telecom companies call centre, the corporate surroundings being a stark contrast to the factories many of the students find themselves placed, it seems like she’s landed herself a good deal.

It’s only once she starts the role that she learns her job is to take calls from customers wanting to cancel their subscription service, and convince them to stay (or even better, convince them to stay and upsell another product). Faced with high retainment targets, an initially supportive manager who soon begins to crank on the pressure, and the frustration of discovering her salary incentives are being withheld due to contract fine print, what seemed like a good deal gradually starts to turn into a soul-destroying nightmare. The call centre environment that Next Sohee takes place in somewhat inevitably echoes the previous year’s Aloners, a movie that similarly focused on a female who joins a call centre, however despite the initial similarities Joo-ri takes her story in a very different direction.

Watching someone fresh to the workforce become slowly beaten down by the unfairness of the program she’s been placed into may not sound particularly engaging, but much like A Girl at My Door Joo-ri’s ability to create characters who feel relatable shines through. Si-eun is a revelation in the role, imbuing Sohee with a sense of resilience that makes her easy to root for, even when the difficulties she faces start to feel overwhelming (especially when her manager commits suicide in his car). It’s worth to point out that once I read Next Sohee was being directed by Joo-ri, I decided to avoid reading anything further and went in blind, so after spending an hour in the company of Si-eun and getting to know her character, it came as a genuine shock when she also chooses to kill herself.

It’s at this point that the plot reveals itself to be a tale of 2 halves. In the latter half we meet Bae Doona’s character, who up until this point we’ve only glimpsed briefly in the dance studio that Si-eun would go to practice her K-pop routines. In recent years Doona seems to have become the go-to Korean actress for playing slightly distant cop characters with an undisclosed traumatic past (usually re-located to a rural station for good measure). Here she could well be playing the same character as she did in A Girl at My Door, and of course we also saw a similar role in Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Broker. Initially tasked with a straightforward round of interviews of those who knew Si-eun so the case can be closed, when it comes to light she wasn’t the first person to kill herself who worked at the call centre, Doona refuses to wrap things up, and begins to look deeper into what led to the deaths.

There’s a quietly seething anger that permeates throughout Next Sohee, an anger that bubbles ever closer to the surface as the narrative progresses. Joo-ri has stated in interviews that the idea for the story came about after she saw a news report in 2016, covering an incident where a girl who’d been sent on an externship program in a call centre killed herself within 3 months of working there. The investigation afterwards brought to light the unfavourable working conditions and how, to some degree, the students who were placed from vocational colleges were being exploited by the companies the colleges partnered with.

The narrative structure is a bold one, eschewing what looks and feels like a murder mystery in its back half, but isn’t precisely because we already know there’s no mystery, having seen how Si-eun chose to take her own life. Rather it becomes the tale of 2 people, both somehow connected through their willingness to rail against the injustices that they see, even though there’s no singular villain for either them or us as the audience to aim our anger towards. In many ways Doona’s role doubles as the avatar for the audience watching, as what starts as mild frustration at the lack of clarity she gets from anyone she speaks to soon develops into outright exasperation at the system that’s operating in plain sight.

On the one hand the approach can be viewed as a nihilistic one from a purely plot perspective, but Joo-ri’s script and direction is constructed in such a way that our closeness to the characters onscreen feels like it’s more important than the circumstances that surround them. In any other filmmaker’s hands Next Sohee would likely have been structured from the perspective of Bae Doona, uncovering how Si-eun decided to take her own life by unfolding it in flashbacks, thus framing it from the perspective of the mystery genre. However by spending the whole of the first hour with Si-eun it feels like we get to know her intimately, as if she’s the main character of the movie (which it could well be argued she is), and therefore allowing the investigation in the second half to be more about getting to know Doona’s character, since we already know Si-eun’s story.

The reason why Next Sohee manages to be so compelling is in the way it crafts a pair of characters who in some way mirror each other’s values, refusing to be defeated by a system that’s so deeply entrenched it’ll never change, yet still remain true to their principles. Will that make it enjoyable for everyone? Probably not, and those expecting any kind of cathartic payoff at the end of the 135-minute runtime will be left disappointed. The injustice is a part of the hierarchal nature of Korean society, and no single suicide or person is ever going to change that, so in the face of such an overbearing beast, the best you can do is be kind to others and let them know they’re not alone. In the final scene Doona’s character seems to realise this, embracing a willingness to do what’s in her control to try and stop a similar tragedy happening to the next Sohee, and hoping the offer of connection is enough.

Managing to tread the fine line between being both a subdued character study and seething indictment of certain aspects of Korean society, Joo-ri’s sophomore feature is a success not so much because of the system it portrays, but rather the impact that it has on the characters that she’s created. For Bae Doona, Next Sohee marks another stellar performance that’s a standout in her filmography, and for Kim Si-eun she’s already gone on to be cast in the 2^nd season of the popular Netflix series Squid Game. As for Jeong Joo-ri, my only hope is that we don’t have to wait another 8 years for her next production to hit the screens, as she remains one of the brightest talents working in Korea today.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 8.5/10

The post Next Sohee (2022) Review first appeared on cityonfire.com.

“The Old Woman with the Knife” Theatrical Poster

Director: Min Gyoo-dong
Cast: Lee Hye-Young, Kim Sung-Cheol, Yeon Woo-Jin,  Kim Moo-Yul, Kim Kang-Woo, Shin Shi-A
Running Time: 122 min. 

By Paul Bramhall

It’s been at least 5 minutes since a female assassin movie has hit either the big screen or a streaming service, so to ensure any withdrawal symptoms are avoided, in 2025 Korea stepped up to the table with The Old Woman with the Knife. The Korean film industry has been on the female assassin bandwagon for a while already, with the likes of Kim Ok-bin in 2017’s The Villainess, Jeon Do-yeon in 2023’s Kill Boksoon, and Jeon Jong-seo in Ballerina from the same year all delivering a dose of femme fatale action with varying degrees of success. The selling point for this latest entry in the genre is its focus on a female assassin in the twilight years of her career, with Lee Hye-young (The Anchor, Raging Years) playing a legendary killer who’s been in the business for 50 years, with no plans to retire.

Those plans are upended though when she’s seriously injured during one of her hits, and wakes up in a veterinary clinic, having been taken in for treatment by the kindly doctor who found her collapsed on the street. With a ‘leave no witnesses’ policy, Hye-young’s decision to let the doctor live causes tensions in the assassin agency which she oversees, especially from a recently hired young upstart with a vicious streak, who takes an unusually close interest in her activities both in and outside of work. Played by Kim Sung-cheol (Troll Factory, The Battle of Jangsari), his discovery of Hye-young’s decision soon puts the innocent family at risk, and Hye-young has to decide if they’re worth protecting. Adapted from the novel of the same name by Gu Byeong-mo, published in 2013, onscreen the result is an uneven mix of believability stretching violence and melodrama stereotypes (the kind that Korean cinema has cultivated so well over the years).

Much like the exorcism genre, the assassin genre has become so saturated over the last 10 years that the template for such stories rarely offers up any surprises. Usually ending up as some variation of – assassin doesn’t go through with a hit, ends up becoming a target themselves, while (in most cases) also needing to protect the target that they let go – TOWwtK (as I’ll refer to it from here on) sticks to the template to a T. The challenge for any director then is what freshness they can bring to a genre that feels so structurally limited, and here Min Gyoo-dong looks to leverage the age angle. As a director Gyoo-dong debuted with the 1999 Korean Wave classic Memento Mori, and over the last 25+ years has proved himself an effective filmmaker across multiple genres. From comedy with Everything About my Wife, period raunch with The Treacherous, tearjerker drama like Herstory, and even sci-fi with The Prayer.

TOWwtK marks the first time for him to venture into action thriller territory, and if one thing can’t be argued it’s that the casting of Lee Hye-young is a masterstroke. While in recent years Hye-young has become a Hong Sang-soo regular (most recently featuring in 2024’s A Traveler’s Needs), her filmography dates back to 1982 when she debuted in Mother’s Wedding at 19, remaining a fixture on Korean cinema screens ever since. Her collaboration with Gyoo-dong marks the second time for Hye-young to headline an action thriller, with the first coming in the form of Ryoo Seung-wan’s sophomore feature from 2003, No Blood No Tears (which ironically paired her with Kill Boksoon leading lady Jeon Do-yeon), and her character is easily the best thing about TOWwtK.

As an assassin in her latter years a medical condition has resulted in a shaky hand, and her body can’t heal as fast as it used to, making for an unusually vulnerable protagonist. Thankfully her experience still makes her a danger, able to draw a weapon on potential victims without them even noticing, and her unassuming appearance allows her to blend into the crowd (an ideal trait for stabbing a target with a poisoned needle on a crowded train). It’s particularly refreshing to see in her first real fight that her slight figure is easily overpowered by the bigger opponent, a reflection of all the cunning in the world not being much use if there’s someone double your size in front of you determined to stay alive. For some reason though, after this scene Gyoo-dong does a 180 on how the action is approached, and once Hye-young decides to protect the doctor who saved her, she effectively becomes The Woman from Nowhere.

It almost feels as if they couldn’t quite decide on how to frame the action, so we go from a protagonist who’s vulnerable and easily overpowered, to one who’s a relentless killing machine, able to stroll into a nightclub and start taking out multiple bodyguards like she owns the place. It’s a jarring shift, made all the more so by the fact the initial approach was so different, and the transition never really convinces. It’s not the only personality disorder that TOWwtK suffers from though, with it feeling like there was a meaner and grittier version of the story somewhere underneath. The perfect example is a scene where the doctor chases after Hye-young, and once they’re in a secluded spot she steps out of the shadows, slitting his throat which covers her face in arterial blood spray. It immediately then cuts to him still chasing her, revealing the prior scene to (presumably) be a clumsy attempt at what Hye-young may have been contemplating.

Unfortunately though it just comes across as a cheap shock tactic, without actually wanting to commit to the shock itself, the biggest problem being that TOWwtK would have been far more interesting if the imagined scene actually happened. Other parts of the plot feel strangely underbaked, like the introduction of a limping character played by Kim Kang-woo (The Childe, Recalled) who appears to be the de facto manager of the agency, and who’s started taking on hits that go against the agencies principle. The assassins call themselves “pest control” whose job it is to “kill bugs”, with the classic trait of only assassinating those who deserve it, but Kang-woo has started to say yes to everything. It’s something that’s mentioned a couple of times, however nothing is really done with it and nor does it create any conflict that impacts the narrative, so it ultimately feels superfluous.

Far more interesting are the flashbacks to 1975, when a teenage runaway Hye-young (played by Shin Si-ah – clocking in her sophomore feature length appearance after debuting as the lead in 2022’s The Witch: Part 2. The Other One) is taken under the wing of an assassin played by Kim Mu-yeol (Space Sweepers, The Gangster, The Cop, The Devil). After accidentally killing an American GI who was attempting to rape her, Mu-yeol tells her not to worry since she’s “just killed a bug”, and her apprenticeship begins. The flashback scenes give Mu-yeol the opportunity to flex his knife skills last seen in The Roundup: Punishment, but more significantly they answer the earlier question of how to make the assassin genre still feel fresh in 2025. I would have happily watched a whole movie about a female assassin operating in 1975 Korea, but as it is the scenes with Si-ah and Mu-yeol are mostly there to humanise Hye-young’s character in the present.

TOWwtK truly jumps the shark though in its action heavy finale, that takes any credibility that may have been remaining around the capabilities of a slight 65-year-old assassin, and throws them into the shredder. Set in an under construction circular building, by the time Hye-young grabs a rope and jumps off an upper floor, swinging around and blasting away at the bad guys like a senior citizen version of Angeline Jolie’s bungee cord scene in Tomb Raider, the only thing left to do was laugh at the audaciousness of it all. What should have been a grounded and gritty finale highlighting her 50 years of experience as an assassin, instead ends up as a circus act, although admittedly a very bloody one.

On the plus side, in an early scene Hye-young adopts a dog, so if anything when it comes to the inevitable male counterpart comparisons, hopefully it means that instead of the all too common “female John Wick” references, we’ll get a “female Gino Felino” quote instead. As it is, The Old Woman with the Knife feels like a missed opportunity for all involved.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 5/10

The post Old Woman with the Knife, The (2025) Review first appeared on cityonfire.com.

“Holy Night: Demon Hunters” Theatrical Poster

Director: Im Dae-Hee
Cast: Ma Dong-Seok, Seohyun, David Lee, Kyung Soo-Jin, Jung Ji-So, Cha Woo-jin, Lee Da-il
Running Time: 92 min.

By Paul Bramhall

It’s been almost 10 years since Ma Dong-seok’s breakthrough role in Train to Busan, and in that time he’s battled zombies, serial killers, crocodiles, gangsters, reptilian human hybrids, gangsters, heavenly guardians and even the yakuza. It was perhaps inevitable at some point then, that his anvil sized fists would be aimed in the direction of satanic demons from the depths of hell. Holy Night: Demon Hunters is the movie that gives us exactly that, with Dong-seok running the Holy Night demon hunting agency (yes you read that right). What’s even more surprising is that it’s not the first time for Korean cinema to prove demons can be dealt with by being punched in the face, with 2019’s The Divine Fury offering up an MMA infused take on the battle of good vs. evil.

In his latest outing Dong-seok is paired with former Girls Generation member Seohyun (Love and Leashes, I AM.) as a shaman with supernatural powers, and Lee David (Svaha: The Sixth Finger, Pluto), who doesn’t seem to have any purpose other than to turn up and film their encounters. It’s a legitimate question to ask if it’s possible to have too much of a good thing, and certainly in the late 2010’s when Dong-seok was starting to cultivate his amicable onscreen persona (combined with an ability to knock out a gorilla), it felt like it’d be impossible to tire of seeing him in action. However I’d state the case for Holy Night: Demon Hunters being the straw that broke the camel’s back, as it’s hard to describe it as anything other than a sloppily made hodge podge of tired exorcism tropes, mixed in with Dong-seok doing exactly what you expect him to.

Admittedly it’s refreshing to see a more visceral take on the done to death exorcism genre (Devils Stay and Dark Nuns were both released in the 12 months prior), however first-time director Lim Dae-hee feels out of his depth in his debut feature. The punchy (no pun intended) 90-minute run time is strangely absent of any kind of narrative thrust or tension, with stilted dialogue often making any scenes that don’t involve Dong-seok hitting things (and there’s many of them) feel stagnant. This issue is exasperated by the reason for his presence in the first place feeling like it’s based on shaky ground, with the explanation being that when someone’s possessed, Satan worshippers will naturally gravitate towards their vicinity. So while Seohyun performs the exorcism, Dong-seok is there to punch out any satanic lackeys who show up (and they always do).

Taking place in a red-mooned Seoul, when the trio are hired by a neuropsychiatrist who begs for their help in saving her possessed sister, they find themselves dealing with a demonic force more powerful than anything they’ve encountered before. The sister is played by Jung Ji-so (Parasite, The Tiger: An Old Hunter’s Tale), clocking in a performance that’s likely to induce feelings of mild irritation to possible annoyance. Most of her screentime is spent incessantly screaming, with a highlight of unintentional amusement being a literal montage of home video footage capturing her possessed activity in the house. Playing out like a Scary Movie style riff on every possessed character stereotype in the book, at one point her face suddenly appears in front of the camera, which elicited laughter from the audience of the cinema I saw it in.

The lack of any real scares being induced from Ji-so’s paranormal activity is reflected in almost every aspect of Holy Night: Demon Hunters. If the unintentional comedy hits the mark, then the intentional comedy doesn’t fare so well. Ever since the first Roundup sequel Dong-seok’s distinctive style of self-effacing laconic humor has faced diminishing returns, and here things get off to an awkward start from the moment he’s introduced. When a client opens the door to his office and he swivels his chair to face them, the chair keeps on spinning so he ends up facing away from them again. The problem is that coming straight after a horror focused opening the comedic tone has yet to be established, so the scene falls flat on its face, with Dae-hee likely assuming it would work simply because audiences are expecting a Ma Dong-seok movie. It’s lazy filmmaking.

Thankfully it’s not a complete write-off, with a handful of Dong-seok’s self-written one liners delivering the intended laughs (including when he asks a demon if it’s Korean), but the ratio is more miss than hit. Action wise he’s once more paired with his go-to choreographer (and now sometime director) Heo Myeong-haeng (The Roundup: Punishment, Badland Hunters), with the action mainly consisting of one versus multiple opponent brawls. While there’s nothing on display we haven’t seen before, with Dong-seok falling back on his tried and tested boxing skills, he doesn’t quite get the easy ride that we see in some of his movies where no one can lay a finger on him which is a welcome change.

The action does achieve some originality in the way it offers up a chance to witness a classic Ma Dong-seok beatdown combined with special effects, at least in a role where he’s not playing a God (yes, Dong-seok has played a God twice – first in Along with the Gods: The Last 49 Days and second in The Eternals). With smoke and burning ash flying off upon contact between fist and face, it may feel more like a throwback to 1990’s era Blade or Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but it’s still a nice touch.

Unfortunately the decision was made to have some of the action framed from the perspective of Lee David’s video camera, clocking in what’s likely to be a contender for the most pointless role of 2025. Harking back to 2000’s era productions like Hong Kong’s Dragon Squad, having a character armed with a video camera that we have to constantly see various scenes through (you know the deal – timer running in one corner, battery percentage in the other, framing lines in the corners of the screen) proves to be superfluous, feeling more like a jarring distraction than anything else.

The biggest tragedy of Holy Night: Demon Hunters though is how cheap it feels, with much of the runtime playing out in the house that Ji-so and her sister used to live in together. While limited locations aren’t necessarily an indication of a bad movie, here they feel restrictive, and it isn’t helped by the fact every time some Satan worshippers show up they look exactly the same as the last batch. It’s easy to get the impression that it was likely the same set of masked stuntmen each time lining up to get a walloping from Dong-seok’s fists, which is ok, but there should be no doubt that what’s presented here is the Ma Dong-seok beatdown playlist at its most rudimentary.

It’s worth noting Dong-seok himself is imbued with an ability to call forth supernatural strength, a trait that’s explained in a number of poorly constructed flashbacks to when he was an orphan, and a tragedy occurred between he and his brother that set them on different paths. All three of the Holy Night trio have a connected past, but the way the flashbacks are interspersed feels haphazard, rarely feeling relevant to the context in which they’re presented. I won’t get started on the CGI demon that haunts Dong-seok in his dreams.

As one point while watching Holy Night: Demon Hunters I found my thoughts turning to how the only entity that Dong-seok really has left to punch in the face is Satan himself. But then surprisingly, in the finale, that’s exactly what he does. Once you’ve given a right hook to the source of all evil, where else is left to go? Time will tell, but for now, it’d be best if he exorcises Holy Night: Demon Hunters from his filmography all together.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 3/10

The post Holy Night: Demon Hunters (2025) Review first appeared on cityonfire.com.

“Yadang: The Snitch” Theatrical Poster

Director: Hwang Byeong-gug
Cast: Kang Ha-neul, Yoo Hae-jin, Park Hae-joon, Chae Won-bin, Ryu Kyung-soo, Kim Geum-soon, Yu Seong-ju, Lim Sung-kyun, Cho Wan-ki, Kim Mi Suk
Running Time: 122 min. 

By Paul Bramhall

In Korea the term Yadang refers to a professional snitch, a role that exists as an unofficial liaison between the junkies and the cops, forming a kind of symbiotic relationship that allows the latter to leverage the former in extracting information on where the drugs they take are coming from. The snitch is paid for their services under the table, and technically everyone should walk away happy – the cops get a fast track to intel that would otherwise take months of investigative work, and the junkies escape jailtime thanks to the information they’ve given up. In Yadang: The Snitch the title role is played by Kang Ha-neul (The Pirates: The Last Royal Treasure, Dongju: The Portrait of a Poet), who we meet in a fast-paced opening segment that shows how he came to exclusively work for an ambitious prosecutor played by Yoo Hae-jin (Exhuma, Confidential Assignment).

Keen to work his way up the ranks, the pair have become so good at what they do that Hae-jin starts getting to the criminals before the cops do, much to the chagrin of a detective played by Park Hae-joon (Heart Blackened, Believer), whose months of investigative work turn out to be for nothing. However when the trio’s paths overlap during a drug bust involving the rich son of a presidential candidate, their fates become interwoven, with Hae-jin agreeing to let the son off the hook in return for a seat in the Central Prosecutors Office. The classic case of a character’s ambitious streak clouding their moral judgement, the decision costs Ha-neul and Hae-joon dearly, and when the dust settles both set out to settle the score.

Directed by Hwang Byeong-gug (My Wedding Campaign, S.I.U.), while watching Yadang: The Snitch there was more than once when I was reminded of Ryoo Seung-wan’s 2010 crime thriller The Unjust, which similarly focuses on the interweaving fates of 3 characters operating on both sides of the law. The comparison is a complimentary one, and perhaps the familiarity also comes from the fact that Yoo Hae-jin played one of the leads in the earlier production as well. There’s a certain throwback vibe throughout Byeong-gug’s latest, one which is particularly felt during an early scene featuring a gang of angry steel pipe wielding cops chasing down a vehicle. I can’t pinpoint exactly when Korean cinema turned away from portraying the trusted steel pipe as its police forces go-to weapon of choice, but if I had to guess I’d say it was probably around the time when Korean culture started to become popular globally in the mid 2010’s.

The relationship between informant and the law has been explored before in the likes of Dante Lam’s The Stool Pigeon, and here Byeong-gug proves there’s plenty of mileage left in the dynamic to anchor a crime thriller around. As the Yadang of the title Kang Ha-neul initially seems to be going for the over-acting award of the year, with a somewhat grating portrayal of a role you’d assume would require an element of staying under the radar, so as not to make yourself known to the wider criminal world. Not so here. Ha-neul is a loud, cigar smoking, hummer driving attention magnet who, only through the assumed magic of cinema, has remained as successful in his role as he has. The portrayal turns out to be a narratively fuelled one though, with his brash demeanour soon fizzled out when the betrayal he suffers leads to some grizzly results.

It works, if only just, although it’s easy to feel that in the hands of a director like Oh Seung-wook or Lee Hae-yeong the way Ha-neul’s character is portrayed before and after would likely have been handled with a bit more nuance. Far more effective is the ever-reliable Yoo Hae-jin, who nails his role as the prosecutor whose ambitions ultimately see him fall victim to temptation. There’s something about Hae-jin that remains inherently likeable even when he’s cast in villainous roles, and as such there are several moments throughout Yadang: The Snitch when you find yourself hoping he’ll redeem himself. However the deeper he’s pulled into the world of political corruption, the harder it becomes to turn back, making his characters journey a particularly compelling one in the way he starts out as someone to root for, but by the end you’re hoping to see his downfall.

Similarly Park Hae-joon clocks in a stellar performance as the detective, with the narrative structure essentially acting in reverse when it comes to how the audience feels about his character compared to Hae-jin. While his frustration at being pipped to the post by Hae-jin’s prosecutor initially frames his role as the typical incompetent cop, as the plot progresses it becomes clear that, even if he’s not the most likeable guy in the room, he does his job well. Once he realises he’ll have to work with Ha-neul to have a chance of taking Ha-jin down, the chemistry between the pair makes for one of cinemas more enjoyable reluctant team-ups in recent years.

While more a crime thriller than an action thriller, there are some welcome doses of the latter throughout the runtime. A couple of vehicular crashes are well staged (including Ha-neul’s hummer mounting the front of a car), and if what we see in Yadang: The Snitch is anything to go by, could it be that in 2025 we’ve finally seen the back of CGI car crashes? Ha-neul and Hae-joon also get their own fight scenes during a visit to a fish restaurant that come courtesy of stuntman turned director Heo Myeong-haeng (Badland Hunters, The Roundup: Punishment). There’s something about Korean movies that feature restaurant set brawls that always hits the spot, from Arahan to Public Enemy, and here Hae-joon’s face off against an axe wielding lackey is a highlight. The brawl is intercut with Ha-neul’s own throwdown against a buzzsaw brandishing gangster in the back of an eel filled delivery truck that features some wince worthy moments.

Despite the narrative moving at a brisk pace, there are some scenes that descend into cliché, and would arguably have been better left on the cutting room floor. At one point Ha-neul and Hae-joon team up with an up-and-coming actress played by Chae Won-bin (Strong Underdog, Run Boy Run), due to her being on the invite list of the drug fuelled parties the presidential candidate’s son holds, the plan being to perform a sting and get the evidence they need to put him away. After successfully pulling it off there’s a whole scene dedicated to her video calling them while driving so they can celebrate together, however it feels out of character and blatantly obvious as to what’s coming next, the setup to get to the outcome feeling all too predictable in its execution. A little more nuance in these one-off scenes would have benefitted Byeong-gug’s latest, however thankfully they’re not enough to diminish the overall entertainment factor.

The son himself is played with villainous delight by Ryu Kyung-soo (Broker, Jung-E), and while his comeuppance is always peripheral to the main plot involving the trio of leads, he makes the most of his limited screentime, ensuring the audience will want to see him receive his just deserts. Similarly the likes of Kim Geum-soon (Seire, Svaha: The Sixth Finger) and Yu Seong-ju (Revolver, The Land of Happiness) clock in effective supporting turns as rival gangsters in the drug trade, their presence broadening the scope of the world the story takes place in, and offering up a suitably bloody conclusion to their own sub-plot.

While Yadang: The Snitch doesn’t necessarily offer up any new ingredients to the tried and tested crime thriller, it cooks them up in a way that feels fresh, and the combination of Kang Ha-neul, Yoo Hae-jin, and Park Hae-joon prove to be an effective trio of leads to share the spotlight. If anything, we may see a shift from the expression “snitches get stiches” to “stiches get third degree burns and forcibly injected with North Korean methamphetamine.” It may not roll off the tongue in quite the same way, but I think it could catch on.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 7/10

The post Yadang: The Snitch (2025) Review first appeared on cityonfire.com.

“The Uninvited Guest of the Star Ferry” Theatrical Poster

Director: Kim Si-hyun
Cast: Im Ja-ho, Seo Jong-ah, Hwang Jang Lee, Heo Yang-mi, Yoon Yang-ha, Baek Hwang-ki, Park Hui-jin, Lee Suk-koo, Baek Hwang-ki, Choe Hyeong-geun
Running Time: 92 min.

By Paul Bramhall

When it comes to the niche world of Godfrey Ho’s infamous cut ‘n’ paste gweilo ninja movies, Ninja Terminator pretty much sits at the top of the pile. A cult oddity featuring Garfield phones, crab cookery gone wrong, and Richard Harrison with a heavy dose of eyeliner, when I first watched it in the early 2000’s the most that was known about the production the scenes had been spliced into was that it was a “low budget Korean kung-fu movie”. In the 20+ years since information on pre-21^st century Korean cinema has become much more accessible, and thanks to resources like the Korean Movie Database, by the time the 2010’s rolled around it became common knowledge (well, at least in kung-fu cinema fan circles!) that the movie in question was called The Uninvited Guest of the Star Ferry.

Released in 1984, like so many Korean productions from the 1980’s, tragically it seemed like the original had been lost to the sands of time (Trouble Solving Broker being a classic example). While we don’t usually talk about specific releases on cityonfire, this time it’s worth to make an exception, as without the release in question there would never have been an opportunity to check out The Uninvited Guest of the Star Ferry in the first place. Thanks to Neon Eagle’s 2024 limited edition Blu-ray of Ninja Terminator, not only did they stack the release with special features, but they also managed to track down a 16mm print of The Uninvited Guest of the Star Ferry, complete with its original Korean audio. While it’s included in the set as one of the extras, for fans of Korean cinema – particularly the taekwon-action genre – the fact that a title once resigned as lost is now suddenly available to be enjoyed feels like nothing short of a miracle.

Directed by Kim Si-hyun, since debuting in 1965 with the drama A Long Journey, he soon found his calling as an action movie maker. From the swordplay genre that was popular in the 1960’s with titles like A Bloody Fight at Suramoon and A Wondering Swordsman, through to the taekwon-action era of the 1970’s, where he frequently partnered with Dragon Lee for the likes of Golden Dragon, Sliver Snake and Enter the Invincible Hero. In fact I’d argue no other filmmaker has had their movies suffer at the hands of the IFD Films crew than Si-hyun, with him being at the helm of many of the cut ‘n’ paste efforts that used Korean movies as their base. Apart from Ninja Terminator using The Uninvited Guest of the Star Ferry, in 1986 Ninja Champion bastardizes Si-hyun’s 1985 rape revenge thriller Poisonous Rose Stripping the Night, while 1988’s War City 2: Red Heat Conspiracy used his penultimate movie Maze of Love.

In fairness by 1984 Si-hyun’s persistence in creating taekwon-action flicks was a little out of step with the times. Many consider 1982’s previously mentioned Trouble Solving Broker to be the end of the taekwon-action era, before the Korean film industry increasingly turned its focus to cranking out erotic cinema for much of the decade, thanks to the loosening of censorship over how much skin could be shown on screen. However Si-hyun stuck to his guns, and would continue to push Im Ja-ho as a new taekwon-action leading man, following his turn in Nam Gi-nam’s Leopard Fist Ninja from 1982. A formidable kicker, while Ja-ho can be seen in the background of many a 1970’s taekwon-action production, his late promotion to leading man unfortunately never saw him become as popular as his counterparts from the previous decade like Han Yong-cheol and Bobby Kim.

In The Uninvited Guest of the Star Ferry Ja-ho plays a private investigator who arrives in Hong Kong (hence the reference to the Star Ferry in the title), intent on getting to the bottom of a restauranteurs murder in Korea Town. Tensions have been running high between the locals and the Korean community because the “Koreans work harder”, but the truth behind the murder could be closer to home. Hired by the victim’s sister (played by Seo Jong-ah – The Last Witness, The Hut) to find those responsible, soon Ja-ho is unleashing his ferocious footwork, possibly falling for the sister he’s been hired by, and taking flak from the Korea Expat Association for poking his nose where it’s not wanted. As a plot its functional if far from inspiring, there mainly to allow Ja-ho to frequently get into scuffles with taekwon-action regulars like Baek Hwang-ki and Park Hui-jin (rocking a haircut which makes him look like a case of Casanova Wong-sploitation!).

Of course one of the most infamous elements of Ninja Terminator is the presence of legendary super kicker Hwang Jang Lee, decked out in a ridiculous blonde wig, fake rubber hand, and white suit that would make any 42^nd Street pimp proud. By the mid-80’s Jang Lee was no longer the omni-present villain that he was just a few years prior, with The Uninvited Guest of the Star Ferry being just one of 3 productions he’d feature in during 1984 (the other 2 being Demon Strike and Shaolin: The Blood Mission), compared to the 9 he featured in just a couple of years prior in 1982! One of the unexpected surprises of being able to watch the original is that there’s still no explanation as to why he’s wearing a blonde wig, although the fact that he’s named his lackey names like Duncan, Jackson, and Barbara somehow makes up for it.

The cuts between Hong Kong and Korea also provide a dose of unintentional amusement, with the HK footage mostly comprising of Ja-ho strolling down the unmistakable neon lit streets, before cutting back to the mountainous countryside of Korea where the main plot plays out (even though we’re still supposed to believe it’s HK). If Si-hyun’s geography is to be trusted, then apparently a Buddhist temple complex in the remote mountains is just a short stroll away from the busy streets of Kowloon. Thankfully the fights come thick and fast, and with contemporary set taekwon-action movies being a rarity in the genre, it’s a pleasure to watch Ja-ho unleash in a modern environment. The only part that requires a little adjustment is getting used to the way many of the fights play out to an upbeat soundtrack, one that sounds like it could be the opening to a daytime TV soap opera, offering up a slightly surreal feel to the violence onscreen.

The inoffensively pleasant soundtrack choice is at least offset by 1984 making The Uninvited Guest of the Star Ferry a latter entry in the genre, meaning that the choreography has developed in such a way that it’s noticeably more impactful than the early to mid-1970’s, when the genre was at its peak. Bodies go flying over cars in slow motion, somersaults result from kicks to the crotch, and of course, this is the only time that Im Ja-ho would face off against Hwang Jang Lee. Taking part in and around a port before segueing onto the beach, despite the 10 year age gap (with Ja-ho being younger) they both give as good as they get, with Si-hyun offering up a typically Korean detour into the absurd as Jang Lee’s leaping around sees him buried up to his waist in sand. In a career that’s seen the boot master beaten by everything from the sight of a woman’s breasts to cat kung-fu, death by accidentally burying yourself in sand is definitely up there.

Whilst far from being the best the genre has to offer, Si-hyeon still shows some occasional flourishes that reflect a filmmaker who cared about the final product. A sequence that sees Ja-ho sprinting to reach Seo Jong-ah before the bomb she’s been strapped to goes off is particularly effective, with the scene including a number of freeze frames to torturously extend the passing of time, while the sound of the bomb ticks away in the background. It’s a small touch, but it works well, instilling a sense of urgency into a genre where such feelings are usually reserved strictly for the fight scenes.

Throw in Kenny Loggins Footloose’, projectile dice, and ill-timed confessions of love, ultimately all of them come together to give The Uninvited Guest of the Star Ferry an odd charm that seems so unique to much of Korea’s output in the 1980’s. It may not be the perfect taekwon-action movie, but it should definitely scratch the itch for anyone seeking a dose of blonde wigged kicks to the face.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 6/10

The post Uninvited Guest of the Star Ferry, The (1984) Review first appeared on cityonfire.com.

“Leopard Fist Ninja” Theatrical Poster

AKA: The Return of Twin Dragons
Director: Nam Gi-nam
Cast: Im Ja-Ho, Baek Hwang-Gi, Kim Yoo-Haeng, Jo Choon, Im Hae-Rim, Chia Kai, Kim Ki-Beom, Jo Hak-Ja, Park Jong-Seol, Choe Jong-Sook, Kang Cheol
Running Time: 83 min.

By Paul Bramhall

By the 1980’s the popularity of the taekwon-action genre was starting to wane in its native Korea, a decline brought on by the hugely popular release of Drunken Master, which saw the kung-fu comedy become the order of the day. As with any shift in genre tastes, not every filmmaker was in a hurry to adapt to changes in the current trends, and in Korea one such director was Nam Gi-nam. After spending the 70’s helming movies like Return of Red Tiger and Double Dragon in Last Duel, Gi-nam maintained his poker-faced approach to action movies into the 80’s, of which The Return of Twin Dragons falls squarely into the category of.

While the likes of Jeong Jin-hwa (Elton Chong) and Seo Byeong-heon (Benny Tsui) were attempted to be sold as local equivalents to Jackie Chan, usually cast as high kicking comedic buffoons in a series of Drunken Master inspired outings, another new face on the block named Im Ja-ho wasn’t so lucky. Arguably arriving in the taekwon-action genre a little too late in the game, while Ja-ho had spent the late 70’s playing supporting roles in the likes of the Bobby Kim vehicle The Mark of the Black Dragon and Chang Il-do headliner The Martial Arts of Dharma, it wasn’t until the 80’s that he’d become a leading man. Along with Keum-Kang Martial Arts, it would be The Return of Twin Dragons in 1982 that gave Ja-ho his first starring role, although unfortunately none of the productions he starred in proved to be a hit at the box office.

In fact I’d argue Ja-ho would likely have become lost into the annals of taekwon-action history if it wasn’t for another last-ditch attempt to make him a star of the genre with Kim Si-hyeon’s 1984 production The Uninvited Guest of the Star Ferry. While the title may not be immediately recognizable, it was one of many Korean productions that Hong Kong distributor Godfrey Ho picked up as part of his IFD Films outfit, and found itself subject to Ho’s now legendary cut ‘n’ paste technique of adding gweilo ninja footage featuring Richard Harrison. Re-branded and re-dubbed for the western market as Ninja Terminator, the mix of Garfield phones, talk of the Ninja Empire, and Hwang Jang Lee in a blonde wig saw it become a cult hit, and for many western audiences Ja-ho became known as Jack Lam – the unintended star of the fiasco (which was followed by the Ja-ho featuring Poisonous Rose Stripping the Night becoming Ninja Champion!).

The Return of Twin Dragons was also acquired by Godfrey Ho, which (as with so many taekwon-action movies) sees his name slapped on as the director in the English print (which, also as with so many taekwon-action movies, is the only available way to see it). Re-titled Leopard Fist Ninja, it at least has the dignity of being one of the last productions that Ho got his hands on prior to his obsession with completely changing storylines and incorporating gweilo ninja footage into the mix. With that being said, there are already signs of Ho’s tendency to start chopping up and re-editing productions to fit what he believed would be sellable to a western audience on display in Leopard Fist Ninja. While a similarly acquired production like 1979’s A Man with Seven Faces was left intact, with only the title changed to Blood of Dragon Peril and an English dub added, here scenes are noticeably out of order and frequently nonsensical.

Admittedly not all of the nonsensical elements are down to Ho’s meddling. Opening with a family consisting of a husband and wife, their 2 kids, and a grandfather hiding away from marauding Japanese invaders, the reason they’re being targeted is due to them being in possession of a secret manual. It’s an 80’s martial arts movie, so of course the manual details how to master a deadly martial art technique right? No, actually it’s the secret to Korean pottery. Is this the first movie where the secret manual the villains are after reveals how to make the perfect vase? Perhaps. What’s more unusual is that Ho didn’t decide to change the nature of the manual in the English dub (which initially I thought he may have, changing it to pottery just for laughs, but upon reading the original Korean plot synopsis, I can confirm that it’s a pottery manual in both versions).

That’s not the only oddity though, with one of the kids being played by Seo Jeong-hee (A Woman’s Castle, Milky Way in Blue Sky). When both parents are murdered the grandfather helps the kids narrowly escape and start training in martial arts for revenge, cue the standard scene of showing them practicing their moves, then throw in a cut to 20 years later and Jeong-hee has now become….Im Ja-ho. That’s right, someone who was a girl when they where a kid grows up to be a heavily moustached guy, and there’s zero explanation for it. Let’s just say gender fluidity has been around for a lot longer than the actual expression itself. The other sibling grows up to be played by taekwon-action regular Baek Hwang-hi (Golden Dragon, Silver Snake, Secret Executioners), here given a rare opportunity to not only play a more prominent supporting role over his usual lackey appearances, but also be one of the good guys!

The rest of the plot for the most part consists of Il-ho getting into fights with an assortment of lackeys while seeking out the Japanese general responsible for his parents death, played by the most recognisable bald fella in the taekwon-action genre, Cho Chun (Returned Single-Legged Man, Eagle vs. Silver Fox). Although here he’s adorned with a funky wig, so that may not be a fair statement. Amusingly Chun has enlisted the services of a Japanese swordsman for hire, played by Kim Yu-haeng (Revenge of Drunken Master, Evil Hits Evil), who comes flanked with 4 foreigner fighters that aren’t credited anywhere (although if you go off the pictureless profiles on the least reliable Asian movie resource on the internet – the IMDB – they could be Willie Freeman, James Exshaw, Chuck Horry, and Dicky Hunt). At least moderately proficient in some form of martial arts if definitely not in screen fighting, the foreigner threat feels largely superfluous.

Far better is the introduction of another revenge seeking orphan played by Choe Jong-suk (Martial Arts for Revenge, Fist of the Golden Monkey), who brings a welcome dose of ferocious female footwork to the table. Despite a fleeting filmography of just 7 movie appearances between 1979 and 1985, her flying kicks make her a welcome presence, and when she teams up with Im Ja-ho and Baek Hwang-hi to take on Kim Yu-haeng in a 3-on-1 fight that precedes the finale, Leopard Fist Ninja delivers the intended entertainment value. While it’s impossible to discern who the fight choreographer was based on the available resources, there’s a good chance it was Hwang-hi considering he’d increasingly moved into a choreographer role during the 80’s. The fight scenes also show why director Gi-nam put his faith in Ja-ho as a taekwon-action leading man, since his kicks feel legitimately dangerous, conveying a palpable sense of power and speed.

Indeed for a dose of no frills taekwon-action Leopard Fist Ninja delivers the goods, although in its current form it comes with the significant caveat of needing to tolerate the increasingly out of order fight scenes. In fact one editing choice that Godfrey Ho made inexplicably attempts to blend 2 fight scenes together, which sees the opponent Ja-ho is fighting against bizarrely change mid-way through the fight. Attention to detail clearly wasn’t the order of the day, although looking at it from a positive perspective, it could well be the small quirks that maintain audiences attention between the fight scenes (including one bizarre scene, which I suspect was supposed to be the closing one, where a bare chested Ji-ho and Hwang-hi cheerfully hold hands and stroll off screen after coming out victorious in one of the many fights!). Far from being top tier, Leopard Fist Ninja should satiate anyone looking for a teakwon-action fix, but certainly nothing more.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 6/10

The post Leopard Fist Ninja | aka The Return of Twin Dragons (1982) Review first appeared on cityonfire.com.

“Raiders of Buddhist Kung Fu” Theatrical Poster

Director: Godfrey Ho 
Cast: Gordon Liu, Wang Ryong, Kim Ki-Joo, Seol Ji-Yeon, Kwak Eun-Gyung, Baek Hwang-Gi, John Kelly, Choe Moo-Woong, Lung Ho-Yu, Park Hui-Jin, Lee Hwa-Jin
Running Time: 90 min. 

By Ian Whittle

So I picked up the DVD assuming from the cover still of Gordon Liu in his usual monk attire that this was going to be another “Gordon from Shaolin” by way of a Korea flick, but once again I have been fooled… here Gordon is the villain! A warlord in what may be Republic era China, but it’s not very clear. And I don’t think Shaolin came into it at all!

So my thoughts on this mess….

• IFD used the Star Wars music for their damn logo!
• Gordon Liu is very miscast as a very milquetoast villain, who seems way too fond of his hot sister. I find it very hard to believe the boyish Liu is supposed to be a powerful warlord here. He’s not helped by the weird old man voice given to non-sequiturs they give him – “Arrest everyone….traitors!”
• An unexplained Roy Horan/Bob Baker/Wallish/ gwailo
• A rather repulsive hunchback traitor, disfigured with a large bright red port-wine stain AND a large cold-sore…
• Speaking of cold, even for a Korean film this looks freezing! Several of the interior scenes show the smokey breath flying out of people’s mouths like a fog machine!
• The old master is very trendy; what’s with his covid mask!?
• The masked monkey fighter on the other hand…
• Ooh, the V-Ger music from Star Trek: The Motion Picture
• Gordon looks very funny riding into battle with what looks like a dead squirrel on his head
• The hero fights Gordon on the ice, bare-chested! Brrrrr….
• Gordon is winning easily with his staff (or “bar” as the dubber calls it), so of course he then throws it away to fight bare-handed….
• Eagles ex machina
• I take back some of the mean things I said about Fury in Shaolin Temple…

Ian Whittle’s Rating: 2/10

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“Fallen” Theatrical Poster

Director: Lee Jung-sub
Cast: Yang Ji, Jang Tae Young, Han Sung Min, Kim Ga Hyun, Lim Jung Min, Lee Ji Yong, Hwang Se On, Yun Ha Bin, Ju Seo Eun, Oh Ji Young, Kwon Ip Sae
Running Time: 110 min. 

By Paul Bramhall 

In the 2019 Korean production Fallen a famous sci-fi author played by Yang Ji, previously only seen in small bit roles in late 2000’s/early 2010’s productions like I Came from Busan and Mr. Idol, is having a bad day. Opening with her as the subject of an on-camera interview for TV, despite it supposedly being about her latest work, it seems the interviewer is more interested in asking about the leaked sex tape she’s featured in, and the fact her mother is a convicted serial killer. Her publicist isn’t much help, insisting she joins him to a local bar considering she’s holed herself up at home for so long, where he suggests that the best thing she can do is to apologise to the public for appearing in the tape. Things go from bad to worse when she wakes up kidnapped, zip tied and stuffed in a drum in an unknown location, her fate in the hands of whoever has taken her captive.

Based on the above description, on paper Fallen probably sounds like it fits the mould of similar female in peril 2010’s era Korean movies like Midnight FM or Manhole, however that would be before taking into account that it’s the directorial debut of screenwriter and producer Lee Jung-sub. Also responsible for scripting 2017’s psychological neo-noir action flick Real, often unfairly sited as one of the worst Korean movies ever made, it’s this production which was originally intended to be Jung-sub’s directorial debut, however for reasons unknown he stepped back shortly after filming commenced. Arriving a couple of years later, Fallen is no less of a head trip than Real (maybe even more so), even if it’s clearly got nowhere near the same budget.

For a start, it turns out that Yang Ji isn’t the only one to have been kidnapped on that night, with everyone else from the bar also turning up in the same location. Except the fact that she’s so dishevelled, and everyone else looks exactly like they did when they were drinking together, provides the first indication that they are, in fact, all in her head. In an earlier scene Ji reveals she doesn’t like being in crowded places, since her creative instincts soon start to imagine everyone around her as characters for her next story, and that would appear to be what’s happening here.

A kidnapped novelist talking to figments of her imagination is just the start of Jung-sub’s ambitious plot though. In parallel we’re introduced to a group of delegates representing global agencies, sat around a table in the middle of a large minimalist set. They’re there to try a murderer who claims to be from 2059, the result of a sinkhole opening up in Seoul containing a portal to the past. Time travel has been made illegal in the future, the result of too many people using it since 2019 is a much more prosperous era than 2059, however the bigger issue is that AI programs have become sentient, and are downloading themselves into people in 2019 so they can take on human form. Referred to as the Fallen, the only catch is that the transition causes them to gradually become blind, so the discovery of a human with a “peculiar antibody” that can prevent it makes them a target. Kind of like Skynet, but with poor eyesight.

What does all of this have to do with an author waking up to find herself kidnapped in a drum? Why is there a random dance number involving a guy in a leotard and a whip in the middle of the movie? Are we really expected to believe that in the future blockchain controls the world and Elon Musk was right about everything all along? (That’s right, Elon Musk gets namechecked more than once thanks to his thoughts on time travel!) Much like in Real, it feels like answering every question that’s posed isn’t the primary concern, with similar themes of identity being explored in ways that, while occasionally feeling like they’ll buckle under their own weight, consistently feel original and fresh. Fallen is frequently beguiling and certainly guilty of being pretentious, but it’s also entertaining in part due to just how different it is from anything else coming out of Korea, and in part because on some level (even if it’s an astral one), it works.

The conversations Ji has with the other bar patrons in the remote warehouse she’s trapped in tend to revolve around how she can escape, with Jung-sub seemingly going for a playful approach by name checking other filmmakers when considering the approach she could take. From Hollywood alumni like Bruce Willis (specifically in Die Hard!), Michael Bay, and Ridley Scott, to more local talent like Jang Sun-woo, Won Bin, and Kang Dong-won, the name checking comes in thick and fast. In fairness I also have Fallen to thank for now knowing who Cormac McCarthy, Gary Pasparov, Lee Sedol, and Hyun Jin-geon are, so if anything I’m slightly more cultured than I was a couple of hours before (although it’s admittedly a low bar to begin with). It all feels a little gratuitous, but then again that could well be the point, with it being clear that subtlety is one of the least important aspects of Jung-sub’s work.

In fact one of the cleverer elements of his directorial debut is that the bar patrons in Ji’s head are so talkative, it’s easy to overlook the fact that for the majority of the runtime, Ji herself has barely more than a few lines of dialogue. Instead we’re watching her thoughts and personality projected onto the characters she was in the bar with, essentially having them speak for her, while barely saying a word herself. It’s indicative of Jung-sub clearly having talent as a director, and combined with also being in the producer’s chair, he finds himself in a position where he can bring his vision to the screen within the limits of his own financial means, without having to worry about compromising.

If one thing becomes apparent in Fallen, it’s how much of Jung-sub’s visual directorial style is also imprinted in Real, certainly enough to raise the question of how much creative input he had in terms of what ended up onscreen. Whereas the finale of Lee Sa-rang’s only movie ended with a ballet infused action scene, in Fallen Ji takes to some ariel silk inspired acrobatics to eventually free herself from her gender fluid cyborg captors, the parallels in the incorporation of performance art making the comparison hard to ignore. It’s a scene which segues into an extended chase sequence that makes up the finale, as Ji attempts to outrun a zombie hunting sniper from the future, before a final scene coda that reveals that Siri is responsible for saving the world.

Had Jung-sub’s directorial debut been released in the early 2000’s I’m confident it would have been able to confidently sit next to the likes of Save the Green Planet and A Bizarre Love Triangle as a similarly sci-fi infused exercise in genre blending. As a 2019 production though, after the backlash against Real it’s perhaps not surprising that Fallen had never been officially released in its native Korea, apart from when it screened as part of the Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival during the same year. It’s a shame, since in a film industry that’s increasingly leaned into more conventional genre narratives during the 2020’s, Fallen stands as a truly original piece of filmmaking, even if it does occasionally entangle itself in its jumble of multi-layered plot threads.

When asked in an interview at the time of its release how he thought Fallen would be perceived 10 years in the future, Jung-sub replied that he’d “like to think that this film would be considered educational.” While we’re still 4 years away from that 10-year mark at the time of writing in 2025, I’m not sure educational will be a word that springs to mind whatever year it is, however it does end with a message of hope that acts as a reinforcement that humanity is fundamentally good. Even if some of the other messages get lost in translation, Fallen nails the landing on its most important one, and the fact that it does so through a mix of time travelling sink holes, gender fluid dancing cyborgs, and lesbian sci-fi novelists makes it an experience that’s unlikely to be repeated.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 7.5/10

The post Fallen (2019) Review first appeared on cityonfire.com.

“Mickey 17” Theatrical Poster

Director: Bong Joon-Ho
Cast: Robert Pattinson, Naomi Ackie, Steven Yeun, Toni Collette, Mark Ruffalo, Holliday Grainger, Anamaria Vartolomei, Thomas Turgoose, Cameron Britton
Running Time: 137 min.

By Paul Bramhall

When it comes to any artist following up whatever it was that gave them their breakthrough – be it a song, a movie, or any other form of creativity – it’s always a challenge. That challenge is exasperated when we’re talking about an international breakthrough for a work made in a foreign language. Koreas had a few examples over the years – K-pop star Psy followed up his massively popular 2012 hit Gangnam Style with the already forgotten Gentleman in 2013. In 2024 director and writer Hwang Dong-hyuk followed up his surprise 2021 Netflix hit Squid Game with, well, Squid Game 2, of which the jury may still be out. Then we have director Bong Joon-ho, whose 2019 movie Parasite not only became a box office hit, but also became the first non-English language production to win Best Picture at the 2019 Academy Awards (along with 3 more, including Best Director!).

In the case of everyone mentioned their international breakthrough was far from being their first work, with Joon-ho already an established name amongst cinephiles thanks to masterpieces like Memories of Murder and The Host. Perhaps the most ironic thing about a Korean language production being the one that made Bong Joon-ho a recognizable name in Hollywood, was that before Parasite’s success he had in fact directed English language productions before. 2013’s Snowpiercer starred Chris Evans and adapted the French comic written by Jacques Lob, while 2017’s Okja featured the likes of Tilda Swinton and Jake Gyllenhaal in prominent roles. What does all of this prove? Perhaps nothing more than it’s impossible to predict what’s going to strike a chord with audiences, and once you do, the attempts to figure it out so that it can happen again rarely reap similar results.

For Joon-ho, to follow up Parasite he’s taken a leaf out of the inspiration playbook for Snowpiercer, and once more decided to adapt a piece of literature. This time it’s Edward Ashton’s sci-fi novel Mickey 7 from 2022, and if you’re already wondering how faithful his adaptation is going to be to the book, then the fact it’s called Mickey 17 gives some indication. For full disclosure I haven’t read the source material, so this won’t be the review for page to screen comparisons. What is interesting is how Joon-ho seems to gravitate towards the sci-fi genre whenever he chooses to dabble in the world of English language productions, be it genetically enhanced pigs to trains endlessly travelling through a dystopian future, and his latest isn’t going to be the one to buck the trend.

Robert Pattinson (Tenet) is the titular Mickey 17, who at some point in the future has joined a ship of human colonists who’ve left the decaying Earth behind, choosing to take the 4-year journey to the icy landscapes of the planet Niflheim. The reason for his departure is driven by the fact he’s heavily in debt (the result of a failed macaron shop, echoing the failed castella shop the family in Parasite had experienced) to a loan shark that enjoys torturing those who can’t pay up, so a planet millions of miles from Earth seems like as good a place to hide out as any. Lacking any qualifications or skills, Pattinson signs up to be an ‘Expandable’, not bothering to read the details and therefore also failing to realise why no one else has applied to be one – his job is to basically be a human guinea pig for the new planet, and each time he dies his body is reprinted (literally), with his memories transferred into the new body.

The Mickey 17 of the title is a reference to the number of times he’s already died and been reprinted, with an 18^th seeming like an inevitability when we first meet him in the opening scene. Sprawled at the bottom of an ice crevice, the result of the ground giving way while out on one of the exploratory missions that make up part of his job, it’s only when he’s rescued (at least that’s what they appear to do) by the isopod like lifeforms inhabiting the underground cave that he’s able to make it back to base. Unfortunately the powers that be also thought it was inevitable, so when he arrives back to his room to find a Mickey 18 in his bed, things get complicated.

Social commentary has always played a significant role in Joon-ho’s productions, subtly weaved into the stories he chooses to tell as metaphors, from the monster representing the ‘Miracle on the Han River’ in The Host to the semi-basement social hierarchy of Parasite. His ability to imbue that commentary with moments of unexpected humor, usually placed at moments when you’d least expect to laugh, feels like one of Joon-ho’s most distinctive traits, however it’s a trait which is approached in a very different manner when it comes to his English language productions. In the likes of Okja and Snowpiercer the humor feels much more at the fore, usually projected through characters who are portrayed as pantomime like caricatures, be it Jake Gyllenhaal’s gratingly obnoxious celebrity vet or Tilda Swinton’s buck toothed Margaret Thatcher inspired minister.

Here the scenery chewing duties go to Mark Ruffalo (The Avengers), blatantly riffing on Donald Trump as a failed politician turned cult like leader of the colony, it feels like all is missing is a Make Humanity Great Again cap. Clearly having a great time in the role and paired with Toni Collette (xXx: Return of Xander Cage) as his sauce obsessed wife, together their portrayals feel the most brazenly political all of we’ve seen from Joon-ho so far, including a bullet grazing assassination attempt on Ruffalo while he’s giving a speech. The panic that unfolds during said scene proves again that Joon-ho is a master of capturing chaos onscreen, echoing the likes of the garden party scene from Parasite, only with more aliens and a whole lot more firepower.

There can be no doubt that Mickey 17 is Pattinson’s show though, with his take on the character coming across like a nihilistically futuristic version of Forrest Gump, with his somewhat naïve outlook on life resulting in some of its funniest moments – usually involving his death. Frequently told after the fact that he’s being used as a guinea pig, his willingness to go along with whatever he’s asked to do makes him easy to sympathize with. Whether that be taking off his glove during a space walk that’s exposing him to unfathomable amounts of radiation, or being the first person to step outside on the new planet, he conveys a kind of resigned reassurance knowing he’ll wake up in a new body following whatever it is that kills him. The disparity between the classes may feel like familiar territory for long time Joon-ho fans, but he continues to find new ways to present his go-to themes, of which Mickey 17 offers up definite proof.

If anything it’s only the final third of the 135+ minute runtime that wavers a little, seemingly obliged to throw in an invasion of the isopod like aliens after Ruffalo and his team capture one of their young ones. It provides a fitting conclusion to the story, however it’s also the least interesting part, the equivalent of the obligatory mass destruction action scene that usually closes out an entry in the Marvel Universe. Thankfully the sequence is saved by the ability to communicate with the aliens, which offers up some of Joon-ho’s most deadpan humor, ensuring it doesn’t just feel like an action scene because one was called for.

Throw in strong supporting turns from the likes of Steven Yeun (Burning) as Pattinson’s fellow in debt macaron shop partner and Naomi Ackie (Blink Twice) as his girlfriend, and you’re left with one of the more original entries in Hollywood’s cannon of science fiction flicks from recent years. While Mickey 17 doesn’t quite reach the heights of Bong Joon-ho’s best work, it’s a movie which feels like it couldn’t have been made by anyone else, and for that alone it deserves to be seen.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 8/10

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“Dark Nuns” Theatrical Poster

Director: Kwon Hyeok-Jae
Cast: Song Hye-Kyo, Jeon Yeo-Bin, Lee Jin-Uk, Heo Jun-Ho, Moon Woo-Jin, Kim Guk-Hee
Running Time: 114 min. 

By Paul Bramhall 

It’s been a decade since the release of 2015’s The Priests, a movie for which its Korean title directly translates to Dark Priests, an approach which has been taken quite literally for its 2025 sequel – Dark Nuns. Despite The Priests being a straight forward exorcism flick, the fact that the genre was largely ignored in Korean cinema 10 years ago (in my review from the time of its release I mentioned “it’s surprising that we haven’t seen more movies from the local industry pitting the church against some sort of evil spirit”) made it an unexpected hit, leading to a slew of Korean exorcism movies in the succeeding years. Within the limitations the genre operates in (person becomes possessed – meet member of the church with tragic backstory/complicated past – perform exorcism), it’s a legitimate question to wonder if Dark Nuns can do anything to differentiate itself from the now overpopulated exorcism landscape.

At least from a character perspective, as the title alludes to, it can. So far in the Korean takes on the genre the exorcisms are always performed by male priests, so swapping things up to have the heavy lifting performed by a pair of nuns makes for a welcome change. Song Hye-kyo (Hwang Jin Yi, A Reason to Live) steps into the lead role, returning to the big screen for the first time since 2014’s My Brilliant Life, having spent the decade in between focused on K-drama’s (including playing the lead in the highly successful Netflix series The Glory). Graced with one of the coolest introductions to a character in recent years, we meet Hye-kyo leaning against a car while calmly smoking a cigarette, as a pair of male priests attempt an exorcism in the property she’s parked outside of. When they run into trouble she throws away the cigarette, dons her habit, and strolls in with a jerrycan full of holy water to finish off the job.

Ironically in my review for the 2024 exorcism outing Devils Stay I posed the question “has there ever been an exorcism movie where the main character that’s possessed isn’t a girl!?”, and less than a year later Dark Nuns makes the answer to the question a yes. Played by Moon Woo-jin (Hijack 1971, Peninsula), when it becomes clear that the demon possessing him could be one of the powerful 12 Manifestations, the stubborn Hye-kyo realises she’s going to need some help. While The Priests marked the feature length directorial debut of Jang Jae-hyeon (adapted from his own short film The 12^th Assistant Deacon), whose gone on to make supernatural outings his modus operandi with the likes of Svaha: The Sixth Finger and Exhuma, surprisingly he hasn’t returned for the sequel.

Instead the directorial reigns have been handed over to Kwon Hyeok-jae, for which Dark Nuns marks his third time in the director’s chair, having made his debut with Troubleshooter in 2010, followed by the underseen 2023 sports drama Count. Hyeok-jae seems to acknowledge that Dark Nuns is in debt of its predecessor, and as such the events in The Priests are acknowledged in a way which ensures audiences know the movies are taking place in the same universe. The heads of the church bring up that a possession involving one of the 12 Manifestations has been successfully executed before, showing a photo of actress Park So-dam, for which The Priests offered a breakout role.

During a meeting it’s also revealed that Father Kim and Father Choi aren’t available to assist, a reference to Kim Yoon-seok and Gang Dong-won’s characters in the original. Considering his image was openly used in the publicity stills released for Dark Nuns, it’s not a spoiler to say that Gang Dong-won does turn up for a final scene cameo, much in the same style as Kim Da-mi’s appearance at the end of The Witch 2: Part 2. The Other One.

Despite the absence of Jang Jae-hyeon, the mixing of religions that plays a prevalent part in Dark Nuns – particularly that of the Catholic church and traditional Korean shamanism – feels like it has his fingerprints on it. Interestingly the original concept for the story is credited to Yim Pil-sung, the director of the likes of Hansel and Gretel and Scarlett Innocence, who hasn’t been active since helming a segment in the 2019 omnibus series Persona. The religion mixing is initiated when Hye-kyo crosses paths with another nun working in the Catholic hospital Woo-jin is transferred to, played by Jeon Yeo-been (Harbin, Cobweb), who’s revealed to suffer from visions of spirits. In Korea such afflictions are usually viewed as a sign from the Gods that the person has been chosen to be a shaman, and despite trying to hide it, Hye-kyo picks up on her ability, recognising that many who reject the calls to be a shaman end up becoming nuns instead.

The pair ultimately come together in an attempt to save Woo-jin from the demon that’s residing inside him, assisted by a shaman protégé played by Shin Jae-hwi (In Our Prime, Strong Underdog), combining the forces of both religions to cast it out. Out of its 2-hour runtime it’s the 2^nd half that’s dedicated to the day of the exorcism, played out in a remote farm, and like so many exorcism movies is the part that also comes with an almost unavoidable feeling of familiarity. In Korean cinema specifically it seems exorcism scenes have become much tamer since the release of The Priests, which was hardly an all-out gore fest, but it at least managed to imbue a certain level of intensity along with some gruesome moments to offer up a cathartic payoff.

From a horror perspective, here the exorcism mostly relies of occasional bursts of deep voiced profanity and room shaking, as both Hye-kyo and Yeo-been throw everything at the demon that’s possessed Woo-jin to get it to reveal its name, while Jae-hwi chants shamanic rituals outside. From a visual perspective it feels like a pedestrian affair, with the most enjoyable part being Hye-kyo’s headstrong nun launching into a tirade of demeaning insults to the demon’s face, arguably beating it at its own game. It’s just a shame that, considering the strong character work that the first half focuses on to invest the audience in Hye-kyo’s mission to save Woo-jin, the actual main event itself feels like it’s been done countless times before.

It’s unfortunate, if not surprising, that the exorcism is the weakest part of Dark Nuns, as the narrative presents a number of ideas that make me wish they’d gone down a different direction all together rather than the exorcism path. The potential for both Christianity and shamanism to team up is presented effectively when Hye-hyo and Yeo-been visit a senior shaman, resulting in a shamanistic ritual being performed based on the demon originating in the sea. It even feels like Hyeok-jae throws in some black humor when the nuns attempt to recruit a shaman to join them for their own exorcism, but an imminent by-election means all of the local politicians have already booked them to perform good luck rituals for their campaigns. Ultimately though such plot threads end up being superfluous, with none of them having any real impact on the tried and tested path the narrative heads towards.

As the credits rolled on Dark Nuns I was left with the feeling there was an opportunity for a distinctly unique slant on the tale of someone who’s been possessed that needs to be saved, but that it was robbed of its potential by deciding to frame it within the unflexible confines of an exorcism movie. While it would be unfair to call it a bad movie, the familiar territory it increasingly finds itself in during the final third leave it as a serviceable if unremarkable entry into what now, 10 years after The Priests, feels like a dead horse in terms of what else can be done with the genre. Thankfully the chemistry between Hye-kyo and Yeo-been keeps it watchable, and dare I say it – based on her performance here, if Hollywood ever decides to revive the Constantine character again, perhaps Hye-kyo would be a more suitable candidate than Keanu Reeves.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 6/10

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“Revolver” Theatrical Poster

Director: Oh Seung-wook
Cast: Jeon Do-Yeon, Ji Chang-wook, Kim Joon-Han, Kim Jong-Soo, Jeong Man-Sik, Jeon Hye-Jin, Lee Jung-Jae, Jung Jae-Young, Ma Woong-Kyu
Running Time: 114 min.

By Paul Bramhall

Revolver marks the third directorial outing for Oh Seung-wook, and while there’s nothing particularly out of the ordinary about a director making their third feature, what makes Seung-wook’s case relatively unique is that it’s taken him the best part of quarter of a century to get there. Debuting in 2000 with the identity swapping gangster flick Kilimanjaro, it’d take 14 years for Seung-wook to make his sophomore feature with 2014’s The Shameless, a movie that I personally consider to be one of the best from the 2010’s. A decade on and Revolver sees Seung-wook reunite with his lead from The Shameless, the legendary Jeon Do-yeon (Beasts Clawing at Straws, Memories of the Sword), for another slice of hard-boiled noir that his style of filmmaking feels synonymous with (even if it is sparsely spread out across 24 years!).

Seung-wook has shown an affinity for taking typically unlikeable characters and making them the leads of his stories, and here is no different, with Do-yeon playing a corrupt cop who we meet as she’s being released after serving 2 years in prison. It’s shown in flashback that before her time behind bars she was in a relationship with another corrupt cop, played by a cameoing Lee Jung-jae (Hunt, Svaha: The Sixth Finger), who receives a call tipping him off that evidence has come to light incriminating Do-yeon for taking bribes. Together with the suspicious owner of an investment firm Jung-jae has been working with, played by Ji Chang-wook (Hard Hit, Fabricated City), the pair convince Do-yeon to take the fall, and in return she’ll have her own apartment, a security job at the investment firm, and 700 million won upon release.

Naturally things go awry, with Jung-jae mysteriously killing himself while Do-yeon is inside, and upon walking through the prison gates to freedom there’s no sign of Chang-wook. Instead she’s picked up by the madame of a hostess club played by Lim Ji-yeon (Spiritwalker, Tazza: One Eyed Jack), revealing she knew Jung-jae and that he’d told her of Do-yeon’s release date, but whose intentions behind connecting with her remain unclear. Realising she has practically nothing to her name except a tarnished reputation, Do-yeon sets about tracking down Chang-wook to claim the 700 million won along with the apartment she was promised, and exploring Ji-yeon’s connections to the nightlife scene prove to be as good a place to start as any.

In my review for The Shameless I’d referred to it as a “classic hardboiled tale of an undercover detective falling for a gangster’s moll”, and similarly Revolver could best be described as a classic hardboiled tale of the felon freshly released from prison seeking revenge against those who did them wrong. It’s a story that’s been told plenty of times before, but thankfully Do-yeon imbues the character with enough recognisable traits that her performance makes it easy to look past some of the more familiar narrative beats. Despite harbouring very little self-worth after what she’s been through (in one scene she’s referred to as a “bottom feeder”, to which she responds by calmly agreeing), there’s a quiet determination underneath the surface that keeps her moving forward, motivated by the desire to ensure she gets what she was promised.

Despite it being ill gotten, Oh-seung’s script (co-written with Joo Byeol) never casts judgement on Do-yeon’s character, and at no point does it feel the need to have her regret the earlier actions that led to her imprisonment in the first place. She was promised certain things by agreeing to take the fall for everyone that was involved, and now she’s out to get what she’s owed, it’s this that becomes the sole motivator now that she’s no longer incarcerated. It’s also this that makes Revolver such a joy to watch. The last time Do-yeon was onscreen it was for a regrettable foray into cookie cutter Netflix action movies with 2023’s Kill Boksoon, an overly bloated narrative disaster that stuck religiously to the straight-to-streaming playbook. To see her reunite with a director like Oh-seung feels like a return to real filmmaking, or at least a movie that represents the vision of the director at the helm, and not a bunch of commercial tick boxes.

Much like Kilimanjaro and The Shameless Oh-seung shows an assured hand at directing with a deliberate pace, allowing the audience to follow Do-yeon down the dead ends and unexpected changes in direction that her lonely mission takes her on. This isn’t the movie for anyone that was hoping to clock in to Revolver expecting Kill Boksoon 2. Best described as a character piece, rather than any kind of realisation of past wrongdoing, Do-yeon sees her only shot at redemption as getting the money she was promised, and the journey sees her forced to become the kind of criminal she should probably have been arresting when she was still a cop. She leverages the dirt she has on a prosecutor to get him to fund the investigation, and finds herself reluctantly asking for help from a washed-up gangster, offering up another welcome cameo from Jung Jae-young (Confession of Murder, The Odd Family: Zombie On Sale).

It’s Jae-yung’s appearance that encapsulates one of the aspects I enjoyed most about Revolver, which was the restraint shown in not needing to know every little detail about every character. In a world of content hungry streaming services I couldn’t help but feel that, if it’d been made as a series, we’d probably have gotten a whole episode dedicated to Jae-young’s backstory and how he ended up the way we see him in the present. It’s not necessary to the story being told, so we don’t get to see it, simply knowing that he used to have a connection with Jung-jae and has obviously seen better days is all the audience needs to know. Similarly for Lim Ji-yeon as the hostess bar madame, while certain lines offer up glimpses into her relationship with Jung-jae while Do-yeon was on the inside, Oh-seung understands that less can be more when it’s done right, and here the ambiguity works in the stories favour.

On a slight tangent, whenever there’s a scene which features Do-yeon and Ji-yeon together I challenge anyone who’s a fan of Korean cinemas early 2000’s output to not be reminded of Ryoo Seung-wan’s No Blood No Tears, when it was Do-yeon playing the younger character alongside Lee Hye-young. Like that movie subverted expectations by casting an action movie with a pair of female leads (seriously, name one Korean action movie prior to 2002 with a female lead!), so Oh-seung chooses to subvert expectations with the finale of Revolver. Almost as if to acknowledge the audacity of Do-yeon’s mission, the convergence of several characters in the middle of a road becomes a surprising exercise in black humour, as almost everyone that Do-yeon has been in contact with unexpectedly finds themselves in the same space.

By this point we know Ji Chang-wook’s villain is just a small piece in a much bigger game, with his relationship with the mysterious Grace who oversees everything shrouded in mystery – some say they’re lovers, others that he’s her younger brother – with the truth only coming out in the penultimate scene. It’s a revelation that’s best described as satisfyingly underwhelming, with Ju-yeon having reached the end of the road in her quest to find who’s going to pay up, offering up an apt conclusion for a scene that takes place on the grounds of a Buddhist temple.

While I’d love nothing more than for Oh Seung-wook to be even slightly more prolific, as it is he’s 3 for 3, with no kinks in the amour. A quietly simmering potboiler that plays like a pulpy detective novel, only the detective is a disgraced female cop with nothing to lose, Seung-wook’s latest works precisely because it chooses to place intrigue over bombast, sticking to its guns until the final scene. The gun in question? A Revolver of course.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 7.5/10

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“Harbin” Theatrical Poster

Director: Woo Min-Ho
Cast: Hyun-Bin, Park Jeong-Min, Jo Woo-Jin, Jeon Yeo-Bin, Lee Dong-Wook, Park Hoon, Yoo Jae-Myung, Lily Franky, Kim Ji-Oh, Lee Tae-Hyeong, Ahn Se-Ho
Running Time: 114 min. 

By Paul Bramhall

There’s been no shortage of action tinged spy thrillers set during Japan’s colonisation of Korea in the early 20^th century, with productions like Assassination, The Age of Shadows, and Phantom being superlative examples of the genre, but few have been based on a true story. With 2024’s Harbin director Woo Min-ho looks to change that, opting to tell the story of An Jung-geun, a Korean independence activist who, at age 30 in the October of 1909, assassinated Japanese politician Ito Hirobumi upon his arrival at Harbin station. Hirobumi had been meeting with his Russian counterparts to discuss who should control Korea, and became a key figure in driving the annexation of the country to fall under Japanese rule. Jung-geun’s actions see him remembered as a martyr for independence in his home country (both in the South and the North), a fact which has seen his story adapted for the screen several times over the years.

The first time was in 1946 with The Chronicle of An Jung-geun, and in 1959 there was King Gojong and Martyr An Jung-geun, which was followed by An Jung-geun, the Patriot in 1972. While the remainder of the 20^th century took a break from re-telling his story, in the 21^st century he’d return in 2004’s Thomas An Jung-geun (in which he was played by Yu Oh-seong from Friend), and most recently he was portrayed by musical actor Jung Sung-hwa in 2022’s musical adaptation Hero. Thankfully the fact that Hero was a musical helps to set Harbin apart, otherwise it’d be a valid question to ask if we really needed 2 adaptations of the same story in 2 years, with Min-ho opting to focus his version on the days leading up to the assassination.

Adapted from author Kim Hoon’s 2022 novel of the same name, for the big screen version of Harbin it’s Hyun Bin (The Point Men, Rampant) who steps into the shoes of An Jung-geun, arguably offering up the most layered role in his filmography to date. Whatever the facts are of Jung-geun’s life, onscreen the way they’re translated into cinematic language stumbles somewhat awkwardly during the opening. Ambushing a Japanese army camp, a bloody battle erupts with gory beheadings and messy stabbings, a battle which the Korean independence fighters win through pure grit and determination. Rounding up anyone who’s left alive, amongst them is a Japanese general played by Park Hoon (Midnight, Golden Slumber), who Bin takes the decision to let go since he has a wife and child, despite the objections from his colleagues.

Has there been any example in Korean cinema during the last 20 years set in the same period when the Japanese army aren’t portrayed as a bunch of merciless killers willing to murder any Korean they come across? I can’t think of one, so when Bin goes to town alone to get some supplies, and upon his return finds his whole team slaughtered and dismembered by the very general he thought would be a good idea to let go, the impression is more one of complete idiocy than of honour and integrity. Whether the scene works better for local audiences more familiar with An Jung-geun, and who may take it as the attempt to portray his Catholic beliefs that it probably is, I can’t say, however taken on face value the scenario makes Bin’s portrayal one that feels hard to empathise with.

The avoidable loss of life does light a fire in him though to seek revenge, taking the decision to assassinate Ito Hirobumi, the man responsible for driving the discussion on Korea falling under Japanese rule. While Min-ho cast Park Hoon as the Japanese general, interestingly for Hirobumi he’s opted to cast a Japanese actor, with Lily Franky (Bad City, As the Gods Will) bringing a sense of gravitas to the role. It’s the planning and execution of the attempt to kill Franky that serves as the narrative thrust for Harbin, with Bin collaborating with his comrades played by the always welcome Park Jung-min (Uprising, Smugglers), Jo Woo-jin (Alienoid, Kingmaker), and Jeon Yeo-been (Cobweb, Dark Nuns).

As a director Woo Min-ho is something of an enigma, as I tend to find his movies either fall into the category of modern classic (A Man Standing Next, Inside Men), or complete trash (The Drug King, Man of Vendetta), with very little middle ground. Harbin feels like the movie that changes that, with it being far from modern classic status, but equally far from being complete trash. Its biggest crime is during the first hour of it’s almost 2 hour runtime, which comes across as dull and uninspiring. Ladened with what feels like endless scenes of exposition and a sluggish pace (characters frequently pause when conversing, although it’s far too early to have established any real stakes, so it usually just feels like dead air), rather than gradually putting the tension on a slow simmer, it just feels slow.

There’s also an inescapable feeling that Hyun Bin doesn’t quite have the gravitas to pull off the role. While he’s been acting for over 20 years, few would argue that in the majority of his roles it’s his good looks that play a key part in why he’s cast. That’s not necessarily a criticism, with his roles in lighter fare like Confidential Assignment and its sequel being a good fit, however here I couldn’t help but think how much better it could have been if the roles were re-cast. Park Jung-min steps into the shoes of An Jung-geun. Jo Woo-jin steps into the role that Park Jung-min plays, and Hyun Bin steps into Jo Woo-jin’s role. Had the roles been switched around that way I’m convinced Harbin would carry a greater emotional weight to it than it does with its existing casting, and would have offered Bin a solid opportunity to play against type.

Thankfully things pick up in the 2^nd half with the realisation that the group may have a spy in the ranks, effectively turning Harbin from a lifeless talkathon into a spy thriller (even if it’d be a stretch to call it a taut one), which is offset by Park Hoon’s desire to find Hyun Bin and kill him for the embarrassment of letting him go when he’d been captured. While an earlier scene may make the spy in the ranks slightly obvious for the seasoned viewer, Min-ho does enough to maintain an air of mild intrigue, with the small window of opportunity they’ll have to assassinate Franky serving as an effective ticking clock plot device.

Korean cinema remains unique in its willingness to adapt events that audiences will know have a relatively nihilistic outcome, with the likes of 12.12: The Day and The Land of Happiness offering up similar endings that heralded the dawn of darker periods in Korean history. While the ending of Harbin may seem like a victorious one for audiences unfamiliar with Korean history, local audiences will likely be aware that Hirobumi’s assassination was seen as one of the key factors that led to Japan accelerating its ambition to annex Korea. It was successful in doing so less than a year later in 1910, leading to Korea becoming a colony of Japan through to the end of World War II in 1945. Still, considering how much history was attempted to be re-written during that period, every small victory feels rightfully celebrated, and it’s understandable how An Jung-geun’s story continues to be told for new generations.

Unfortunately Min-ho’s adaptation of the events during that fateful week in October 1909 just isn’t that compelling, and Hyun Bin’s portrayal comes across as too one dimensional to be invested in or even care that much about. Harbin coasts along with some gorgeous cinematography, and like in Cobweb we even get a gratuitous cameo from Jung Woo-sung (giving us a taste of what his character from Musa would look like 20 years later if he’d discovered booze), however neither are enough to fill in for the fundamental gaps that exist in Min-ho’s latest. Thankfully when it comes to An Jung-geun there’s no shortage of other adaptions to choose from, and while they may not be as sleek as Harbin, they’re definitely far more engaging.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 5/10

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“Devils Stay” Theatrical Poster

Director: Hyeon Moon-seob
Cast: Park Shin-Yang, Lee Min-Ki, Lee Re, Won Mi-won, Yoon Jong Seok, Yoo Sun-ho, Shim So-young
Running Time: 95 min.

By Paul Bramhall

Ever since 2015’s The Priests Korean cinema has had bit of a thing going on with, well, priests. While Jang Jae-hyon’s debut served up its holy protagonists in the context of the exorcism genre, since then we’ve had MMA priests fighting demons in The Divine Fury, occult detective priests in Svaha: The Sixth Finger, and more exorcisms in Metamorphosis. Delve into the K-drama world and it would be remiss not to mention The Fiery Priest, The Guest, and don’t forget just plain old Priest. Needless to say if Asians in dog collars are your thing, then Korea has you covered. Almost 10 years later, and in 2024 its once more exorcism that’s on the cards for Lee Min-ki’s (For the Emperor, Monster) priest in Devils Stay.

The big screen debut of director Hyeon Moon-seob after helming the 2016 web-drama Nightmare Teacher, Devils Stay is another production in Korea’s seemingly inexhaustible backlog of movies that got pushed back from release during the COVID-19 pandemic. Filmed in 2020 (which aligns it much closer with the previously mentioned titles), it eventually got taken off the shelf in 2024, its mid-budget status likely seeing it pushed to the back of the queue behind the bigger budgeted productions that suffered a similar fate. Opening very much like any number of other exorcism movies, we’re introduced to Min-ki attempting to free a young girl of the demon that’s possessed her. I’ve made this point before, but has there ever been an exorcism movie where the main character that’s possessed isn’t a girl!?

It’s such a familiar trope at this point that Moon-seob seemingly didn’t give a 2^nd thought to having the scene play out as part of a pre-credits sequence, which is perhaps a sign of awareness that audiences are overly familiar with a screaming girl strapped to a bed at this point. Played by Lee Re (Peninsula, Seven Years of Night), on the scale of demonic possession portrayals in cinema she’s on the lower end, strictly limited to wide eyed yelling and pretending to be fine in an attempt to make her father break into the room and interrupt the exorcism. No 360 head turns or projectile vomit here.

Also in the tradition of opening scene exorcisms, things expectedly take an unexpected turn, and despite seemingly being freed from the demon’s clutches, Re suddenly passes away. It’s here that Devils Stay thankfully decides to differentiate itself from the myriad of other exorcism movies out there, so rather than skip a few months into the future or some other plot switch, the narrative settles its focus on her heart surgeon father in the immediate aftermath of her death. Played by Park Shin-yang (The Big Swindle, The Uninvited), here marking his first time to return to the big screen since 2012’s The Man on the Edge, we learn that Re was suffering from a heart problem and needed a transplant.

Interspersed flashback scenes allow the audience to gain an insight into her and her fathers close relationship, with the contrast between the past and present effectively presented to convey the sense of loss Shin-yang is going through, and gradually reveal how the possession came about. Devils Stay takes a leaf out of Seire’s book in its use of Korea’s 3-day funeral ritual to frame its plot, and after the familiar opening the change in tone to one of more creeping dread is a welcome one. Most of the plot plays out in the funeral home that the family stay at during the ritual, with Re’s body kept in the morgue in the basement, and Moon-seob creates a claustrophobic atmosphere using the limited location.

Considering the title Devils Stay, it’s not a spoiler to say that the demon in question may not have left Re’s body, even in death, which soon starts to cause a number of unexplained goings on. One of the biggest issues Devils Stay has though is just how many of them remain unexplained, with spooky goings on hinted at then seemingly dropped without any further explanation. When Shin-yang first visits Re in the morgue there’s surprise that rigor mortis has yet to set in, except for a tightly clenched fist in which I’d expected it’d be revealed she’s holding something significant. Well, she is holding something, but it has no bearing on the plot. Similarly the camera chooses to linger on the youngest son in a couple of scenes, hinting that perhaps the demon is going to shift into his body, but again it ultimately turns out to not mean anything.

It almost feels like horror movie trolling, although I don’t think any of it was intentional. Building up a sense of dread and the unknown is critical to any movie like this one, however there needs to be some meaning attached to the buildup, otherwise it just ends up feeling empty. Indeed the more Devils Stay progressed, the more it became apparent that some of its most promising moments may have been accidental rather than intended. A perfect example is how the finale appeared to be making the bold choice to take place in broad daylight, eschewing the traditional darkened rooms the genre usually ends up in, however it’s not long before the key players end up in a darkened boiler room. The choices frequently frustrate, resulting in a missed opportunity for Devils Stay to really differentiate itself from its peers.

It’s Lee Min-ki’s priest who’s subjected to the greatest disservice though. By far the most interesting character, being a former military chaplain who himself was once possessed during him time in the forces, the plot makes his appearances essentially serve as bookends. As an exorcist with limited powers due to his prior possession, his character feels far more compelling that Shin-yang’s in denial father, and there’s an inescapable feeling that the narrative would have been much more engaging if it was Min-ki we get to spend the most time with.

Despite the punchy 95-minute runtime proceedings come close to derailing in the final third. The buildup of creeping dread is swapped out for a somewhat ridiculous reveal involving a cult on the run from the Russian Orthodox Church (a fact which I found to be amusing in its specificness), and at one point Min-ki turns up and starts throwing down with a few of the cult members. Maybe in a future instalment we’ll see him team up with Park Seo-joon from The Divine Fury? (Plus, whatever happened to ‘The Green Exorcist’!?) Unfortunately the finale also plunges Devils Stay back into overly familiar territory, with Re’s corpse requiring another exorcism to get rid of the demon for good.

Apart from tried and tested lines like “don’t believe anything you see or hear” being thrown around, from an editing perspective the sequence feels messy. The narrative structure has relied on the frequent use of flashbacks to gain an insight into Re’s previous life, and Moon-seob appears to keep them going during the finale, except at some point I realised they’re not supposed to be flashbacks anymore, but rather visions the demon is making Shin-yang suffer from. The fact that there’s no differentiation between how the scenes are presented results in a sense of confusion as to if what we’re watching is supposed to be a moment from the past, or an illusion the demon is projecting onto Shin-yang, robbing the sequence of any tension due to the lack of clarity.

In the end Devils Stay offers up a perfectly serviceable if completely average slice of exorcism horror, the kind of movie that if someone asks you a question about a couple of days after watching it, you’ll struggle to answer as it’ll already have left the memory. Its greatest strength is Lee Min-ki’s priest, perhaps ironically because we don’t get to learn much about him, but get enough of a glimpse into his past to be left wanting to know more. For most people though, they’ll walk away from Moon-seob’s feature length debut feeling like it was a distinctly timid affair, when it could easily have been so much more.

Paul Bramhall‘s Rating: 5.5/10

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“Secret Executioners” Theatrical Poster

Director: Lee Doo-Yong
Co-director: Godfrey Ho
Cast: Shin Woo-chul, Hwang Jang Lee, Jim Norris, Kwon Il-soo, Min Bok-gi, Park Dong-ryong
Running Time: 90 min.

By Paul Bramhall

It remains one of the greatest travesties in Korean cinema that director Lee Doo-yong’s The Trouble-Solving Broker is referenced in 99% of English language content as “another one of those Godfrey Ho cut and paste jobs.” The real tragedy is that it’s also true, with (as of the time of writing in 2024) no known surviving prints of Doo-yong’s original version in its native Korea, making the re-named Secret Executioners Filmark version that has Godfrey Ho’s name slapped on it as director a double-edged sword. On the one hand its a horrendously modified version of the original – clocking it at 90 minutes compared to the original runtime of 108, which when you factor in the newly inserted gweilo fight footage means there’s likely close to 30 minutes missing. On the other, it’s also the only available way to watch it. The perils of attempting to watch many of the entries in Korea’s taekwon-action genre!

In my feature Fists, Kicks, & Kimchi, I’d stated that “if it’s possible to choose one title which could be interpreted as the last of the ‘pure’ taekwon-action movies, then it would likely be The Trouble-Solving Broker.” Made during an era when the taekwon-action style was increasingly being incorporated into more traditional kung-fu themed settings thanks to the success of 1978’s Drunken Master, Secret Executioners acts as a kind of snapshot of the other direction the genre could have gone in. The 1980’s in general are considered a grim period for Korean cinema, and in 1982 the country as a whole was still reeling from military dictator Chun Doo-hwan strong arming himself into power following the assassination of Park Chung-hee. Fittingly, Doo-yong shifted the taekwon-action genre from the western inspired locales of early 20^th century Manchuria to the modern day, often filming guerilla style on the streets of Seoul.

The story focuses on the titular broker (or “the illegal problem solver” as the English dub calls him) played by Shin Woo-chul (Fury in Shaolin Temple, The Supreme Order), looking for all intents and purposes like a Korean version of Columbo, complete with the crumpled beige raincoat and an unassuming demeanour. His services are hired to assist a group of market vendors who’ve been extorted by a gangster running a real estate scam, and who’s backed himself up with a gang of heavies led by fellow broker Hwang Jang Lee (Eagle vs. Silver Fox, Buddhist Fist and Tiger Claws). An acquaintance of Woo-chul who’s less averse to taking on jobs that involve criminal activity, despite sharing a friendship the arrangement puts the pair at loggerheads with the expected results. After their investigations lead them to an acquaintance of the market whose sister has been kidnapped, they’re able to put aside their differences to come to the rescue.

The core of the story for the most part remains, with Godfrey Ho choosing to regrettably incorporate a handful of fight scenes filmed in Hong Kong that utilise the debatable talents of Jim Norris, responsible for the most embarrassing display of snake fist ever committed to film. These scenes involve such highlights as a guy who spits milk whenever he gets hit, insults like “white trash” and “n*gger boy” being thrown around, and most bizarrely – Kwon Il-soo (The Postman Strikes Back, Hard Bastard). Il-soo’s presence is a weird one since he’s also in the original version, so how he got roped (or if he knew he was in the first place!) by Ho into filming the new scenes is one of those great genre mysteries we’ll probably never know the answer to. Their roles give the story a gang rivalry slant, often resulting in narrative confusion, but thankfully there aren’t too many scene insertions (unlike the infamous Ninja Terminator which would come 3 years later).

Despite being responsible for starting the taekwon-action genre with 1974’s The Manchurian Tiger, the last time Doo-Yong had dabbled in the genre prior to Secret Executioners was 6 years earlier with 1976’s Visitor of America (also criminally most well known as its bastardized version Bruce Lee Fights Back from the Grave). In the time since he’d go on to become a critically acclaimed director by helming the likes of The Hut and The Last Witness (both from 1980), and it’s the gritty realism of the latter which also permeates throughout Secret Executioners. The low budget sees Doo-yong frequently filming on the street’s guerilla style, including a frantic foot chase, and much of the story plays out in billiard halls, coffee shops, nightclubs and marketplace restaurants, unintentionally capturing an authentic aura of what Seoul felt like at the time, even with the dubbing.

The same grittiness applies to the story itself, and while Hwang Jang Lee was relegated to being a bit player in almost all of Doo-yong’s early taekwon-action movies, here he’s upgraded to co-star status following his popularity in Hong Kong. Indeed his character here is probably the most fully realised of all his roles – far from turning up to deliver little else aside from sternly worded threats, evil laughter, and his lethal boot work, here we get to see him partake in more menial tasks like getting his hair shampooed in a barber shop, getting it on with a prostitute, and going to a public bath with an acquaintance (source of the much noted HJL posterior shot that seems necessary to point out in any discussion on Secret Executioners!).

It’s the latter setting that also delivers one of the most brutal beatdowns in the boot-masters filmography. Finding himself ambushed in the locker room, Jang Lee proceeds to unleash his kicks against anyone in range, offering up a sense of franticness and desperation which feels far removed from his invincible kung-fu villain roles. The opening Filmark credits list Jang Lee as the fight choreographer, although without the original Korean credits this is impossible to verify, however what’s clear is that Doo-yong seemed to want to make this his taekwon-action swansong and go out with a bang. Fights frequently break out against multiple opponents within confined spaces involving plenty of property damage, and even if some of it feels a little sloppy, the hits feel hard and the choreography leans into the brutality of being kicked or punched in the face.

Woo-chul is a highlight, and as an actor who’s slightly on the burlier side, he energetically throws himself into the kicks he delivers. A standout fight sequence (and the only real one on one) sees him go up against Jang Lee in a knockdown drag out brawl on a beach that segues into an abandoned building, in which they almost bring the entire structure down by kicking out the wooden supporting pillars holding up the rafters. In a latter café set fight scene there’s also an unintentionally amusing moment when Woo-chul delivers a flying kick to a foreigner playing one of the lackeys. After delivering the reaction shot to being kicked he proceeds to calmly stand in the corner, assuming he’s out of shot, until it becomes obvious someone must be frantically signalling him off-camera to move, and he attempts to (failing miserably) subtly exit stage left.

The best is saved for last though, as a literal who’s who in the taekwon-action genre convene in a brick factory for an almost uninterrupted 8-minute mass brawl encompassing fists, feet, steel pipes, knives, spades, bricks (expectedly) and a katana for good measure. Doo-yong even throws in a car driving through a brick wall, as Woo-chul and Jang Lee combine forces to rescue Min Bok-gi (Wild Panther, Strike of the Thunderkick Tiger) and her sister. It’s an entertainingly chaotic and relentless sequence that sees more flying kicks doled out than is possible to count, and everyone goes at it as if their life depended on it. As one of the last times the original era of taekwon-action would grace the screen, Doo-yong ensures that everyone has a moment in the spotlight, and in many ways the scene acts as a precursor to the kind of group brawls that would become a fixture in the gangster genre during the 1990’s and 2000’s.

Despite the Filmark interference Secret Executioner has been subjected to, Doo-yong’s gritty street level vision of Seoul in the early 1980’s and the characters who populate it still shines through. In one particularly gnarly scene a character has their head pushed face first into an unflushed toilet bowl, and as much as I’d consider it a similarly suitable punishment for how Filmark treated so many of the taekwon-action productions, in this case we also have them to thank for being able to see it at all. For that, they can almost be forgiven. Almost.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 8/10

The post Secret Executioners | aka Trouble-Solving Broker (1982) Review first appeared on cityonfire.com.

“Bridge of Death” Theatrical Poster

Director: Lee Doo-yong
Cast: Han Yong-cheol, Bae Su-chun, Kim Yeongran, Chang Il-sik, Woo Yeon-jeong, Mun-ju Kim
Running Time: 90 min. 

By Paul Bramhall

In my review for Returned a Single-Legged Man 2 I concluded with “What’s left to ask but for more taekwon-action productions be made available to be enjoyed.” The line was in reference to the Korean Film Archive’s decision in 2023 to release some of director Lee Doo-yong’s taekwon-action movies starring Han Yong-cheol on their Korean Classic Films YouTube channel, which kicked off with The Manchurian Tiger and Returned Single-Legged Man. Sadly Doo-yong would pass away in January 2024, so was no longer around when the Archive released the sequel a month later in HD, uncut, and in its original language probably for the first time since it was released. Within the same year the ask was answered, when in August Doo-yong and Yong-cheol’s 2^nd collaboration was released, Bridge of Death.

With information being so scarce on the taekwon-action genre for so long, confounded by the fact many were distributed overseas with different titles and edited into completely different plots (and thanks to Godfrey Ho, some even had gweilo ninja footage spliced in!), it’s not surprising that Bridge of Death has rarely been mentioned. On the likes of the Hong Kong Movie Database the title is listed as an alias for Returned Single-Legged Man, more thank likely down to the iconic scene where Han Yong-cheol takes on a bunch of lackeys single handedly (or should that be footedly?) on a bridge. There is an entry for Bridge of Death, except it’s under the title Gate of Destiny, which perplexingly also has the original title down as an alias, giving some idea as to why there’s so much confusion around Korea’s martial arts output from the 1970’s and 1980’s.

Bridge of Death would only be Han Yong-cheol’s 3^rd time as a leading man, having appeared in Choi Young-chul’s Black White Big Fist straight after debuting in Lee Doo-yong’s The Manchurian Tiger. Watching the collaborations between Doo-yong and Yong-cheol fifty years on, of which they cranked out 6 in 1974 and would go their separate ways, there’s a sense of familiarity to what was a fairly stock standard plot template. Underground Korean independence fighters are roughing it out in Manchuria, hoping for the day when the Japanese will be kicked out so they can return to their homeland, and there’s usually a missing stash of gold involved that’s intended to be used to fund the independence movement. Expect Bae Su-chun (Miss, Please Be Patient, Return of Red Tiger) to turn up as the Japanese villain, the usual roster of lackeys, and Yong-cheol eventually revealing himself to also be on the side of Korean independence.

For their sophomore collaboration together Bridge of Death does zero to deviate from the formula, although it’s worth mentioning that the plot may well have still felt fresh for audiences at the time, more so than watching Doo-yong and Yong-cheol’s collaborations out of order today. Yong-cheol plays the homeless son of a traitor who worked for the Japanese, and as such is frowned upon wherever he goes, with even his introduction being an amusingly undignified affair. Thrown out of a restaurant from the first-floor balcony, the obvious switch to a mannequin is sure to raise a smile in its quaintness. Referred to as a “Korean punk” by the Japanese, he’s taken pity on by a young apple seller, played by Kim Yeongran (7-Star Grand Mantis, Kill the Shogun), who turns out to be a part of the underground freedom fighter movement along with her brother.

While Yeongran is keen to bring Yong-cheol into their fold despite his father’s background, he wants nothing to do with it, however when the Japanese catch wind that she’s a part of the independence movement and knows the location of a stash of gold (of course), Yong-cheol feels obliged to protect her. Naturally that involves unleashing a barrage of kicks against the usual roster of bad guys, with Chang Il-sik (Tiger of Northland, Dragon from Shaolin) playing the lead of a gang who are also after the gold, and offering up a suitably intimidating opponent for Yong-cheol to flex his feet against in the extended finale.

The most interesting element of Bridge of Death (apart from the fact that there really isn’t any bridge to speak of) is a pronounced Bruce Lee influence. At one point Yong-cheol dons a disguise not dissimilar in comedic tone to what the Little Dragon portrayed in 1972’s Fist of Fury, and at the end he dons an all-black getup to sneak around the Japanese headquarters. It’s a look which feels clearly influenced by Bruce Lee’s sneaking around Han’s underground lair in 1973’s Enter the Dragon, and notably at the time of Bridge of Death’s release he’d only passed away 9 months earlier. It’s possible that for their 2^nd collaboration perhaps Doo-yong was playing around with the idea of making Yong-cheol a localised version of the star who’d become popular throughout Asia.

The most obvious reference is when Yong-cheol starts bouncing on the balls of his feet during his fight against Il-sik, which even includes a flick of the nose, removing any doubt that the intention was to mimic Lee’s mannerisms. However it would appear the early attempt at Bruceploitation was a one-off, as by the time Doo-yong and Yong-cheol would collaborate again a few months later for Returned Single-Legged Man, the Bruce Lee influence was nowhere to be found, allowing Yong-cheol to further develop his own screen identity. Like The Manchurian Tiger it’s Kwan Yung-moon (Kung Fu Zombie, Blood Child) who’s in the role of fight choreographer, and here he once more stays behind the camera, a habit he’d thankfully break in Returned Single-Legged Man where he’d share top billing with Yong-cheol.

Despite the condensed timeframe that Doo-yong and Yong-cheol cranked out their 6 collaborations, with The Manchurian Tiger released in March, and the last of their collaborations A Betrayer released in October, there’s a clear uptick in the quality of the fight choreography with each production. The action in Bridge of Death noticeably utilises the undercranking technique to speed up the flow of the fights, and there’s the welcome inclusion of breakable props, with plenty of collateral damage in the form of vases and door windows on the receiving end of kicks. There’s still a certain clunkiness to some of the fights here, with the flow that screen fighting requires not quite there, resulting in the occasional pause during a fight while waiting for another performer to execute their choreography, but for 1974 it’s completely forgivable.

Even with the traditional formula that Bridge of Death rigidly sticks to for the most part, it does have one surprise up its sleeve with a nihilistic ending that feels pulled straight out of the Chang Cheh playbook (and foreshadows the likes of Hong Kong’s The Gold Connection by several years). Considering the kind of censorship that Korean cinema suffered from in the 1970’s it’s an eyebrow raising moment that it was able to be left intact, however on reflection, when considering earlier plot points it’s clearer as to how they got away with it. Ironically it’s offset by being one of the few Manchuria westerns that closes with the announcement of Japan’s surrender, which would also place its setting as 1945, considerably later than the go-to time period of the 1930’s.  

While Bridge of Death is one of the lesser productions that Doo-yong and Yong-cheol released during their 1974 hot streak, it still ticks all the boxes of what you want to see in a Manchuria western, offering up a heady mix of duplicitous bar girls, determined freedom fighters, villainous Japanese, and kicks to the face. There’s also the undeniable fact that, considering these productions have been unavailable for the best part of fifty years, to be able to watch them in HD, presented in their original language, and uncut is a rare pleasure that many had resigned themselves to never happening. For that, it’s almost impossible to complain.   

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 6/10

The post Bridge of Death (1974) Review first appeared on cityonfire.com.

“Uprising” Netflix Poster

Director: Kim Sang-man
Cast: Gang Dong-won, Park Jung-min, Cha Seung-won, Jung Sung-il, Kim Shin-rok, Jin Sun-Kyu
Running Time: 126 min. 

By Paul Bramhall

Much of the publicity for Uprising has leant into the fact that it’s co-scripted by Park Chan-wook, the director who gave us such modern-day classics like Decision to Leave and The Handmaiden. It’s an understandable approach, as while Chan-wook is most well known for the times he’s sat in the director’s chair, he’s also penned a number of classics where the directorial reigns have gone to someone else. From Lee Moo-young’s A Bizarre Love Triangle, to his protégé Lee Kyoung-mi’s Crush and Blush and The Truth Beneath, even when not directly involved in the production his touch is still felt.

For Uprising directorial duties have gone to Kim Sang-man, who worked on a number of Chan-wook’s productions in the 2000’s, primarily in the marketing department. In 2007 he’d make his own directorial debut with the action-comedy Girl Scout, going on to helm Midnight FM in 2010 and 2014’s The Tenor Lirico Spinto, before pulling that distinctive trait that’s so prevalent in the Korean film industry of disappearing for the next 10 years. Uprising marks his return to directing, reuniting him with Park Chan-wook for the first time since 2006’s I’m a Cyborg, But That’s OK.

The story takes place in the late 16^th century Joseon Dynasty, where we meet the emperor played by Cha Seung-won (Believer 2, Night in Paradise), who’s very much cut from the cloth that anyone with royal blood sits above the common man, wielding an almost God like status that makes them untouchable. Within the palace an unlikely friendship develops between the young son of a military family, and the lowly slave whose role it is to receive the punishment on the son’s behalf whenever he makes a mistake during sparring. Being handy with a sword himself, the slave starts teaching the son under the cover of darkness, initially to avoid the beatings he unfairly finds himself on the end of, however as time passes a bond grows between the pair.

Growing up to be played by Park Jung-min (Smugglers, Time to Hunt) as the privileged offspring now serving in the military, and Gang Dong-won (Broker, Peninsula) as the prospectless slave bound to serve him, their lives go in different directions once the Japanese invade. While Jung-min has to leave his wife and child in the palace to help the emperor escape, promising he’ll be back, the slaves rise up and seize the opportunity to free themselves, overpowering the small number of remaining officials. With Dong-won imprisoned due to a failed escape attempt, when he manages to free himself the palace has been set alight, and despite his attempts to rescue Jung-min’s family, their refusal to listen to a slave sees them seal their fate. When Jung-min hears the news, he assumes Dong-won was part of the uprising, holding him responsible for his family’s death, and swears to take revenge should their paths ever cross again.

Split into 4 chapters, at the heart of Uprising is the friendship between the pair and how it’s torn apart through circumstance, so it’s ironic that if often feels like the least important part of the story. In part the reason would appear to be down to Sang-man’s directorial approach. The initial scenes play out in a disjointed manner, cutting back and forth between the pair as kids and events in the present (which are similarly told out of sequence to confusing effect), and it’s easy to feel that if Chan-wook had been in the director’s chair this part of the story would have had more time dedicated to it. As it is though, it comes across like the narrative does the bare minimum to quickly establish their friendship, filming the scenes likely exactly how they appear on the page, but forgetting to add any kind of dramatic weight to them so the audience can invest in their friendship.

Where Uprising finds its rhythm is once the Japanese invade, kicking off the six-year Imjin War, which sees the narrative focus on Jung-min and Dong-won’s respective journeys. With a rebelling population deeply unsatisfied with the social inequalities, Jung-min’s mission to protect the emperor sees him frequently massacring his fellow countrymen, an act that’s fuelled by his own belief that it was the commoner population who are responsible for his family’s death. Dong-won on the other hand falls in with a ragtag group of fighters determined to defeat the Japanese, not dissimilar to the protagonists from 2014’s Kundo: Age of the Rampant (in which, ironically, Dong-won played the villain), achieving an almost folk like hero status.

Up against a ruthless Japanese general played by Jung Sung-il (Remember, The Chase), the pairs confrontations lead to plenty of hacking and slashing, with a welcome dose of black humor introduced through a translator attempting to keep up with the verbal barbs they throw at each other while fighting. Indeed a large part of the enjoyment Uprising delivers comes from its action beats, with severed limbs frequently flying through the air, and a healthy amount of blood splatter. As the only noteworthy female role in the cast Kim Shin-rok (The Plot, Burning) clocks in an entertaining performance brandishing what’s best described as a 2-section staff – with one part a traditional long staff, and the other a short club dangling from the end of it. In fact such is the strength of each of Dong-won and Jung-min’s respective journeys, it becomes easy to forget that it’s their relationship which is supposed to be what’s at the fore.

Despite the lack of initial investment in the bond between the two leads, in the latter half the plot brings all of its separate threads together in an effective manner. The end of the war should also signal the slaves who actively contributed having their status upgraded, however the emperors beliefs result in a bitter betrayal of trust, one that sees Dong-won go from an innocent, none the wiser of the ill will towards him, to someone who becomes equally motivated to seek revenge. It’s a turning point which ultimately sets Dong-won, Sung-min, and Sung-il on a bloody collision course with each other, and gives the narrative a welcome sense of escalation in the final third that gains Uprising plenty of goodwill.

Setting up a 3-way finale on a beach as mist begins to roll in, the use of sound and lack of visibility are smartly incorporated into the duel, with Chan-wook’s script setting it up so that every character is heavily invested in killing the other 2. While it would have been even better if the emotional investment was established in Dong-won and Jung-min’s relationship from the beginning, to his credit Sang-man manages to successfully wring the desired emotional payoff from the pair reuniting. The question of whether the truth will come out before one of them stops breathing effectively raises the tension, adding an emotional weight that while arguably not fully earned, is still better arriving late than not at all.

When the end credits rolled on Uprising, for the first time in a while I was left with the feeling I’d enjoyed it far more than I probably should have. Looked at as a period piece dealing with a fractured friendship stemming from the social divide that permeated the Joseon Dynasty, and the tragic consequences that would follow, it undeniably misses the mark. However looked at as a period piece actioner that looks to deliver a healthy dose of swordplay, and even dares to throw-in some subtle moments of comedy (the translators work during the finale is sure to draw a laugh, in much the same way you laugh at parts of Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance), then it undeniably hits all of the intended marks. An entertaining mix of nose hunting Japanese generals, sadistic slave hunters, and righteous freedom fighters, don’t go in expecting too much more and you’re sure to have a good time.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 8/10

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“Seire” Theatrical Poster

Director: Park Kang
Cast: Shim Eun-woo, Seo Hyun-woo, Ryu Abel, Ko Eun-Min, Kim Woo-Kyum, Jeon Woon-Jong
Running Time: 100 min.

By Paul Bramhall

Taking its name from a traditional Korean custom that follows childbirth, Seire refers to a newborns first 21 days, during which time the entrance of a property has a protective rope hung on it to ward off evil spirits, and the baby should have minimal interaction with those outside immediate family. The reason behind the custom is that newborns are believed to be at their most vulnerable to bad luck and curses during their first 3 weeks. In the opening we meet a new mother played by Shim Eun-woo (The Closed Ward, Each), who thanks to her mother is a firm believer in sticking to tradition, while the restrictive rules of the custom see her husband, played by Seo Hyun-woo (Escape, Thunderbird), looking forward to getting it over with.

Despite being supportive of his wife’s beliefs, Hyun-woo is clearly exhausted by the challenge of being a new father while balancing a busy job, and finds himself increasingly haunted by dreams of rotten apples and a woman who’s not his wife. The woman turns out to be his ex-girlfriend of 6 years, played by Ryu Abel (Young Adult Matters, A French Woman), and when he wakes up one morning there’s a text revealing she’s passed away. Invited to the 3-day funeral ritual that’s about to be held, Hyun-woo feels obliged to go, even though attending a funeral during the seire period is strictly forbidden. Considered to be an open invitation to bad luck, Eun-woo understandably asks him to skip it and send condolence money instead.

Despite agreeing, he ultimately decides to attend just to briefly show his face, during which he meets his ex’s twin sister (also played by Ryu Abel) who he’d forgotten existed. Hoping he’d be willing to be a part of the 3-day funeral ritual due to his former relationship with her sister, Hyun-woo finds himself reluctantly agreeing, but at home odd things start to occur, with Eun-woo’s pregnant sister who lives next door also beginning to experience complications. As expected, Seire proves to be a slow burn in mounting dread, unfolding within the surroundings of the start of life and the end of it, and deeply entrenched within the traditional Korean customs that are attached to both.

Helmed by Park Kang, while he’s sat in the director’s chair before for the short films Choke (2015) and Deal (2019), its Seire that marks his feature length debut (produced by Korea’s National University of Arts), and it’s an unsettlingly effective one that portrays how the superstition’s behind Korea’s ancient traditions can bleed into everyday life. The narrative places the audience in the shoes of Hyun-woo, which is a smart move since his lack of familiarity with the customs at the heart of the story also act as an introduction to them for the audience. It also serves to make his dilemma between staying at home or briefly showing up for the funeral feel relatable, and since his character doesn’t place much weight on the traditions he’s resigned himself to follow, his decision to attend is portrayed as an understandable one.

However it’s also during the funeral that Kang gradually weaves in a sense of unease that permeates through much of the 100-minute runtime. Things don’t feel quite right, and when Hyun-woo comes home to find the baby has a fever, it sets off a chain of events that prove difficult to undo. Despite being a feature length debut director Kang shows an assured hand in using cinematic language to tell his story, with one particularly effective sequence juxtaposing scenes of the body being prepared for the burial ritual, alongside Hyun-woo and Eun-woo frantically trying to ease their newborns fever. The contrast between the end of a life and the start of one is kept ambiguously foreboding, never spoon feeding, but always giving just enough to know that things aren’t as they should be.

The conflict between modernity and the traditions of the past has always been a recurring theme in the Korean horror genre, from 1981’s Suddenly in the Dark to more recent productions like 2016’s The Wailing, and Seire explores similar territory. What makes it feel refreshing is the decision to set the story in the period immediately after childbirth, which also serves to set it apart from other similarly set Korean horror movies like the early 2000’s productions Unborn but Forgotten and Acacia. The lack of sleep any new parent goes through acts as another way to crank up the tension when odd things start to happen, with the lethargy Hyun-woo imbues his character making him equal parts relatable and frustrating. On the one hands its admirable how he still does everything he can to make sure Eun-woo and the baby are ok, but on the other it frustrates when he begins to dismiss opportunities to reverse the perceived bad luck.

After featuring in small supporting roles for a number of years, it’s a joy to see Seo Hyun-woo in more meatier roles recently, and his performance is a significant part of what makes the underlying horror work so well. His constant state of tiredness brings us with him into a world where everything feels slightly numb, like when we see him visibly rattled when he initially meets his ex’s twin sister, but then quickly returns to the lethargic demeanour he’s established so far. Seire is ultimately about Hyun-woo and the person he is today attempting to reconcile with the person he was in the past, and Kang uses the characters dreams as a way to fragment and distort the narrative. We’re never quite sure if Hyun-woo’s dreams are him re-visiting his past, or are the influence of something more sinister in the present, hinting at something that happened which both the audience and Eun-woo are kept in the dark about.

Kang is in full control of the disorientating plot structure though, with the various scenes of past and present eventually slotting into place like a jigsaw puzzle, painting a fuller picture of what’s unfolding. Even then the narrative stops short of explicitly spelling out some of the darker scenarios that Seire portrays, instead leaving the audience to draw their own conclusions (and subsequent judgements) around what took place. It’s a daring decision, drawing the line at casting certain characters in a horrific light, and instead offering up just enough detail to allow the viewer to fill in the gaps. Whether they choose to do so or not is on the audience’s shoulders, with certain characters increasingly painted in shades of grey, as the question is posed of if the actions from the past can ever really be escaped in the future.

In many ways Kang’s debut foreshadows both Jason Yu’s Sleep from the following year, and Jang Jae-hyeon’s Exhuma from 2024, in the themes it explores and the way it chooses to do so. Despite clearly not having the budget (or the stars) of either, arguably the result is one that makes Seire a more unsettling experience. There’s a gradual build-up of oppressiveness, of something evil getting ever nearer, and the limited locations prove to be one of the productions biggest strengths. While far from being a visceral exercise in horror, mostly keeping the tension on a slow burn throughout, Kang does throw in one scene of effective gore that acts as a reminder that we’re watching a horror movie, and it’s one that won’t be forgotten easily.

As a mid-budget slice of horror Seire successfully subverts the usual Korean go-to horror tropes to offer up a fresh take on the genre, choosing to get under your skin more than make you jump out of it, an approach it executes with aplomb. Easily marking Park Kang as a new talent to watch out for, the final scene goes for a killer gut punch that’s either cruelly or joyously left open for interpretation, but either way it’s one that feels nothing less than appropriate. Strongly recommended.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 8/10

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“I, the Executioner” Theatrical Poster

Director: Ryoo Seung-wan
Cast: Hwang Jung-min, Jung Hae-in, Oh Dae-hwan, Oh Dal-soo, Jang Yoon-ju, Kim Shi-Hoo, Jeong Man-Sik, Shin Seung-Hwan, Jin Kyung, Kwon Hae-Hyo
Running Time: 118 min.

By Paul Bramhall

When Veteran hit the screens in 2015 it struck the perfect balance as an action comedy, and director Ryoo Seung-wan promised audiences there’d be more, revealing in interviews at the time how it was the first in an intended trilogy. Almost a decade later, and it’s safe to say many had given up on the chances of a sequel ever happening, however in 2024 Seung-wan returned to the director’s chair for I, The Executioner (simply called Veteran 2 in its native Korea), delivering a 2^nd dose of Hwang Jung-min (Mission: Cross, The Point Men) as the grizzled veteran cop of the title.

To his credit, Seung-wan has reunited all of Jung-min’s colleagues from the original, with an opening action sequence involving an illicit gambling den reintroducing us to the likes of team leader Oh Dal-soo (The Wild, Tunnel) and the high kicking Jang Yoon-ju (Ballerina, One Win). Swapping out Blondie’s Heart of Glass for Baccara’s Yes Sir, I Can Boogie, it’s not long before bodies are hanging precariously off air conditioning units several floors up, and flying kicks fall comedically short of their target. It’s a sequence which successfully recaptures the tone of the original, alleviating any concerns that too much time has passed for a sequel to still feel relevant, however it’s also true that the cinematic landscape has changed a lot since 2015.

In many ways it feels like the Ma Dong-seok starring Round Up franchise (2017 – 2024) stepped into the action comedy shoes that Veteran was expected to fill, and as if to acknowledge the same, after the entertaining opening I, The Executioner noticeably pivots away from its comedic leanings. What’s interesting about the shift in tone is that Seung-wan had stated part of the reason why he made Veteran was that he wanted to move away from the darker material he’d been helming at the time, like The Unjust and The Berlin File, and get back to the type of action movies he enjoyed in his youth. Now coming off the back of 2023’s entertaining Smugglers, it would appear Seung-wan is more comfortable heading back into darker territory, even if it does conflict with the breezy tone of the original.

Taking a page from Herman Yau’s Death Notice from the previous year, the plot sees a mysterious vigilante, who the internet has dubbed Haechi, brutally murdering criminals who he feels have gotten off too lightly. Jung-min and the team are tasked with uncovering Haechi’s identity, and while doing so bring onboard a new team member. A rookie cop has also been doing the rounds on social media, referred to as the “UFC patrolman” for his impressive fighting skills, who it turns out idolises Jung-min for his no-nonsense approach to taking down criminals, making him a welcome addition to the team.

Played by Jung Hae-in (12.12: The Day, Start Up), the narrative somewhat clumsily attempts to disguise the fact that Hae-in is the mysterious Haechi, despite the setup making it blatantly obvious. With a plot that essentially centers around Jung-min inviting the very killer he’s looking for to be part of his team, being able to buy-in to such a stretch in believability is core to audience’s enjoyment of I, The Executioner. By throwing in a twist (if you can even call it that) so early, much of the runtime is spent waiting for Jung-min to catch on to a revelation the audience already knows, and to that end Seung-wan’s approach appears to be one of making the plot as busy as possible as a means of distraction.

The sequel has a clear message about the negative aspects of social media and internet mob mentality (one of the more memorable lines has Jung-min questioning if there’s “such a thing as a good murder”), however the narrative feels overly stuffed with sub-plots that needlessly bloat the runtime. From high school bullying, the treatment of foreign families, generational violence, societies treatment of those who’ve served their time, Korea’s ongoing issue with light prison sentences for drunken violence and sexual assault, social media influencers chasing views, all the way to vigilante justice. They’re issues that deserve to be touched upon, however a disproportionate amount of time is spent on many of them with no real purpose of moving the plot forward, making the pacing occasionally feel like its trudging through mud.

The more serious tone also results in Jung-min’s team for the most part pushed into the background, which after being teased with the opening sequence that sees them front and centre, almost makes it feel like it was a waste to go to the effort of bringing everyone back. In a way the returning cast act as a microcosm of the change in approach between the original and the sequel, with the scenes where they do appear usually there for comedic purposes, however with the shift to a darker tone, the result is one that frequently comes across as forced and out of place. It would have been nice to see the development of the relationship between Jang Yoon-ju and Oh Dae-hwan (Devils, Paid in Blood), whose yells of “Miss Bong!” were part of the originals charm, however here we barely get to see them interact with each other.

While the comedic aspect may have been trimmed down, thankfully the action beats are still on point. I, The Executioner may be the first Korean production to take full advantage of Namsan Mountain (of which Seoul Tower sits on top of), with a parkour infused chase sequence unfolding in and around the many stairs that lead to the top. For anyone who watched John Wick 4 and was left thinking what would be the next production to incorporate an impressive fall down a set of stairs, the one here will definitely satisfy. Similarly a rooftop fight sequence, that sees the whole team attempting to take down a perpetrator, impressively updates the ‘fight scene in a body of water’ that was so popular in the 2000’s (see My Wife is a Gangster, The Matrix Revolutions, Raging Phoenix, Naked Weapon – I could go on forever!).

While there’s been a noticeable shift in recent years to more realistic fight choreography, Seung-wan has a clear understanding of how stylistic fight choreography can be just as entertaining. The rooftop fight is a perfect example, with bodies sliding across the neon drenched rooftop to throw punches or even themselves into harm’s way, feeling like a welcome return to the kind of fight choreography that looks to prioritise excitement over realism. Unfortunately the sequence also results in Seung-wan committing the cardinal sin of placing I, The Executioner’s most impressive fight scene midway through rather than it being the finale (the likes of No Tears for the Dead and Steel Rain are guilty of the same).

The result sees the sequel ultimately build up to an underwhelming finale that suffers from a couple of major issues, the first being that with Jung Hae-in’s expertise in mixed martial arts being such an integral part of the plot, it never feels realistic that Jung-min should be able to beat him (which is the catharsis the audience is looking for). Secondly the whole setup that the final fight takes place in feels like it’s been taken straight from the Saw playbook, with multiple victims set up to meet their demise, and Jung-min placed in an impossible situation to rescue them all. While the intent is clear, it serves as a distraction to the face off between the pair, and with no cameo appearance from Ma Dong-seok to liven things up, it all feels a little overly serious.

There’s more than one scene in I, The Executioner when a character states that “times have changed”, and it’s an appropriate line for Seung-wan’s approach to the sequel. If anything, in tone it’s Smugglers which feels like it has more of a connection to the 2015 original, so how much audiences will enjoy this 2^nd outing will largely depend on how much they’re willing to accept a shift into more straight-faced territory. I, The Executioner may take itself more seriously, however it’s at the cost of the charm that made its predecessor work so well.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 6/10

The post I, The Executioner | aka Veteran 2 (2024) Review first appeared on cityonfire.com.

‘The Killer: A Girl Who Deserves to Die” Theatrical Poster

Director: Choi Jae-Hoon
Cast: Jang Hyuk, Bruce Khan, Cha Tae-Hyun, Son Hyun-Joo, Lee Seo-young, Anne, Son Hyun-joo
Running Time: 95 min.

By Paul Bramhall

It’s no secret that in the 21^st century mainstream Korean cinema has rarely sold itself on action. It’s certainly not for lack of talent, but rather you’re likely to find the countries best action sequences play out as part of a gangster movie, or a crime thriller, with very few productions marketed purely on the strength of being an ‘action movie’. There are a few exceptions to the rule, with the likes of 2006’s City of Violence, 2013’s The Suspect, and 2022’s Carter all proudly wearing their action credentials on their sleeve as the reason for audiences to check them out, and in 2022 they were joined by The Killer: A Girl Who Deserves to Die.

Starring as the titular killer is Jang Hyuk, a talented actor proficient in a number of martial arts, who originally got his big break in 2001’s Volcano High, a kind of post-apocalyptic The Matrix-inspired actioner (in which he was bizarrely dubbed by André 3000 for the MTV sanctioned western release!). Coinciding with the Korean Wave (the name popularly attributed to the recognition Korean cinema started to receive internationally in the early 2000’s), the direction the film industry took would ultimately transition away from the Hong Kong influenced action movies of the late 1990’s, and Hyuk rarely had an opportunity to show off his action chops in the succeeding years. In fact it’s only in the 2020’s that he’s returned to action lead status, initially with 2020’s The Swordsman, and then playing the bad guy in 2021’s Paid in Blood.

The Killer: A Girl Who Deserves to Die reunites Hyuk with the director of The Swordsman, Choi Jae-hoon, for which their first collaboration also marked his directorial debut. Since then Jae-hoon has dipped his toes into the horror genre with 2021’s The Hypnosis, but his latest finds him back firmly in action movie territory. The best ingredients for an action movie always tend to be the simplest, and in that regard for their latest collaboration it’s safe to say they nailed the brief. Hyuk plays a former hitman for hire now living a peaceful life with his wife, however his laid-back routine is interrupted when his wife decides to go on a trip with her friend, and insists he take care of the friend’s teenage daughter until they come back.

Played by newcomer Lee Seo-young, despite his reluctance Hyuk resigns himself to his guardian role, telling her she can do her own thing, but being smart enough to place a tracking device in her purse to keep an eye on her. It turns out to be the right move, since when she ends up getting mixed up with a group of juvenile delinquents its Hyuk who comes to the rescue, only to find the next day that some of them have been found murdered. Finding himself in the position of prime suspect for the case, things go from bad to worse when one of the surviving members arranges for Seo-young to be kidnapped by a sex trafficking ring, and before you can say “I’m thinking I’m back”, Hyuk is forced into a rescue mission before his wife’s holiday wraps up.

In reality the John Wick quote isn’t a fair reflection of TK: AGWDtD (as I’ll call it from here on in). Instead Jae-hoon’s latest shares much more DNA with the likes of Taken and The Man from Nowhere, particularly the latter with it also being a Korean production. In fact The Man from Nowhere even gets namechecked, feeling like a clear acknowledgement of its influence. Like Won Bin in the 2010 classic, Hyuk isn’t on a mission of revenge for the death of a loved one, but rather a mission of vengeance against those who’ve kidnapped a young girl left in their care. The differences between the 2 are clear though, implicitly stated by their titles – while The Man from Nowhere wanted the audience to get to know Won Bin’s character, in TK: AGWDtD Hyuk is much more of a one-man killing machine.

That’s a good thing, with Hyuk taking a refreshingly clinical approach to finding Seo-young, as likely to put a bullet between your eyes while sipping on a latte as he is to stab you in the neck, displaying a ruthless streak that doesn’t subside until the end credits roll. While it’s almost impossible to avoid a John Wick comparison in any post-2020 action movie that includes judo throws and head shots (although we all know it was Steven Seagal who did it first!), the action in TK: AGWDtD is much more varied and frequent than in any of the productions mentioned. The fact that Hyuk comes with a legitimate martial arts background is also clear onscreen, with the action scenes having a flow to them that even the most rehearsed action sequence with non-martial artists can only hope to achieve. Despite all the technological advances and intensive training regimes, you simply can’t replace the real deal.

Clocking in at a lean 95 minutes, TK: AGWDtD has practically no fat on the bone, quickly establishing the setup then pretty much allowing Hyuk to do his thing for the bulk of the runtime. It’s also Hyuk who takes credit for choreographing the action, and there’s plenty of it, from hallway skirmishes against multiple attackers, to brutal one on ones, and it’s all shot with minimal camera trickery (even the sparingly used CGI blood gets a pass, off set by the use of real squibs for any close-up damage). It’s worth sticking around for the end credits to get an insight into how some of the actions scenes were executed, with the behind-the-scenes footage revealing that even smashing through a window in front of a green screen can go wrong if you don’t land the right way!

Most of the one-on-one action pits Hyuk against another familiar face from the Korean action scene in the form of Bruce Khan (The Last Eve, The Medallion). Like Hyuk, Khan is also a multi-disciplined martial artist, and having spent a stint in Hong Kong it was in 2018 that he’d finally get to headline his own action movie with Revenger. Khan is to TK: AGWDtD what Thanayong Wongtrakul is to The Man from Nowhere, and sporting a dash of dyed yellow hair his appearance comes across as a lethally dangerous uncle, one who you wouldn’t want to get on the wrong side of. Most importantly, Khan offers up an opponent who gives as good as he gets, and each of he and Hyuk’s encounters gradually escalate in tension and the damage dished out.

If any criticism could be directed towards TK: AGWDtD then it’ll likely be the lack of characterisation. Its sometimes hinted at, such as when Seo-young quizzes Hyuk around if the reason for he and his wife not having kids is because they’re unable to conceive, however such moments are quickly brushed aside without any real meaning. There’s also a certain inevitability around who the mystery person is who placed a “special order” for Seo-young to be kidnapped, with many likely to call it out long before it’s actually revealed, but to the narratives credit even with the expected reveal their demise is a suitably satisfying one.

It’s worth noting that those familiar with the Korean film industries output during the 2000’s should appreciate a couple of special appearances, with Son Hyun-joo (The Phone, Hide and Seek) turning up as the classic character who runs a gun range, but also honeymoons as an arms dealer on the side. Similarly for Cha Tae-hyun (Along with the Gods: The Two Worlds, My Sassy Girl) who’s cast as the owner of a “premium” clean-up service that disposes of bodies after a hit has taken place. While their screentime may be limited, their appearances effectively serve the purpose of building the world Hyuk’s former profession took place in (and never descends into any nonsense about High Tables or special coins).

It feels like I often use words to the effect of “there’s a lean little action movie somewhere within the bloated runtime” for so many modern action movies, so it’s a joy to experience a movie like The Killer: A Girl Who Deserves to Die, that understands exactly what it’s there for, and delivers in every aspect. Would it be too much to ask for a sequel?

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 8/10

The post Killer: A Girl Who Deserves to Die, The (2022) Review first appeared on cityonfire.com.