Werckmeister Harmonies (2000) ☆☆☆1/2(3.5/4): The Melancholy of Existence

Posted on September 22, 2026 by kaist455

“Werckmeister Harmonies”, the 2000 film made by Hungarian filmmaker Béla Tarr and his co-director Ágnes Hranitzky, feels like a homework to do at first and then becomes something much more than that. Yes, this is one of the quintessential examples of “slow cinema”, but you will be captivated and then mesmerized by how it is about even though you will also often scratch your head on what it is about.

In fact, I also remain baffled about what it really is about even after watching it twice, so I will simply try to describe what I observed and felt during my viewing. Right from the very first scene which sets the overall tone of the film, the movie is brimming with a subtle sense of artistic confidence, and you will find yourself gradually impressed and then engaged in what is being so dexterously and effortlessly presented on the screen.

On the surface, the opening scene of the movie is just a sudden impromptu moment inside a bar in some unknown Hungarian village in a rather unspecified period background (We can only vaguely guess that the period is around the later stage of the Hungarian communist regime era, by the way). When the bar is about to be closed at late night, many of its drunken customers are not so willing to leave, and then a bright lad named János Valuska (Lars Rudolph) comes to make a little insightful speech on time and universe. During his speech, some of the drunken customers act as the Sun, the Moon, and the Earth, and the mood is lightened up a bit as almost everyone at the bar moves and rotates under his instruction.

What does his speech exactly mean or reflect? Now I am reminded of how inconsequential our existence on the Earth is in the vast darkness of the universe – how meaningless our concept of order and system can ultimately be in terms of space and time. Sure, we have tried to study, define, and understand the nature and the universe for many centuries, but, let’s face it, both the nature and the universe have not cared about our existence at all from the very beginning, and that will remain same as usual even when we all are gone forever someday.

Mainly through János, who incidentally works as a local newspaper carrier, we slowly begin to feel the unnerving sense of doom around the village and its residents. While the village looks mostly empty and barren, several villagers phlegmatically tell János some disturbing incidents including the sudden disappearance of a whole family, and the mood becomes all the more ominous when a mysterious circus visits the village. In a darkly striking unbroken shot, the movie simply observes the arrival of the big circus trailer truck along with János, but that is more than enough for disturbing and intriguing us.

The main show of this circus is a big stuffed whale, which is kept inside that big trailer truck along with an elusive figure called “Prince”. This surely come to draw more attention from János and many other people in the village, and the movie does not disappoint us when he gets a close look on the whale at one point early in the story. Patiently accompanying him during next several minutes, the camera observes more details from the whale, but its presence feels as ambiguous as that monolith in Stanley Kubrick’s “2001: A Space Odyssey” (1968). Regardless of whether it is merely a part of circus show or not, the whale somehow causes more anxiety and confusion in the village along “Prince”, who is incidentally never shown throughout the movie.

In case of an old man named György Eszter (Peter Fitz), who is also one of few people close to János, he simply prefers to focus more on honing his musicology philosophy associated with the harmonic principles of the 17th century Baroque musical theorist Andreas Werckmeister, but he also finds himself pushed and then cornered by whatever is happening in the village. His ex-wife suddenly returns with a certain demand, and he cannot possibly say no because she threatens to live with him again in a rather absurd way involved with a suitcase of hers.

Around that point, we become more confused just like János, but the movie just throws more chaos and confusion before eventually arriving at what can be regarded as the inevitable collapse of the existing order of life. There is an overwhelming crowd scene which culminates to another impressive extended scene unfolded inside a local hospital, and what is so plainly but powerfully shown around the end of this moment will lead you to more musing. I wonder whether this is an allegoric element associated with one of the most atrocious aspects of World War II, but, again, the movie does not give us any easy answer or interpretation.

I was not so surprised to learn later that the movie actually consists of less than 40 shots despite its 145-minute running time (Its average shot length is 3.7 minutes, by the way). This may sound quite boring to many of you, but the result is not so boring at all. Mostly being static in its steady position, the camera also fluidly and subtly moves for several different modes including long shots, tracking shots, closeups, and framing shots, and this makes us all the more immersed in the distinctive atmosphere and details on the screen, which are enhanced further by its starkly crisp black and white cinematography.

On the whole, “Werckmeister Harmonies”, which is based on the 1989 novel “The Melancholy of Resistance” by Nobel laureate László Krasznahorkai (He also wrote the screenplay with Tarr, by the way), surely requires some patience from the very beginning, but it is certainly worthwhile to watch as one of the best works from Tarr, who sadly passed away early in this year long after announcing his retirement with his last work “The Turin Horse” (2011). Although only watched “The Turin Horse” before watching “Werckmeister Harmonies”, I can tell you that he deserves to be mentioned as one of the great filmmakers in our time, and I also assure you that you will not easily forget whatever you observe or experience from this fascinatingly enigmatic piece of work.

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The Furious (2025) ☆☆☆1/2(3.5/4): Furious and intense indeed

Posted on September 21, 2026 by kaist455

Hong Kong martial art action film “The Furious” is furious indeed. Once it does its very elementary setup at the beginning, the movie relentlessly goes up and up along with its seemingly plain hero who turns out to have a particular set of skills, and I came to admire its skill and ambition more as being often enthralled by a number of top-notch action scenes,

After the prologue scene which introduces some of its main villain characters, we meet the hero of the movie, who is a mute Chinese dude residing in some unspecified Southeast Asian city (The movie was mainly shot in Bangkok, Thailand, by the way). He has a young daughter who came from China to stay with him for a while, but he is adamant about her going back to China even though he has been happy to be with her, and this certainly frustrates her a lot.

It is implied that he thinks the city is not so safe for his daughter. There have been frequent cases of missing children in the city, and, as already shown to us during the prologue scene, there is indeed a big child trafficking organization somewhere in the city. Not long after she argues a bit with her father and runs away from him, our hero’s daughter happens to get kidnapped by several seedy members of this dangerous criminal organization, and we get the first action sequence in the film as he desperately tries to rescue his daughter with remarkable tenacity and stamina which somehow took me back to a similar chase scene in “Terminator 2: Judgment Day” (1991).

After he unfortunately fails to rescue his daughter in the end, our hero naturally runs into a local police station, but, not so surprisingly, he does not get much help from those police officers except one sympathetic female police officer, who subsequently becomes curious about who the hell he is. He is basically a nobody on the record, but she somehow senses that there is something more than that, and we soon see him becoming all the more determined to find his daughter by any means necessary.

 As already shown from the previous action sequence, he is surely a physical force to reckon with, and that is confirmed again during the next big action sequence, which is unfolded inside a place belonging to a middle-ranking member of that criminal organization. After he swiftly overpowers a bunch of goons coming at him, our hero comes across a guy named Navin (Joe Taslim), and then we are served with more physical action across the screen before Navin eventually reveals that he is actually an ally to help our hero find his daughter. Just like our hero, Navin has been in the middle of his own personal mission against that criminal organization, and it does not take much time for him and our hero to bond with each other as they stick together in front of more bad guys to come along their increasingly risky quest.

Around that point, the movie becomes quite intense to say the least, but it surprises and then excites us as throwing more action onto the screen with considerable skill and spirit. Sure, it is a bit too thin and simple in terms of story and character, but we can overlook that for a while as being often overwhelmed by the sheer intensity and energy generated from a series of well-executed physical action scenes in the movie. These physical action scenes are as fast and furious as required, but the camera of cinematographer Meteor Cheung smoothly and dexterously captures every physical movement on the screen, and the editing by Chris Tonick never feels choppy or scattershot at all even during the busiest moments in the movie.

I must tell you that the physical action scenes in the film are not only very electrifying but also utterly brutal at times. As a matter of fact, the movie made me wince as much as “The Raid: Redemption” (2011), but it presents its extreme moments of violence with style, personality, and a bit of wit at least. Sure, “The Raid: Redemption” is a well-made genre exercise, but it is rather monotonous as merely showing off numerous violent physical action scenes. In contrast, “The Furious” boldly and ambitiously goes further for more fun and excitement for us, and it is occasionally quite willing to go over the top to our amusement while also steadily maintaining the ground with admirable commitment.

It certainly helps that many of the main cast members in the film are skilled martial arts experts, who ably embody what my late mentor/friend Roger Ebert said in his review for “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragoon” (2000): “The best martial arts movies have nothing to do with fighting and everything to do with personal excellence.” As the center of the story, Xie Miao, who once held his own place quite well besides Jet Li in “My Father Is a Hero” (1995) 31 years ago, diligently holds the center with his earnest acting, and Joe Taslim is also effective as an accidental partner of Xie’s character. Young performer Yang Enyou is fetching as her character comes to show more pluck than expected later in the story, and Brian Le, Joey Iwanaga, and Yayan Ruhian are as formidably menacing as demanded by their colorful villain characters. While some of you may be amused to see Ruhian fighting with Taslim as they once did in “The Raid: Redemption”, Le, who was crucial in that very hilarious action sequence in Oscar-winning film “Everything Everywhere All at Once” (2022), functions as an unexpected source of twisted humor at times.

On the whole, “The Furious” is one of the most impressive action films of this year, and director Kenji Tanigaki, a Japanese filmmaker who has been mainly known for his action choreography career in Hong Kong action cinema, surely demonstrates here that he really knows how to engage and then enthrall his audiences. To be frank with you, I considered giving only three stars as being fairly satisfied around the middle of the film, but then it impressed and entertained me a lot more than expected, so I give an extra half star as a little gesture of my inconsequential compliment.

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Turning Point: Generation 9/11 (2026) ☆☆1/2(2.5/4): From 9/11 to Now

Posted on September 20, 2026 by kaist455

Netflix documentary “Turning Point: Generation 9/11” attempts to look over how things have changed for a particular generation during last 25 years since the 9/11 terror incident in 2001. Mainly because its main subject is too enormous to be packed into its 97-minute running time, the documentary merely scratches the surface of its main subject at times, but it is also difficult for us not to be touched by some powerful human moments presented in the documentary.

Just like many of you, I remember how much I was confused and shocked by what happened on that day in September 2001. Because it was the late night in South Korea at that time, I merely studied and then slept for the next day just like many others in my university campus, and I belatedly came to learn about the incident around the noon of the very next day. I initially thought it was just a minor accident, but it did not take much time for me to realize how serious it really was, and I could not help but feel numb or anxious at times even though I kept going in my academic daily life as usual.

Not so surprisingly, the best parts of the documentary mainly come from a bunch of various interviewees deeply affected by the 9/11 incident in one way or another. Their lives were changed forever by this dreadful incident, and a series of rough but undeniably visceral archival footage clips give us a closer look into how shocking and devastating the incident was to them and many others in US at that time. Yes, everyone was just mildly baffled when the first airplane crashed into one of the twin towers of the World Trade Center, but then there came the second attack around 20 minutes later, and things did change forever for not only US but also the whole world after that point.

Several young interviewees in the documentary, many of whom were very young or born after the 9/11 incident, openly talk about how their lives have been shaped by that. In case of Laurel Homer, her father was the co-pilot of United 93, and she willingly tells us how much she has been haunted by her personal loss as well as the 9/11 incident. In case of An Nguyen, his South Vietnamese immigrant father happened to be working inside the Pentagon at that time, and he still remembers vividly when he saw his dear father for the last time in the early morning of that day.

As the whole country was shaking in shock, confusion, fear, and anger, the US government led by President George W. Bush instantly went all the way for the following War on Terror, which turned out to be far longer than expected while only causing a heap of ramifications to deal with. First, they invaded Afghanistan mainly for capturing Osama bin Laden, and then they went after Iraq on the false excuse of Weapons of Mass Destruction (MWD). As all of us know too well, this led to more chaos and violence while not making the country or the whole world safer at all. Even after bin Laden was finally located and then eliminated, chaos and violence continued to reign in Afghanistan and Iraq, and this unfortunately opened the door for something worse than Al-Qaeda. 

Most of all, the American society has become much more oppressive to its own people. More power and authority were handed to the US government in the name of national security during next several years since the 9/11 incident, and the documentary sharply points out how this eventually led to the blatantly hostile policies on millions of immigrants in US, which have become all the worse under President Donald J. Trump and his equally deplorable cronies. In addition, the 9/11 incident also caused the alarming increase of conspiracy theory and political polarization, and this surely contributed a lot to Trump’s unbelievably shocking political rise in the middle of the 2010s. 

The second half of the documentary mainly focuses on what was supposed to be the end of the War on Terror. In 2021, the US government decided to withdraw its soldiers from Afghanistan, and everything rapidly crumbled as the Taliban army swiftly took over many parts of the country within a few days. Needless to say, Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, and many of its citizens were soon thrown into fear and panic, and the documentary shows thousands of Afghanistan people desperately trying to get out of the country at a big airport under the control of the US Army.

 I must say that it is often devastating to observe their sheer panic and desperation at that time. Many of them were blocked at a certain spot near the airport as frequently threatened by those Taliban soldiers, and, to make matters worse, the American soldiers guarding this spot were not so prepared for this immense emergency from the start. 

Some of these soldiers, who incidentally represent another side of the 9/11 generation in US, frankly talk about that time in front of the camera, and it is apparent to us that they are still haunted by what they saw and experienced. When they joined the army, they all certainly believed that they were doing the right thing for their dear country, but now they have a lot of doubt and disillusionment about what they and many other American soldiers really fought for during last two decades.

In conclusion, “Turning Point: Generation 9/11”, which is directed by Brian Knappenberger, is engaging to some degree, but it would be more insightful and interesting if it were a docuseries instead just like several other Turning Point docuseries on Netflix. Sure, it is sincere and respectful about its main subject, but it does not enlighten me that much on the whole, and that is a bit disappointing for me.

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Coming of Age (2025) ☆☆☆(3/4): Now there comes the time to grow up for all of them

Posted on September 20, 2026 by kaist455

South Korean independent film “Coming of Age” is a familiar mix of comedy drama. Mainly revolving around one problematic father and daughter relationship, the movie looks around not only its two main characters but also several other family members of theirs, and it is alternatively humorous and poignant as closely examining their lives and relationships.

The two main characters of the story are a middle-aged man named Cheol-taek (Ki Joo-bong) and his young adult daughter Jeong-mi (Ha Yoon-kyung). Right from his very first scene in the film, we see how casual Cheol-taek has been in his daily life, and we are not so surprised to learn later that he has been living alone by himself for many years since his wife Hyeon-sook (Yang Mal-bok) left him for living her own life away from him.

And then there comes an unexpected problem for Cheol-taek on one day. His recent medical examination shows that he has been on a very late stage of thymus cancer, and he surely needs somebody to help and support him during his following medical treatment period. Fortunately, Jeong-mi, who is his only child and has incidentally earned her meager living via working as an actress, is willing to be around him as much as possible, but Cheol-taek does not think that he really needs her help, while not worrying that much about his current medical condition.

However, once his medical treatment begins, the possibility of his mortality comes closer to Cheol-taek than before. His physical condition becomes more and more deteriorated due to his ongoing chemotherapy, and we get a little funny moment of dark humor between him and one of his fellow chemotherapy patients. While he subsequently gets a chance for considerable recovery, that understandably costs a lot of money, and this certainly puts much more burden on Jeong-mi, who soon finds herself a lot more frustrated and exasperated as taking care of her father day by day.

Ieong-mi and his father eventually consider getting some financial help from several family members of theirs, who are not so willing to do that for each own personal reason. Hyeon-sook, who has been enjoying her own life more after her retirement, is not so pleased about getting involved again with the man who was nothing but a headache for her before their eventual separation, though they are still technically married to each other on the record. She does not give much damn about him, but she cares a lot about her daughter nonetheless, and that makes her feel more conflicted about her husband’s grim circumstance.  

In case of Cheol-taek’s older brother Gwan-taek (Kim Jong-goo), he may be affluent enough to help Cheol-taek to some degree at least, but he cares more about the welfare of his own family. Gwan-taek’s adult son and his family, who are living with Gwan-taek, have clearly depended a lot on Gwan-taek’s financial support, and even his little grandson notices how his parents try to please and indulge his grandfather as much as possible.

As often generating humor and absurdity from the strained relationships among the family characters in the story, the movie lightly bounces from one episodic moment to another for more character development. While they spend more time with each other due to Cheol-taek’s ongoing medical treatment, Cheol-taek and Jeong-mi come to face more of the emotional conflicts beneath their relationship, and this consequently leads to a comic moment of social embarrassment among them and several others who happen to be around them. A subplot involved with Kyeong-mi’s ongoing struggle in her professional career feels rather redundant at first, but then it comes to function as another crucial part of the story later in the film.

I also like how another subplot in the movie shows more poignancy than expected. When her several siblings demand that she should take care of their nonagenarian widow mother, Hyeon-sook is not so willing to do that even though she does care a lot about her, but then there comes a little surprise from her aging mother, who has mused a lot on her family as well as her own life along the story as reflected by her phlegmatic narration.

The screenplay by director/writer/co-producer Jeong Seung-o, who is no stranger to dysfunctional family considering his previous film “Move the Grave” (2019), resolves the conflicts among its main characters a bit too conveniently, but the movie remains supported well by the solid ensemble acting from its main cast members. While Ki Joo-bong and Ha Yoon-kyung ably complement each other throughout the film, Yang Mal-bok, a wonderful veteran actress who has risen as one of the most dependable performers in South Korean during last several years since her astounding performance in “The Apartment with Two Women” (2021), has her own moments to shine, and several other main cast members in the film including Won Mi-won and Kim Jong-goo are equally effective in their respective supporting parts.

 On the whole, “Coming of Age” is a typical dysfunctional family dramedy, but it is fairly engaging thanks to Jeong’s competent storytelling and the commendable efforts from his main cast members. In the end, everyone in the film comes to learn that it is really the time for all of them to grow up, and the movie does earn a glimpse of hope and optimism as they respectively step forward a bit in one way or another. Regardless of how old or young you are, it is never late to grow up, isn’t it?

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Resident Evil (2026) ☆☆☆(3/4): A risky delivery

Posted on September 19, 2026 by kaist455

Zach Cregger’s latest film “Resident Evil” is a genre product packed with enough fun and excitement. Yes, just like its many other predecessors, it surely has lot of gruesome entities to pop up here and there, but it skillfully and humorously handles its familiar materials, and we gladly go along with that during its rather short running time (90 minutes).

As all of you certainly know, the movie is based on Capcom’s Resident Evil video game franchise. While there have already been a bunch of Resident Evil films during last 24 years, none of them was not particularly successful, and the first one, which was made by Paul W.S. Anderson in 2002, incidentally inspired my late mentor/friend Roger Ebert to write one of his most enjoyable negative reviews: “Eventually its tongue is nailed to the floor of a train car and it is dragged behind it on the third rail. I hate it when that happens.”

I have not seen any of the previous Resident Evil flicks, and I am also not so familiar with Capcom’s video game franchise, but it did not take much time for me to get accustomed to the story background and setting of the movie. After all, as your average moviegoer, I have watched a fair share of zombie movies for many years, and some of them are actually not so far from the Resident Evil films in terms of story and character.

The hero of the story is Bryan (Austin Abrams), a young medical courier who accepts another delivery job right after delivering an organ to a local hospital. When we hear where he has to go, we instantly sense a big trouble coming to him, but he agrees to go there anyway mainly because he needs to earn more money, and we soon see him driving his car to that place with something to be delivered by him.

Of course, the mood becomes ominous as he drives his old shabby vehicle along a very snowy road in the middle of night, and then something strange happens. A mysterious figure suddenly appears on the middle of the road, and that is just the beginning of what turns out to be a very long night for Bryan. As he struggles to understand and survive whatever is happening around him, more horrible things come upon him, and it goes without saying that this rather sloppy lad finds himself thrown into more manic and fear along the story.

As its frequently incompetent hero clumsily bounces from one narrative point to another, the movie deftly swings back and forth between horror and comedy. There are a bunch of horrible entities as expected, and most of them wield a lot of tentacles just like those creatures in John Carpenter’s classic SF horror film “The Thing” (1982). In case of one scene featuring a particularly mean dog appearing early in the film, the movie deftly dials up and down the level of tension as Bryan frantically tries to evade it, and we surely get some laugh and surprise from that.

Although it lags a bit when its hero has an obligatory scene where he gets to learn more about what is happening around him, the movie steadily serves effective moments of gory fun. Besides a certain grotesque entity which keeps coming after Bryan along the story, there are several other equally gruesome entities ready to attack him in one way or another, and I was particularly amused by an entity who can vomit something as acidic as the blood of that alien creature in “Alien” (1979).

I must point out that the story is basically a series of video game stages, but the screenplay by Cregger and his co-writer Shay Hatten steadily builds up narrative momentum while occasionally focusing on character development. While we mostly observe Bryan’s ongoing plight from the distance, he gradually comes to us as an ordinary dude desperately struggling in a crisis way over his head, and we come to care about whatever may happen to him in the end. 

It surely helps that the movie is supported well by the considerable talent and presence of Austin Abrams, who played a substantial supporting role in Cregger’s previous film “Weapons” (2025). He is constantly convincing in his character’s fear and panic along the story, and he also ably handles several darkly absurd moments from his hero’s frequent incompetence. You may roll your eyes as watching these moments, but, well, I would also be that incompetent if I suddenly faced a bunch of monsters coming after me.

Although Abrams’ good performance is the main show of the film, it is a bit shame that several other few notable cast members of the film merely come and then go without much impression. Zach Cherry, Kali Reis, and Paul Walter Hauser do as much as possible with their thankless supporting roles, but the movie could have a bit more space for them.

Overall, “Resident Evil” is often fun and entertaining thanks to the commendable efforts from not only Abrams but also Cregger and his crew members including cinematographer Dariusz Wolski, who did a stellar job of filling the screen with a chilly sense of dread. Although it is relatively less impressive than “Weapons”, the movie accomplishes its task as well as intended, and it surely sets an exemplary standard for any future Resident Evil flick to come next.

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The Intern (2026) ☆☆☆(3/4): A solid South Korean remake to enjoy

Posted on September 16, 2026 by kaist455

South Korean film “The Intern”, which is the remake of Nancy Meyers’ 2015 film of the same name starring Robert De Niro and Anne Hathaway, is better than expected to my little surprise. While being pretty conventional to the core just like the original version, the movie balances itself fairly well between comedy and drama on the whole, and I actually got engaged in the story and characters even though it did not exceed my expectation a lot.

Choi Min-sik, who has been comfortably going for relatively less intense roles compared to his unforgettable performance in Park Chan-wook’s “Oldboy” (2003), plays Kim Ki-ho, a 67-year-old widowed man who decides to try something different for his remaining life instead of being stuck in his ongoing retirement just like many old dudes like him. He applies for “silver internship” at some promising fashion startup company without much expectation, but, what do you know, he is soon notified that he is hired, and then we see him hopefully beginning his first day at the company.

However, everyone in the company including its young CEO Lee Seon-woo (Han So-hee) does not expect that much from him. After all, the main purpose of the silver internship is getting some tax break to benefit the company, and Ki-ho is understandably perplexed as he is simply required to occupy his desk without doing anything at all.

Nevertheless, he tries as much as he can for befriending others around him in the company. Despite the considerable age gap between him and two other interns much younger than him, it does not take much time for Ki-ho to get friendly with them mainly because they sit right next to him, and there is an amusing little moment when he learns several online slangs used among their generation (FULL DISCLOSURE: I felt really old because I am not familiar at all with any of these slangs – and I am just 43 at present, for Christ’s sake).

In the meantime, Ki-ho also actively looks for any chance of giving some help or assistance to Seon-woo and several other employees working under her. Needless to say, he inadvertently makes a few mistakes at first, but he gradually proves himself as a dependable intern ready for any task, and he also becomes a temporary chauffeur for Seon-woo after he happens to see her chauffeur drinking right before driving his car.

Although the mood is rather awkward between them at first, Seon-woo soon finds herself becoming comfortable with Ki-ho, who does not disappoint her at all as showing a lot of tactfulness and resourcefulness. Besides his reliable driving, he helps her in one way or another just like he has helped many of her employees, and Seon-woo comes to appreciate his sincere and dexterous assistance more.

And Ki-ho quietly and tactfully observes the growing personal/professional conflict of his boss. Although she has been the main force behind the considerable growth and advance of her company, Seon-woo has also been frequently pressured to hand over her CEO position to any more experienced and qualified businessman out there, and she feels all the more conflicted after sensing more of how she and her husband has become estranged to each other than before.

Needless to say, Ki-ho willingly becomes someone to lean on for Seon-woo, who is touched a lot by his humble decency and integrity. At one point in the middle of the story, he confides to her on why her company felt so special to him at the beginning, and we subsequently get a brief but sweet moment when he shows her a little hidden private spot inside the company.

After that narrative point, the story becomes more predictable as Seon-woo must decide what to do for her life as well as her company, but the movie thankfully does not overplay this. While leisurely rolling its two lead characters as before, it stays focused on their genuine human interactions, and it does earn its feel-good ending along with some smile from us.

While Choi Min-sik’s laid-back acting steadily holds the ground as required, Han So-hee did a good job of embodying her character’s strength and vulnerability, and she is convincing as Seon-woo comes to have more confidence and determination thanks to Ki-ho’s gentle support and encouragement. In case of several other main cast members including Kim Ju-han, Park Ye-ni, Ryu Hye-young, Kim Geum-soon, Yoon Sang-jeong, Kang Tae-oh, and Han Ji-eun, they are simply demanded to fill their respective spots, but that fortunately remains as a minor flaw as Choi and Han ably carry the film together from the beginning to the end.

In conclusion, “The Intern” works thanks to not only its two lead performers’ strong acting but also the good direction by director Kim Do-young, who drew my attention with her first feature film “Kim Ji-young, Born 1982” (2019). Like her previous film “Once We Were US” (2025), which is incidentally based on Chinese film “Us and Them” (2018), the movie is a solid remake with enough appeal and interest, and I gladly recommend it while rating it a bit higher than the original version (I gave it 2.5 stars, by the way). No, it does not surpass the original version, but I will not deny that I was more entertained this time, and my inconsequential rating simply reflects that.

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The Drama (2026) ☆☆☆(3/4): This is one *nasty* movie

Posted on September 14, 2026 by kaist455

Norwegian filmmaker Kristoffer Borgli’s latest film “The Drama” is quite sour and nasty to say the least. While it starts like your average romantic comedy, the movie soon turns out to be an absurd and vicious black comedy drenched in unabashed misanthropy. In fact, you may also be offended a lot by how brashly it uses a very, very, very sensitive certain American social issue as the ground for a number of deliberately unpleasant comic moments, and please don’t say that I did not warn you in advance.

The story begins with a rather awkward Meet Cute moment between a young American woman named Emma Harwood (Zendaya) and a British lad named Charlie Thompson (Robert Pattinson). While Emma is a literary editor, Charlie is a museum curator, and he tries a rather pathetic attempt to get closer to her when he happens to notice and then become smitten with her at a cafe. Although his little deception is soon exposed during their following first date, Charlie and Emma find themselves more attracted to each other, and then they prepare for the upcoming wedding some time later.

At first, everything seems to be going fairly well for their upcoming wedding. As they are more reminded of how much they are still attracted to each other, Charlie sincerely tries to write a flawless speech to express his love toward Emma, and it looks like he is going to deliver something really good enough to touch not only her but also their guests.

Of course, there subsequently comes a very unexpected problem for Charlie and Emma. As they have a casual conversation with Charlie’s best male friend Mike (Mamoudou Athie, who is unfortunately stuck in a very thankless supporting role) and his wife Rachel (Alana Haim, who does not have much to do here just like Athie), they are demanded to reveal to each other the worst thing they ever did in their respective lives. They could simply say no, but, mainly because 1) Mike and Rachel already did that first and 2) they happen to be quite drunk, they casually reveal what they respectively have not told each other.

While what Charlie reveals is merely trivial, what Emma reveals is so serious that it instantly ruins the mood among them and their two friends. I will not go into details here, but I can tell you instead that her shocking revelation subsequently throws Charlie into a lot of confusion and conflict. Regardless of whether he really loves Emma as much as he says, he cannot help but become more fixated on that serious fact in her past, and this surely frustrates and exasperates her a lot.

Cooly observing Charlie and Emma’s increasingly strained relationship from the distance, the movie has a lot of twisted fun with Charlie’s pathetic pettiness. Despite being fairly sophisticated as reflected by his profession, he only finds himself still struggling to process and then accept that exposed past of his future wife, and this inevitably leads to a series of very unwise (and stupid) choices which consequently make their situation all the worse than before.

Borgli is no stranger at all to such a morbidly absurd comedy like that. His second feature film “Sick of Myself” (2022) is occasionally quite uncomfortable as illustrating how far its incorrigibly narcissistic heroine is willing to go for more attention, and his next film “Dream Scenario” (2023), which is incidentally his first English language film, often touches on our nerve as a wry comic allegory on the volatile aspects of online popularity.

In case of “The Drama”, it is decidedly as misanthropic as several notable works of Michael Haneke and many other clinically disagreeable European films about dark and unpleasant human behaviors, and I observed that with repulsion as well as fascination. The main characters are mostly broad caricatures I did not care that much about, and most of them are pretty disagreeable at times, but I was also sort of amused by how far the movie can go as pushing the story and characters toward the inevitable finale. 

Reflecting more on what I observed during my viewing, I think the movie sometimes goes too far to justify its vicious satire. Technically, anything can be a subject for comedy, but what I vaguely mentioned at the beginning of the review can be regarded as something too dark and serious to be used for humor and satire. Moreover, considering the racial and gender background of Emma, Borgli’s screenplay should have handled that subject with more sensitivity and thoughtfulness in my inconsequential opinion, and it also fails to flesh her out more along the story as mostly focusing more on Charlie’s petty and thoughtless behaviors.  

Fortunately, the commendable efforts from the two lead performers compensate for the weak aspects of the movie. Despite her under-written part, Zendaya demonstrates again that she is a charismatic actress with undeniable potential and talent, and it is a shame that she has not yet found a film which can make her really shine at the center. On the opposite, Robert Pattinson, who incidentally appeared in Christopher Nolan’s “The Odyssey” (2026) like his co-star and will appear along with her in the upcoming Dune movie by Denis Villneuve, unhesitatingly throws himself into the sheer pettiness of character, and he surely reminds us again that he is one of the most interesting movie actors at present. 

In conclusion, “The Drama” is definitely not something you can casually watch for casual entertainment, but you may observe its many unpleasant sides with some fascination and admiration if you appreciated Borgli’s two previous films mentioned above. I still feel rather ambivalent about whether it is as successful as intended, but I conclude that it is interesting enough to recommend, and you may later tell me what you think and feel about it.

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Oasis: Don’t Look Back in Anger (2026) ☆☆☆1/2(3.5/4): Oasis back in action

Posted on September 14, 2026 by kaist455

Documentary film “Oasis: Don’t Look Back in Anger”, which was released in South Korean theaters shortly after being premiered at the Venice International Film Festival, is a powerful experience you should not miss even if you are not so familiar with its main subject (FULL DISCLOSURE: I am one of such persons). Closely following the 2025 comeback tour of English rock band Oasis, the documentary mostly stays focused on the two contrasting figures at its center, and it is often touching to observe how their eventual reconciliation led to something very special for not only themselves but also many others out there.

They are Liam and Noel Gallagher, the two brothers who founded Oasis in their hometown Manchester, UK in 1991. The beginning of their band was pretty humble to say the least, but, thanks to their considerable talent, it did not take much time for Oasis to become one of the most popular rock bands in not only UK but also many countries around the world, and the early part of the documentary shows how popular their band really was during the 1990s.

However, due to their undeniable personality difference, Liam and Noel also constantly clashed with each other, and the increasingly tense conflicts between them certainly affected their band in one way or another. In the end, their collaboration was suddenly aborted in the middle of their another tour in 2009, and that seemed to be the irreversible end of one of the most successful British rock bands in the history.

During next 15 years, Liam and Noel never tried to approach to each other in public or private, but both of them subsequently changed their mind. Regardless of how angry or bitter they were about each other, they somehow agreed to put their old band back in action, and that accordingly led them to the preparation for the worldwide tour in 2025.

Of course, working together again after many years of estrangement and resentment were not so easy for both Noel and Liam, and we get some uneasy amusement as observing how they and several other musicians including their old friend/colleague Paul “Bonehead” Arthurs did their rehearsals. While he begins the rehearsal first along with his colleagues, Noel is still not so sure about whether Liam will eventually come, because he knows too well how capricious Liam can be. Fortunately, Liam later arrives at the spot, but the remaining tension and awkwardness between him and Noel is palpable to us even though they tactfully maintain some distance between them throughout their rehearsal.

Nevertheless, they and their colleagues gradually work together more and more, and the documentary sometimes juxtaposes this compelling process with the interview recordings of Liam and Noel. While being quite frank about their personality difference, both of them often become reflective about their life and career, and there is real human poignancy from how they get closer to each other bit by bit via their common artistic passion.

Needless to say, the documentary also pays attention to how their comeback excited millions of their fans around the world, who certainly contributed a lot to the huge success of the 2025 tour of Oasis. Noel, Liam, and their band members were enthusiastically greeted by their fans right from the first day of their tour, and this surely galvanized them more as they did one concert after another around the world.    

While the documentary surely shows a lot of enthralled audiences during the concerts, it becomes more interesting when it listens to a number of various Oasis fans around the world. To each of them, those very popular songs from Oasis mean a lot for their respective personal reasons, and they all have each own interesting story to tell. I was amused a bit as observing a Brazilian lady eagerly introducing a pet dog named after one of the band members, and I was also touched as listening to a South Korean “haenyeo” talking about how she got a lot of emotional comfort and support from those Oasis songs.

And it is also moving to watch how Liam and Noel became all the closer to each other during the tour of their band. As recognizing and accepting more of their many differences, they came to work together more harmoniously than before, and that accordingly brought more affection and respect from both sides. When we later see them doing an interview together, the mood between them feels quite more casual and relaxed compared to their strained first steps toward reconciliation, and their restored relationship becomes all the more evident to us when they show more appreciation and support to each other around the final concert of their tour.

Overall, “Oasis: Don’t Look Back in Anger” is one of the best music documentaries of this year, and directors Will Lovelace and Dylan Southern, who previously directed “Shut Up and Play the Hits” (2012) and “Meet Me in the Bathroom” (2022), did a stellar job of presenting their main subject on the basis of what was planned by co-producer/writer Steven Knight. Although the condition of a small screening room where I watched the documentary along with a few audiences including my boyfriend yesterday was not exactly ideal, I soon got interested and then excited within less than 30 minutes, and I also began to consider checking on several albums from Oasis later. This says a lot about how effective the documentary was to me, doesn’t it?

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Gill (2024) ☆☆☆(3/4): The boy who can breathe in water

Posted on September 14, 2026 by kaist455

South Korean independent animation feature film “Gill”, which finally came to local movie theaters after being premiered at the Bucheon International Animation Festival two years ago, impressed me a lot for its distinctive mood and style. Based on the 2011 novel of the same name by Gu Byeong-mo, the film presents an odd but compelling fantasy drama, and the result holds our attention to the end even though the story falters a bit during its last act.

The center of the story is a boy who is later named “Gon” (voiced by Jung Hae-in), and the opening part establishes how he somehow acquired an extraordinary ability. When his widower father attempted to drown himself and Gon in a big lake not long after killing someone, Gon managed to survive after becoming able to breathe in water via the sudden generation of a pair of gills on his neck, and then he was later rescued by an old man who has earned his meager living via collecting junks from those abandoned ships and boats on the lake.

The old man lives with his young grandson Kang-ha (voiced by Kang Ha-neul), who has stayed with his grandfather since he was abandoned by his mother several years ago. Although he does not welcome Gon that much at the beginning, Kang-ha soon becomes like a big older brother to Gon as he and his grandfather come to take care of Gon, and he is actually the one who came to think of that new name for him.

As both Kang-ha and his grandfather try to protect Gon from the outside world as much as possible, we observe a rather complicated relationship developed between Kang-ha and Gon during next several years. While quite fascinated with how different Gon is from others due to not only gills but also the shiny scales on his back, Kang-ha is alternatively protective and abusive to Gon, and he also commits some real cruel things to Gon just for putting more distance between them – until there later comes a point where Gon must leave Kang-ha and the old man. 

Their story is presented in a series of flashbacks intercut with a subplot associated with a young woman named Hae-ryoo (voiced by Lee Chung-ah), who happened to be rescued by Gon in the middle of one desperate night of hers. Quite baffled by her unbelievable encounter with Gon, she subsequently tries to locate whoever may know Gon, and that is how she eventually meets older Kang-ha, who, after becoming wiser and more thoughtful than before, is ready to tell everything without hiding or exaggerating anything at all about his very complex past with Gon.

As going back and forth between two individual storylines, the film sometimes loses its narrative focus, and we often observe the story and characters from the distance instead of getting more engaged, but the film compensates for its weak aspects via its distinctive mood and style. Although Gu’s novel is set in contemporary South Korea, the modern background of the film is an amusingly eclectic mix of Korean and European elements, and its cell animation texture often evokes several notable animation films of Studio Ghibli. These deliberate choices in terms of mood and style certainly feel a bit weird even to South Korean audiences like me, but it somehow works well with the fantasy elements in the story besides intriguing us more along the story.

And we are served with a series of fantastic visual moments whenever the story goes further with Gon’s special abilities. As becoming more aware of how different he is from others including Kang-ha and his grandfather, Gon feels more loneliness as your typical outsider, and he naturally comes to feel more freedom whenever he dives into the lake, though he remains stuck with Kang-ha no matter how harsh Kang-ha is to him.

While frequently admiring the commendable visual qualities of the film, I also found its story and characters a bit too flat and superficial. While several substantial supporting characters in the story besides Kang-ha’s grandfather are more or less than mere plot elements, the story also does not delve that deep into that love and hate relationship between Kang-ha and Gon before eventually throwing a couple of melodramatic plot turns during the last act.

Furthermore, the dialogues and narrations in the film are a little stiff and strained at times, and this often undermines the fairly good efforts from its several notable voice cast members from Jung Hae-in, Kang Ha-neul, Lee Chung-ah, Yoo Jae-myung, and Kim Sun-young. Jung, who recently appeared as a substantial supporting character in “I, the Executioner” (2024), and Kang did a solid job of embodying the contrasting personalities of their characters, and Lee brings some extra warmth and sensitivity to the story as her supposedly functional character comes to show more of her own thoughts and feelings along the story.  

In conclusion, “Gill”, directed by Ahn Jae-huun, is another interesting work to be added to the growing list of South Korean animation films during last several years. Although their levels of achievement are not so even in my humble opinion, they all show considerable potential in each own way nonetheless, and “Gill” surely demonstrates more of how far South Korean animation may go in the future. In short, this is one of the better recent results from South Korean animation, and I assure you that you will not easily forget it after it is over.

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Days of Being Wild (1990) ☆☆☆(3/4): A self-absorbed lad’s languid descent

Posted on September 12, 2026 by kaist455

Wong Kar-Wai’s 1990 film “Days of Being Wild”, whose 4K remastered version was released in South Korean theaters a few days ago, remains a distant but interesting experience for me. Mainly revolving around one handsome but hopelessly self-absorbed lad who is nothing but annoyance for others around him, the movie is not so pleasant to watch to say the least, but it also occasionally shows Wong’s considerable talent and potential which would give us several better films such as “In the Mood for Love” (2000).

At the beginning, the movie, which is set in Hong Kong, 1960, shows how its hero, Yuddy (Leslie Cheung), actively pursues attention and affection from a young woman named Su Lizhen (Maggie Cheung). As constantly dropping by her shabby workplace day by day, he tells her that they are destined to fall in love with each other, and she does not believe his words at first, but, what do you know, she eventually opens her heart to him due to his persistence.

This surely looks like the beginning of a genuine romance, but the movie soon shows how Lizhen’s relationship with Yuddy leads her to a lot of misery and bitterness. When she begins to consider being more serious about their relationship, Yuddy starts to distance himself from her just because he does not want to settle at all. This certainly breaks her heart, but she still cannot get over him – even after Yuddy quickly moves onto some other woman without any hesitation.

When she attempts to see Yuddy again, Lizhen encounters a young policeman who happens to be doing his routine patrol in Yuddy’s neighborhood. Although remaining as officiously detached as possible, the young policeman sincerely feels sorry for her, and that leads to the most poignant moment in the film. Although it is apparent that they feel something being developed between them, neither of them are willing to get closer to each other despite that, and we are more saddened to observe how the romantic possibility between them is eventually extinguished.

Meanwhile, the movie continues to observe more of how crass Yuddy is in many aspects. In case of his new girlfriend, Leung Fung-ying/Mimi (Carina Lau), she seems to have no illusion about Yuddy from the beginning, but, not so surprisingly, she also comes to want more from Yuddy just like his previous girlfriend, and Yuddy naturally becomes quite ready to get off from her at any time. This surely exasperates her a lot, and this leads to a dramatic confrontation between Mimi and Lizhen later in the story. Just like Lizhen, Mimi cannot help but become bitter and morose about her current status, and she is not even consoled that much by Yuddy’s friend Zeb (Jacky Cheung), who has been genuinely attracted to her for a while but only finds himself very frustrated to see her heart still yearning for Yuddy.

In case of Yuddy’s foster mother Rebecca (Rebecca Pan), who was once a fairly successful prostitute, she knows and understands her son better than anyone, but they frequently cannot help but pull or push each other. Even though being quite resentful about her, Yuddy still has to depend a lot on his foster mother because he is basically nothing but a bum, and this makes him cling more to finding and then meeting his biological mother someday.

While the story becomes moodier and seedier during its last act, the movie continues to dole out small but impressive moments tinged with indelible mood and style. We remain distant to its disagreeable hero to the end, but Wong and his cinematographer Christopher Doyle serve us a series of brief but poetic moments to remember, and you will not mind the rather redundant final scene at all even though you may also wonder whether this is really necessary. To be frank with you, I am still not sure about how this scene is connected with the rest of the story, but it is certainly nice to see Tony Leung Chiu-wai doing what can be regarded as a test run for his unforgettable performance in “In the Mood for Love”.

As the melancholic center of the movie, Leslie Cheung, who incidentally passed away in 2003, is flawless in his superficial character’s self-pity and narcissism. While his character is definitely an unpleasant cad, Cheung makes Yuddy as an engaging case study to observe from the distance at least, and he is particularly good whenever his character lets himself drenched in his own romantic narcissism – such as when he dances to music alone by himself while wearing only underwear (By the way, this was hilariously parodied in South Korean independent film “Lucky Chan-sil” (2019)).

Several other cast members in the film hold each own place well. Maggie Cheung, Carina Lau, and Rebecca Pan are terrific in their respective key scenes in the film, and Pan is especially good when we observe more of the complicated relationship between her character and Yuddy. Andy Lau and Jacky Cheung are also solid as the two substantial male supporting characters in the story, and Lau is an effective counterpoint to Maggie Cheung as they convey to us the subtle romantic tension between their characters.

In conclusion, “Days of Being Wild”, which incidentally came after Wong’s first feature film “As Tears Go By” (1988), does not impress me as much as “Chungking Express” or “In the Mood for Love”, but it is still interesting to observe how Wong was honing and refine his own artistic touches at that time. I merely admire it instead of embracing it, but it was nice to revisit it along with many audiences at a local theater anyway.

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