The Moon (2023) ☆☆(2/4): A middling space drama with lots of squeezed tears

Posted on August 3, 2023 by kaist455

My mind instantly went back to several different space drama films as watching South Korean film “The Moon”, which is incidentally not a remake of Duncan Jones’ acclaimed 2009 SF drama film of the same name. While its first act reminds me a lot of Alfonso Cuarón’s “Gravity” (2013), its middle act sometimes feels like the lunar version of Ridley Scott’s “The Martian” (2015) peppered with bits of Ron Howard’s “Apollo 13” (1995), and its last act attempts to squeeze tears much more than Christopher Nolan’s “Interstellar” (2014). However, there is nothing in the film which surpasses or reaches to the considerable achievement levels of all these wonderful movies mentioned above, and this sheer mediocrity is unfortunately exacerbated more by its awful screenplay and middling performances.

At the beginning, the movie, which is probably set in the late 21st century, quickly summarizes how the South Korean government has tried to advance its little but ambitious space program. Although the first manned mission to the moon was quite disastrously devastating to say the least, those folks at the South Korean space center try again 5 years later, and things seem to be going pretty well during the first several days after the successful rocket launch.

However, due to an unexpected big solar flare, the spaceship comes to have a serious mechanical problem, and that leads to another big problem which consequently kills two astronauts of this mission. To make matters worse, the only surviving astronaut, Hwang Sun-woo (Doh Kyung-soo), does not know much about how to control the spaceship, and that makes those folks at the space center all the more nervous. At least, the spaceship is on the autopilot mode, but there can be any unexpected problem during the rest of the mission period, and everyone begins to fear for the worst.

In the end, the head of the South Korean space center hurriedly seeks for help from Kim Jae-guk, who was incidentally his predecessor before that disastrous incident. As one of the chief engineers behind the development of the spaceship, Jae-guk surely knows a lot about how the spaceship is operated, and he reluctantly agrees to provide some help and advice even though he is still haunted by what happened five years ago.

And it soon turns out that there is some past between Jae-guk and Sun-woo, who is revealed to be the son of one of Jae-guk’s close colleagues. Because of their personal connection, Jae-guk becomes more determined to find any possible way to guarantee Sun-woo’s safety and eventual return to the Earth, and Sun-woo is surely ready to go for any chance for survival.

However, there subsequently come small and big troubles along Sun-woo’s increasingly perilous course around the Moon. At one point, he decides to go down to the Moon as scheduled before, but, of course, the situation becomes much more dangerous than expected, and we accordingly get a big action sequence as he desperately tries to survive at least for now.

Meanwhile, Jae-guk often finds his attempts blocked in one way or another. There is an incompetent science and technology minister who seems to have nothing to do except shouting or behaving like a jerk, and there is also some bureaucratic blocking by NASA. Although Jae-guk’s ex-wife Moon-yong (Kim Hee-ae), who is currently the general director of the NASA space station, tries to help him as much as she can despite their estranged relationship, but then she is also blocked by a couple of unsympathetic NASA bureaucrats (The movie will certainly not be welcomed that much by NASA just like Peter Hyams’ “Capricorn One” (1978)).

Around that point, we are supposed to care more about its several main character’s tenacious efforts along the story, but the movie frequently falters as resorting to lots of plot contrivance and heavy-handed melodrama. While none of its main characters are particularly developed well, most of dialogues in the film are not so good even at my rather low standard, and, above all, its many shameless attempts to squeeze tears from us are often on the verge of parody instead of ringing true to us.

It is apparent that the main cast members of the film struggle a lot with their deficient dialogues, and the movie will surely not be the best moment in their respective acting careers. Sol Kyung-gu broods, shouts, and cries a lot over many key scenes in the film, but the result remains monotonous to our boredom, and the same thing can be said about Doh Kyung-soo, who reminds me again that he always needs some strong direction for giving an engaging performance to watch. Besides merely looking convincing amid lots of CGIs on the screen, he is rather stiff or bland even during those blatant tear-jerking moments in the film, and he eventually get wasted just like Sol and several other main cast members including Kim Hee-ae, Park Byung-eun, and Hong Seung-hee.

Overall, “The Moon” underwhelms me for many bad reasons, and I can only appreciate the considerable technical efforts from its director/writer/co-producer Kim Yong-hwa, who previously directed “Along with the Gods: The Two Worlds” (2017) and “Along with the Gods: The Last 49 Days” (2018), and his crew members. Sure, the movie shows that they can make a technically competent space drama flick, but, alas, Kim overlooks what really matters most in those films mentioned at the beginning of this review, and I am already having an urge to revisit any of them.

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Ransomed (2023) ☆☆1/2(2.5/4): A risky unofficial operation in Beirut

Posted on August 3, 2023 by kaist455

South Korean film “Ransomed” is a disappointment in more than one aspect. As a thriller, it is not particularly tense or engaging in my humble opinion, and I only came to discern more of many fictional embellishments on a real-life story behind the film. As a drama, it is often shallow and mediocre in terms of story and character, and I became more distant to it instead of really caring about its two main characters’ urgent situation.

The movie is mainly set in Beirut, Lebanon in 1987. Due to the ongoing civil war, the city became a dangerous war zone during that time, and even foreign diplomats were not so safe just like many people living in the city. As shown in the opening scene of the film, a South Korean diplomat was really kidnapped under broad daylight on one day of 1986, and he was actually gone missing for more than one year after that.

Here in this film, we get the fictional version of how this kidnapped diplomat was eventually found and then saved (Is this a spoiler?). He somehow called to the ministry of foreign affairs in the South Korean government, and his desperate coded message happens to be received by a young diplomat named Min-joon (Ha Jung-woo). Once Min-joon reports to his superiors, his superiors immediately try to find any possible way to get back the kidnapped diplomat, and they eventually conclude that they must authorize a little unofficial operation for saving him as soon as possible.

Thanks to a foreign broker introduced by a CIA agent working in South Korea, all they will have to do is 1) securing enough money for the ransom and 2) delivering the ransom to whoever is holding the kidnapped diplomat at present, but both of these two tasks turn out to be not so easy to say the least. In case of the ransom money, they need to get the permission from President Chun Doo-hwan and his right-hand guy, who has been a crucial figure in the president’s ongoing dictatorship as the chief of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency. Incidentally, the president and his government are more occupied with preparing for the upcoming presidential election and the Summer Olympics in the next year, and any unnecessary diplomatic trouble in public is the last thing they want right now.

Anyway, the ransom money is finally secured after some persuasion, but somebody must step forward for delivering it to Beirut, and that is how Min-joon enters the picture again. Just because he has been hoping to work in US instead of some other less important countries, he volunteers to deliver the ransom alone by himself for impressing his superiors, who agree to give him a position in US if he successfully accomplishes his mission.

Of course, right from when he arrives at the airport in Beirut, Min-joon realizes that he may come into a circumstance way over his head. Although he manages to evade the watchful eyes of the airport guards who are as treacherous as many militia soldiers and criminals out there, he soon finds himself in the middle of a sheer chaos shortly after managing to get out of the airport, and that is how he comes across a South Korean expatriate name Pan-soo (Ju Ji-Hoon), who has incidentally worked as a taxi driver.

After saving Min-joon at the last minute, Pan-soo naturally gets more involved with Min-joon’s unofficial operation along the story. He does not want to get himself into any kind of trouble, but he agrees to help Min-joon more after promised that he will get some reward for that later. Although it does not take much time for Min-joon to see how untrustworthy Pan-soo can be, Min-joon has no choice but to depend more on Pan-soo because, well, Pan-soo is probably the only one he can really trust right now.

The middle act of the film focuses more on their shaky alliance, but the screenplay by Kim Jung-yeon and Yeo Mi-jung often fails to develop Min-joon and Pan-soo into engaging figures onto whom we can hold till the eventual finale. Despite the solid efforts from Ha Jun-woo and Ju Ji-hoon, both Min-joon and Pan-soo do not have much human depth or personality beyond their contrasting appearance, and many of supporting characters in the film including Pan-soo’s local girlfriend are more or less than under-developed plot elements. Even in case of the kidnapped diplomat, the movie does not seem to know what to do with this unfortunate dude, and he simply remains in the background even during the climactic part, just like numerous local militia soldiers and criminals hunting for him as well as Min-joon and Pan-soo.

Anyway, the movie does not disappoint us in case of several action sequences, director Kim Sung-hoon did a fairly competent job on the whole. Although it does not reach to the level of what is intensely achieved in Ryu Seung-wan’s “Escape from Mogadishu” (2021), the climactic part is handled with enough skill and craft at least, and I wish the rest of the film were as good as this part at least.

In conclusion, “Ransomed” is not entirely without any strong point, but these few strong points in the film do not compensate much for its weak story and thin characterization, and the result is one or two steps down from Kim’s previous two films “A Hard Day” (2014) and “Tunnel” (2016). At least, it is relatively a little better than another recent South Korean hostage thriller drama “The Point Men” (2023), but that is the only good thing I can say for now, and I would rather recommend you “Escape from Mogadishu” instead.

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The Blackening (2022) ☆☆☆(3/4): Which one is more, uh, black?

Posted on July 31, 2023 by kaist455

As a South Korean audience who does not know that much about the African American culture, I may not be an ideal one for “The Blackening”, but it amused and entertained me enough as a humorously self-conscious genre exercise. Although I am not that sure about whether I get all the jokes and satiric jabs in the film, I still can appreciate it as a silly but entertaining mix of familiar genre elements and some acerbic sociocultural satire, and I actually got tickled more than once as observing some of the most outrageous moments in the film.

The main background of the movie is a cabin located in the middle of some remote forest area, which surely spells a trouble to you right from the start if you are quite familiar with many slasher horror films out there. An African American couple arrive there first before their friends come, and nothing looks troubling on the surface, but of course, they soon find themselves targeted by some insidious figure once they come across a little old board game in the basement game room of the cabin.

After this unfortunate couple is promptly dispatched for not playing that board game that well, the movie quickly moves onto the next part of the story as introducing their arriving friends one by one. Everyone is eager to have a good time together in that cabin, and, to our little amusement, one of them is not bothered at all even when she happens to encounter a very suspicious figure while stopping by an old store in the surrounding area of the cabin. Sure, “The Texas Chain Saw Massacre” (1974) is naturally mentioned, but everything seems to be going fine and well once they are all inside the cabin while ready for fun and games during the evening.

However, the mood becomes quite disturbing when they subsequently go inside that basement game room and then find that old board game in question, which is incidentally named, yes, “The Blackening”. Once they open and then touch the board game, they soon find themselves trapped inside the cabin by that mysterious figure behind the board game, who has a diabolical plan on everyone in the cabin. This unknown figure is going to force all of them to play the board game which will spring up one deadly question after another to answer, and their survival mainly depends on how knowledgeable they are about the African American culture as well as being a black.

Coming to realize how perilous their situation really is, the main characters of the movie desperately try to survive as much as possible, and that is where many of laughs in the film come from. It soon turns out that most of them are not, uh, black enough for answering all those lethal questions thrown at them step by step, and the movie cheerfully makes a fun of their increasingly absurd situation while also showing the considerable influence from a bunch of notable genre flicks such as “Scream” (1996) and, yes, “Get Out” (2017).

The movie is basically a one-joke comedy, but the screenplay by Tracy Oliver and Dewayne Perkins, which is based on the 2018 short film of the same name by the comedy troupe 3Peat, keeps things rolling as often throwing self-conscious jokes and gags associated with its genre clichés and conventions. Because nearly every main character in the film is black, any of them can be quickly eliminated as required by those genre rules, and there is even a tense but amusingly preposterous scene later in the film where several main characters must decide who is the “most black” in the bunch for avoiding not getting killed together in the end.

Around the narrative point where the identity of the menace surrounding its main characters is eventually revealed, the movie comes to lose some of its comic momentum as expected, but it continues to provide good laughs under the competent direction of director Tim Story. While you will be amused a bit when someone unwisely says “I’ll be right back”, you may also have some good laugh from a very typical but undeniably hysterical case of talking villain syndrome during the finale, and I must tell you that I particularly like a nice punchline moment at the end of the movie, which incidentally involves with why many African American people are usually reluctant to call the police.

The main cast members of the film play their archetype characters as straight as possible for enhancing their many comic moments throughout the film. While Jermaine Fowler and X Mayo are relatively showier as required by their exaggerated supporting roles, Grace Byers, Melvin Gregg, Dewayne Perkins, Antoinette Robertson, and Sinqua Walls are also effective in their respective parts, and Jay Pharoah and Yvonne Orji have a little fun during their brief appearance at the beginning of the film.

Overall, “The Blackening” is often funny for its smart and engaging juxtaposition of its genre elements and the African American cultural elements, and it surely deserves to be mentioned along with “Get Out” and many other recent African American genre exercises including “Sorry to Bother You” (2017) and “They Cloned Tyrone” (2023). Although it does not surpass the devious comic precision of “Get Out” or the no-holds-barred satire of “Sorry to Bother You”, it is still entertaining enough to recommend, and it is certainly something you cannot miss if you are looking for something different.

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Bodies Bodies Bodies (2022) ☆☆☆(3/4): …And then it becomes deadly for all of them

Posted on July 31, 2023 by kaist455

“Bodies Bodies Bodies”, which is currently available on Netflix in South Korea, a nasty but humorous comedy thriller film which will amuse you in more than one way. On the surface, it looks like your average woman-in-danger flick, but it goes a bit deeper than expected as thoroughly and relentlessly satirizing its main characters’ banal relationships and shallow behaviors, and that is where most of its fun comes from.

The movie opens with a little private moment between two young women named Sophie (Amandla Stenberg) and Bee (Maria Bakalova), and we get to know a bit about them as they are going to a remote spot belonging to the father of one of Sophie’s rich friends. They have been in a romantic relationship for a while despite their apparent social difference, but Sophie is eager to introduce Bee to her friends, and Bee hopes that she will have a good time with others there.

However, things do not look particularly promising because Sophie and Bee turn out to be virtually uninvited when they arrive at a big house located at that remote spot in question. Although her three female friends, Jordan (Myha’la Herrold), Emma (Chase Sui Wonders), and Alice (Rachel Sennott), welcome Sophie and Bee at first, it is clear to us that they do not like their fun time with two guys interrupted by Sophie and Bee’s appearance.

The two guys in question are Greg (Lee Pace) and David (Pete Davidson), who is incidentally the son of the owner of that big house. David later expresses his displeasure during his private conversation with Sophie, and we also come to gather that they and their friends actually do not know anything about Greg, who is much older than them but comes there anywhere just because he recently happens to get involved with Alice via an online dating application.

Anyway, they all expect to have a good time together inside the house while it gets dark and stormy outside due to a hurricane during the evening. While a friend of theirs happens to be absent for some reason, Bee is willing to fill the empty spot instead, and the mood soon become more casual and playful as they are about to play a little murder game called, yes, “Bodies Bodies Bodies”. Somebody among them will take the role of the killer, and, after some dark moment inside house, they will have to guess the identity of the killer once lights are turned on and then the “body” is found.

Of course, the situation subsequently becomes more tense than before when something suddenly occurs to the shock of everyone inside the house. To make matters worse, they also find themselves completely isolated from the outside for no apparent reason, and they become more terrified as it seems that someone among them is going to eliminate them one by one.

This is certainly a classic thriller setup exemplified by Agatha Christie’s chilling mystery thriller novel “And Then There Were None” and many other similar movies ranging from John Carpenter’s “The Thing” (1982) and Quentin Tarantino’s “The Hateful Eight” (2015) to those Friday the 13th movies. As the body count is naturally increased along the story, the movie deftly dials up a sense of dread and paranoia among its main characters, and that is further accentuated by the atmospheric score by Disasterpiece.

In the meantime, the screenplay Sarah DeLappe, which was developed from the story written by Kristen Roupenian, has a naughty fun with how superficial the relationships among the main characters really are. Mostly interacting with each other on the Internet instead of making any genuine human connections among them, they inevitably come to reveal each own deception and hypocrisy under their increasingly perilous circumstance, and the resulting conflicts among them only lead them to a series of unwise things you should not do if you are in a slasher horror film.

As a result, many of the main characters in the film become rather unlikable to us, but the movie keeps holding our attention before eventually arriving at its expectedly ironic finale, and its main cast members are effective as broad but colorful characters. While Maria Bakalova, who has been more well-known thanks to her hilarious Oscar-nominated turn in “Borat Subsequent Moviefilm: Delivery of Prodigious Bribe to American Regime for Make Benefit Once Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan” (2020), dutifully holds the center in a plainer appearance, Amandla Stenberg, who has been more notable since her powerful lead performance in “The Hate U Give” (2018), functions as a good counterpart for Bakalova, and My’hala Herrod, Chase Sui Wonders, and Rachel Sennott are also equally solid. In case of Lee Pace and Pete Davidson, they do not hesitate at all from the obnoxious sides of their respective supporting roles, and their solid comic performances provide extra humor to the film.

“Bodies Bodies Bodies” directed by Halina Reijn, a Dutch actress/filmmaker who previous made a feature film debut in “Instinct” (2019). I have not seen that movie yet, but “Bodies Bodies Bodies” shows that she is a good filmmaker who knows how to engage and entertain us, and I enjoyed how she balanced the film well between comedy and thriller. Yes, this is another typical genre exercise, but it has some wit and personality in addition to working well as a biting social satire, and I recommend you to give it a chance someday.

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Stephen Curry: Underrated (2023) ☆☆☆(3/4): From an underdog to a legend

Posted on July 30, 2023 by kaist455

Documentary film “Stephen Curry: Underrated”, which was released on Apple TV+ in last week, looks into the past and present of the professional athletic career of Stephen Curry, one of the most prominent NBA players at present. As a guy not so interested in sports, I could only observe and assess what is presented in the documentary, and I can only tell you for now that it gives us a fairly engaging underdog narrative although it could show us more about Curry as a human being in my inconsequential opinion.

At the beginning, the documentary mainly focuses on how much Curry was underrated in his early years. Just like his father, Curry wanted to be an NBA basketball player, but he did not look that promising just because he was rather skinny in addition to being not so tall, and this actually came to motivate him a lot. As advised by his father, he trained himself more and more in addition to improving his athletic strength further, and this eventually helped him distinguish himself as a young nut promising basketball player.

However, Curry still did not receive much attention when he was about to enter the college basketball league in 2006. At first, he really wanted to go to Virginia Tech because it was where both of his parents studied and played, but then he could not go there to his disappointment, and then there came an unexpected offer from Davidson College of North Carolina. Bob McKillop, who was the coach of the Davidson Wildcats at that time, clearly recognized considerable potential from Curry, and he was quite willing to nurture and support Curry as much as possible even though nothing much was expected from Curry at that time.

Anyway, Curry’s first year at the Davidson Wildcats was rather disappointing in the beginning, but McKillop continued his support toward Curry nonetheless, and a series of archival footage clips show how Curry gradually got better in addition to becoming another substantial part of the team. There later came a big moment of defeat and frustration for not only Curry but also many of other team members, but McKillop did not give up at all, and Curry and his several ex-team members reminisce about how McKillop gave them some hard criticism while never losing his usual supportive stance at that daunting time.

What followed next is your typical underdog drama, and that is certainly the most engaging part of the documentary. After discerning that they really had to play together as perfectly as possible, Curry and other main team members tried hard to excel themselves besides building up more team spirit among them, and, what do you know, they became almost invincible once they eventually found a way to click well with each other on the court. At the Southern Conference, the Davidson Wildcats surprised everyone as winning the Championship three times during 2006-2008, and this significant achievement eventually led to its participation in the NCAA tournament in 2008. Because the Davidson Wildcats never entered the NCAA tournament for almost 40 years, everyone in the Davidson College went wild to say the least, and that was certainly another highlight in Curry’s years in the Davidson Wildcats.

I will not go into details on what happened next, but I can tell you instead that director/co-producer Peter Nicks, who previously impressed me with two very good documentaries “The Force” (2017) and “Homeroom” (2021). did a competent job of building up narrative momentum. Around the point where it the documentary eventually arrives at a big dramatic moment to remember for everyone at the court, you may brace yourself for a bit even though you are much more knowledgeable about Curry’s professional athletic carrier than me.

This narrative is often intercut with Curry’s current status as a prominent NBA player. As already told to us at the beginning of the documentary, Curry was underrated again around the time when he entered the NBA draft in 2009, and many people showed doubts as his rather disappointing records during first several years, but, of course, he was not so deterred by this as eventually becoming one of the most valuable players of the Golden State Warriors.

2021 was rather daunting for Curry despite a little historic moment for his professional athletic career, and the documentary attempts to look closer into his life, but I must say that this part feels relatively banal to the part focusing on his years in the Davidson Wildcats. The documentary surely interviews Curry’s several family members including his parents, but what they say in front of the camera is not particularly revealing in my humble opinion, and that is a shame considering that they might talk more about Curry’s life and personality. Things get a bit more interesting when the documentary shows us Curry’s sincere efforts on getting a college degree, but that still does not show much about him, while only leading to an eventual feel-good moment where he finally receives the college degree in front of his proud family members and numerous attendees.

In conclusion, “Stephen Curry: Underrated” is mostly informative and engaging on the whole, so I recommend it despite some reservation due to its relatively weak aspects. As far as I can see from the documentary, Curry is an interesting human figure to watch in addition to being a remarkable basketball player to remember, but his life and career are still going through their middle chapter even at this point, and now I wonder whether the documentary is a bit too early. As shown at the end of the documentary, he is already ready for whatever will come next to him, and we may get more interesting stories about him later in the future.

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Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken (2023) ☆☆1/2(2.5/4): The tale of a Kraken girl

Posted on July 29, 2023 by kaist455

Animation feature film “Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kragen” might have felt a bit more refreshing if it came out a few years earlier at least. During my viewing, I was reminded of several other recent animation films including “Luca” (2020) and “Turning Red” (2022), and, despite some fun and entertainment, the film does not have much to distinguish itself in the bunch. I liked it to some degree without getting bored, but, folks, I also wished it to have a little more distinctive personality besides merely being a well-made product.

The story of the film mainly revolves around Ruby Gillman (voiced by Lana Condor), who is your average shy high school girl and turns out to have a good reason for her anxiety and insecurity. She and her family are actually sea creatures called, yes, Krakens, but they have hidden their true identity from others in their little seaside town while disguising themselves as “Canadians”. Although she has gone along with that well during last several years, Ruby has felt more awkward about hiding her true identity from her schoolmates than before as entering her adolescence years, and even hanging around with several misfit students in her school does not help her that much.

Nevertheless, Ruby is eager to experience and enjoy more things out there, and one of these things is incidentally the upcoming school prom to be held on a big boat, but there are two problems to deal with. First, she wants to ask a certain hunky boy in her school, but she is understandably hesitant about that because she is not so sure about whether he really likes her as much as she adores him. Second, her mother Agatha (voiced by Toni Collette) has firmly forbidden her from doing anything on or in the sea, and she is not so pleased when Ruby tries to persuade her to make an exception for the upcoming school prom.

Of course, Ruby soon comes to learn the reason why she has not been allowed to be on or in the sea throughout her whole life. When that hunky boy happens to fall into the sea by her little mistake, Ruby jumps into the sea despite her initial hesitation, and, what do you know, that causes her subsequent transformation into a big Kraken with shiny tentacles. Once she later manages to get smaller thanks to her mother’s timely intervention, she comes to learn more about her mother’s family via her jolly uncle Brill (voiced by Sam Richardson), and that eventually leads her to meeting her grandmother, the underwater queen who incidentally prefers to be called “Grandmamah”.

While Grandmamah is eager to show and teach her granddaughter more about her kingdom and the considerable power and ability of their family, Agatha still wants her daughter to stay outside the sea, and that certainly makes Ruby quite conflicted. She does not feel like being ready for succeeding her grandmother someday, but she also feels less comfortable with her current life outside the sea, and the only consolation comes from Chelsea (voiced by Annie Murphy), a pretty red-haired girl in the high school who turns out to have her own secret to hide just like Ruby and quickly befriends her because of that.

What follows next is predictable to say the least, but director Kirk DeMicco and his crew provides a number of visually wonderful underwater moments to engage us as Ruby explores more of her new world along the story. Although I must say that they do not look as amazing as the highlights of “Finding Nemo” (2003), they are still fairly gorgeous with lots of broad but colorful details to enjoy, and I especially like the splendid grandeur of Grandmamah’s big giant underwater palace.

In the end, the story culminates to an expected climactic part coupled with some action, and that is where I got a bit dissatisfied. Although it thankfully avoids being too rapid or flashy, the film could take some more time for building up its story and characters more in addition to letting us enjoy more of its mood and details before hurriedly heading to its big finale.

Anyway, the voice cast members of the film are solid in their respective parts. While Lana Condor, who has been mainly know for Netflix film “To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before” (2018) and its two following sequels, fills her archetype role with enough charm and pluck, and her good voice performance diligently carries the film to the end even while the film stumbles more than once later in the story. While ably supporting Condor, Toni Collette, Annie Murphy, Colman Domingo, Sam Richardson, Will Forte, and Jane Fonda have each own moment to shine, and Fonda certainly relishes every moment of hers as Ruby’s commanding but doting grandmother.

In conclusion, “Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kragen” is often deficient in terms of storytelling and characterization, but it is a mostly competent product which has some enjoyable elements to hold our attention for a while. Sure, “Turning Red”, which is about a girl who can be transformed into a big red panda as entering her own problematic adolescent period, did a better job of presenting the anguish and anxiety of female adolescence with more wit and imagination, and “Luca”, which is incidentally the coming-of-age tale of a sea creature boy, has more style and personality in comparison. Nevertheless, “Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kragen” is not entirely without fun and amusement at least, and I will not stop you from spending your spare time on it.

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The Son (2022) ☆☆(2/4): The disappointing second film by Florian Zeller

Posted on July 29, 2023 by kaist455

Florian Zeller’s second film “The Son” is disappointing for seeming to have all the right elements to give us a fairly good family drama on the surface. Again, Zeller adapted one of his acclaimed plays along with Christopher Hampton, but the overall result is curiously dull and lackluster compared to the powerful human moments of their previous Oscar-winning film “The Father” (2020), and we only come to observe its cast members struggling a lot with thin narrative and superficial characterization.

At the beginning, the movie depicts how the daily life of Peter Miller (Hugh Jackman), an affluent New York City lawyer currently living with his second wife, is unexpectedly disrupted when his ex-wife Kate (Laura Dern) comes to tell him about their son Nicholas (Zen McGrath). According to Kate, Nicholas has been quite problematic for rather unspecific reasons, and now he wants to live with his father instead of his mother. Although he is not eager to live with his son mainly because his second wife Beth (Vanessa Kirby) is raising her baby son at present, Nicholas eventually agrees to let Nicholas stay in his residence, and Nichoals seems to be grateful for that.

However, of course, the situation gradually becomes awkward between Peter and his son. While he seems to get a bit better than before after moving to a new school, Nicholas does not talk much about whatever he has been struggling with, and that certainly frustrates Peter a lot. As a father, Peter certainly tries his best to connect with his son, but Nicholas seems to be more withdrawn instead of answering to any serious question from his father, and things only get worse as he shows more erratic behaviors.

Because she usually stays in their residence along with her baby son, Beth often shows her understandable concern to Peter, and Peter feels more conflicted about what to do with his son. In addition, he happens to get a big opportunity which may boost his professional career a lot, and he wonders whether he should give up that chance for paying more attention to his son.

However, no matter how much Peter tries, Nicholas only becomes more distant to him with a number of clear signs of mental deterioration. He turns out to have a certain disturbing habit shown from many mentally unstable people, and he often says about how much he has been tired of everything in his life. He sometimes looks brightened up a bit as shown from an impromptu dance scene between him and his father, but he soon goes back to his usual moody mode, and that disturbs both Nicholas and Beth more.

However, the adapted screenplay by Zeller and Hampton unfortunately fails to convey us whatever Nicholas is struggling in his deeply troubled mind. Despite Zen McGrath’s earnest efforts, Nicholas is mostly defined by his frequent mood swings and inexplicable behavioral patterns instead of coming to us as a real human character, and Zeller and Hampton’s adapted screenplay gets worse as struggling to provide some explanation via a number of contrived dialogues scenes which belong more to stage than screen. Now I am reminded of late critic Pauline Kael once said; “Explaining madness is the most limiting and generally least convincing thing a movie can do.”

As a matter of fact, many of relatively better moments in the film are not directly involved with Nicholas. The private conversation scenes between Peter and his ex-wife are believable as we can sense their past from some underlying bitterness beneath the surface. Even though the movie does not show a lot about what is going on between Peter and his current wife, we can clearly observe some emotional wound when he apologizes to her for whatever happened between them when he was quite drunk at the previous night.

The best scene of the movie comes from a brief but crucial scene between Peter and his aging father Anthony (Anthony Hopkins). Peter still remembers how much he and his mother were mistreated by his father in the past, but Anthony does not show any regret or remorse at all, and it becomes quite apparent to us that their toxic father and son relationship is influencing Peter’s efforts for Nicholas in one way or another.

It is not much of a spoiler to tell you that Peter belatedly comes to realize what a crummy father he has been to Nicholas just like his father was to him, but the movie continues to disappoint us more as throwing more plot contrivance into the story. As a result, what is supposed to feel devastating do not strike us much, and the following epilogue scene do not ring true to us at all.

Anyway, the main cast members of the film try as much as they can do with their underwritten roles. While Hugh Jackman shows that he can be much more serious than he was in “The Greatest Showman” (2017), he is not demanded to do much except looking glum and conflicted, and Laura Dern and Vanessa Kirby are mostly limited by their thankless supporting parts. In case of Anthony Hopkins, who was absolutely magnificent in his Oscar-winning performance in “The Father”, he somehow leaves a lasting impression despite his short appearance, and that says a lot about his immense talent and presence.

In conclusion, “The Son” is a major letdown compared to the considerable achievement level of “The Father”, and it only makes me curious about watching its stage version someday. On sidenote, Zeller also wrote “The Mother” besides “The Son” and “The Father”, and I can only wish that he will have more luck when he is going to adapt “The Mother” later.

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Polite Society (2023) ☆☆☆(3/4): A feisty genre exercise to cherish

Posted on July 27, 2023 by kaist455

“Polite Society” is a little but feisty genre exercise to cherish for good reasons. As an energetic mix between martial arts action movie and coming-of-age comedy, it kicks and punches all the way for giving us a bunch of outrageously spirited fun moments, and you will also enjoy how it is deliciously peppered with distinctive style and cultural elements to be savored.

At first, we are introduced to Ria (Priya Kansara) and her older sister Lena (Ritu Arya), and the movie quickly establishes these two young Pakistani-British girls’ respective personalities as they go through another day in their neighborhood in London. While Lena does not know what to do next after recently quitting her art school, Ria is quite determined to become a stuntwoman someday as frequently honing her martial art skills, and Lena sincerely supports Ria’s aspiration as her dependable older sister.

And then there comes an unexpected change into their daily life. On one day, they and their parents are invited into a big traditional part held at the old country manor of a wealthy family friend named Raheela (Nimra Bucha), and what we get next is a sort of the 21st century version of Jane Austen movie mixed with Pakistani cultural elements. Besides Ria and Lena, many other young ladies are invited to the party, and all of these ladies are eager to draw the attention of Raheela’s son Salim (Akshay Khanna), who happens to be an eligible bachelor in addition to being a very successful geneticist.

Unlike many of those young ladies at the party, Ria and Lena do not give a damn about Salim at first, but, what do you know, Ria is shocked to learn later that Salim proposes to Lena and Lena actually accepts his proposal. Naturally, Ria tries to protest, but her parents support Lena’s decision, and Lena does not have any problem with her decision to marry Salim. After all, she feels rather frustrated after quitting her art school, and it seems that marrying a nice rich guy like Salim is a much better option for her life.

What follows next is a series of comic moments showing Ria’s clumsy attempt to stop her older sister’s marriage by any means necessary. With some help from her two best friends, she tries to dig up anything suspicious about Salim for changing her older sister’s mind, but, not so surprisingly, that only adds more strain and conflict to her increasingly estranged relationship with Lena. So far, Lena looks perfectly fine to be with Salim or her future mother-in-law, and we wonder whether Ria simply does not accept well how things change between her and her older sister due to her older sister’s upcoming wedding.

However, Ria eventually discovers that there is something sinister about Salim and his mother. While it is apparent that Salim is your average mama’s boy behind his dashing appearance, he and Raheela look like having some insidious plan behind their back, and, as your typical domineering mother, Raheela is not going to let Ria to ruin her son’s upcoming wedding at any chance.

For fighting against this mighty opponent, Ria’s particular set of skills surely come handy to her, though she is still not so confident about whether she can actually save her older sister. The movie generates some good laughs when she tries to demonstrate her martial art skills in front of her schoolmates at one point early in the story, but it still cares about her hope and aspiration nonetheless, and it surely takes some risk along with its heroine when she must act right now for saving her older sister later in the film.

As the center of the film, Priya Kansara is alternatively funny and electrifying in her dexterous performance balanced well among comedy, drama, and action. Besides looking believable in many of physical action scenes in the film, she also anchors the movie well with unadorned sincerity and gravitas, and that is the main reason why several deliberately exaggerated moments in the film work on the emotional level even while tickling us a lot. When the movie tries a bit of song and dance moment during its climactic part, Kansara gives another impressive moment to be appreciated, and we come to root for her character more than before.

Around Kansara, director/writer Nida Manzoor, who incidentally makes a feature film debut here after making several short films, assembles a number of colorful performers. Besides looking both cordial and sinister as required, Nimra Bucha chews every moment of hers in the film with sheer gusto, and she does not disappoint us at all when her character eventually reveals her devious design on her son’s marriage. Ritu Arya fills her seemingly thankless role with enough life and presence, and she and Kansara ably convey to us well the considerable emotional bond between their characters during several key scenes of theirs. In case of several other main cast members, Akshay Khanna, Shobu Kapoor, and Jeff Mirza are well-cast in their respective supporting roles, and Seraphina Beh, Ella Bruccoleri, and Shona Babayemi provide extra fun as Ria’s schoolmates.

Overall, “Polite Society” is quite entertaining for its deft handling of several different genre ingredients, and it surely shows that Manzoor is another promising filmmaker to watch. As far as I can see from the movie, she is a competent filmmaker who knows how to engage and entertain us, and I guess I can have some expectation on what may come next form her.

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Smugglers (2023) ☆☆☆(3/4): Female divers who become smugglers

Posted on July 27, 2023 by kaist455

South Korean film “Smugglers” simply has a fun with juggling its various colorful criminal characters, and I enjoyed that. Although you can clearly see where it is sailing right from the start, you will gladly go along with that while being entertained by the game efforts from its solid main cast members, and the result is one of more entertaining products during this summer season in South Korean theaters.

The movie, which is mainly set in a small fictional port city in the 1970s, begins with the extended prologue part establishing the conflict between its two female main characters: Chun-ja (Kim Hye-soo) and Jin-sook (Jung-ah). Along with several other local women, they have worked as female divers, called “hanyeo”, for Jin-sook’s father, but their work has recently been jeopardized by the pollution caused by nearby chemical plants, and that is how they later come into the world of smugglers along with their boss. Things seem to get much better for everyone for a while thanks to their little smuggling activities, but, of course, there eventually comes a moment where they come to face the consequence of their criminal action, and the following tragedy breaks Jin-sook’s heart while also making her quite angry about Chun-ja. After all, Chun-ja manages to escape and then is disappeared, and everyone thinks she is the one who betrays them all.

Two years later, we see Chun-ja working as a small-time black market operator in Seoul. Because she has done her business without any permission from a powerful (and ruthless) smuggler called Sergeant Kwon (Zo In-sung), she soon finds herself being about to be eliminated by Sergeant Kwon and his right-hand guy, so she quickly suggests one seemingly good business idea for him. She is going to establish a new smuggling route for him, and she is willing to go back to her old place for that even though she is well aware that she will not be welcomed much there.

Anyway, once she succeeds in convincing Sergeant Kwon, Chun-ja promptly goes to her old place and then starts her little criminal project along with Ok-bun (Go Min-si), a charming but opportunistic young woman who has run a little coffee shop there. Because Jin-sook and other female divers are necessary for her plan, Chun-ja contacts with a guy who once assisted Jin-sook’s father but now becomes a local criminal boss, and he is certainly willing to help her a bit because of whatever he may get as a new business partner for Sergeant Kwon.

When she soon comes to learn of Chun-ja’s return, Jin-sook is naturally not so pleased to say the least. Although she and her fellow female divers have worked for that local criminal boss from time to time, getting associated with Chun-ja again is the last thing they want, and Jin-sook even swears in front of Chun-ja that she and her female fellow divers will not work for Chun-ja at any chance.

However, not so surprisingly, Chun-ja’s offer eventually becomes the one Jin-sook and her fellow female divers cannot refuse, but things become a little more complicated in the meantime. There is a local customs officer who has been watching on whatever is going on among Chun-ja and her associates, and Chun-ja also has a little plan for her survival when the situation gets much riskier later in the story.

Although it takes some time for building up its narrative momentum during its first half, the screenplay by director/co-producer Ryoo Seung-wan and his co-writer Kim Jeong-yeon deftly rolls the story and characters to the expected climactic part, and it also provides some seriousness as paying attention to the estranged relationship between its two female main characters. While they do not like each other much, Chun-ja and Jin-sook subsequently find themselves sticking together for beating their opponents, and it is not much of a spoiler to tell you that Chun-ja actually has her own reason for running away from Jin-sook and others at the time.

When it eventually arrives at the climatic part, the movie does not disappoint us at all with a thrilling underwater action sequence, and the main cast members keep holding our attention with their good performance. While Kim Hye-soo, who is still one of the most interesting South Korean actresses at present even though she has been active for more than 30 years, is the most prominent member in the group, she does not overshadow her fellow cast members at all, and her showy acting is often complemented well by Yum Jung-ah’s more grounded performance. While Zo In-sung and Park Jeong-min are effective as Chun-ja’s two different criminal associates, Kim Jong-soo is also well-cast in his supporting role, and the special mention goes to Go Min-si, who effortlessly steals every moment of hers in the film.

On the whole, “Smugglers” is another good genre film from Ryoo, who has steadily worked since his debut feature film “Die Bad” (2000). Although I did not like “The Battleship Island” (2017) much, his next film “Escape from Mogadishu” (2021) reminded me that he is still a good director who knows how to thrill and entertain us, and “Smugglers” shows him trying something a little different. As mainly driven by the vivid personalities of its main female characters, the movie surely makes a considerable contrast with many of his usually male-dominant films, and that is sort of refreshing in my trivial opinion. To be frank with you, mainstream movies in South Korea really need more female characters these days, and “Smugglers” may be a small but significant sign of change.

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They Cloned Tyrone (2023) ☆☆☆(3/4): They indeed did…

Posted on July 22, 2023 by kaist455

Netflix film “They Cloned Tyrone”, which was released yesterday, is a modest genre mix which is often very familiar but also engaging enough in its own way. Definitely reminiscent of a bunch of notable African American films ranging from those classic Blaxploitation flicks of the 1970s to Jordan Peele’s “Get Out” (2017) and Boots Riley’s “Sorry to Bother You” (2018), the movie wildly swings back and forth between social satire and conspiracy thriller for more thought and amusement, and you will simply go along with that once you get accustomed to how it is about.

The opening part of the film feels like your average African American crime movie. First, we are introduced to a young drug dealer named Fontaine (John Boyega), and then we observes how he gets himself into a trouble with some rival drug dealer in his slum neighborhood. In the end, right after visiting a local pimp named Slick Charles (Jamie Foxx) at a local motel for some little business issue between them, Fontaine gets shot multiple times outside the motel, and that seems the end of his life story.

However, what do you know, we see Fontaine waking up at his shabby residence in the very next morning without any sign of trauma, and Slick Charles is naturally confused and frightened when Fontaine subsequently visits the motel again. Although Fontaine do not remember anything about what occurred on the previous day, Slick Charles and one of his prostitutes, Yo-Yo (Teyonah Parris), did witness that incident, and Fontaine decides to look for the answer to this befuddling matter of his along with Slick Charles and Yo-Yo.

What follows next is a series of funny moments which make these three main characters have more doubt and question about their surrounding world. It looks like there has been some hidden conspiracy involved with their slum neighborhood, and they come to see more signs and clues as they try to get to the bottom of their increasingly peculiar circumstance. For example, they happen to find an underground laboratory where a certain kind of substance is being produced, and they later discover that this substance is actually one of special ingredients used by, surprise, a certain popular fried chicken brand among black people.

Because of the very title of the movie, it is not much of a spoiler to tell you that Fontaine eventually comes to learn that he is actually a clone, but there are some small, nice surprises I will let you behold for yourself. I will not tell you much here, but I can tell you instead that things become more preposterous when a certain supporting character played by Kiefer Sutherland enters the picture later in the story, and the movie shifts itself onto the realm of John Carpenter’s classic B-action films and their numerous juniors such as Kleber Mendonça Filho and Juliano Dornelles’ “Bacurau” (2019) when Fontaine and several other characters eventually decide to fight against the insidious conspiracy on them and many other black people out there.

While it does not reach to the devious horror satire of “Get Out” or the no-holds-barred farce of “Sorry to Bother You”, the screenplay by director Juel Taylor and his co-writer Tony Rettenmaier takes its time to build up some comic momentum along the story, and the movie has enough mood and details to hold our attention. Although the story is clearly set in the 21st century background, Taylor and his crew members including cinematographer Ken Seng deliberately fill the screen with grainy texture in retro style, and we are amused more as observing the blatantly old-fashioned interior design of those hidden underground places to be discovered by Fontaine and his gangs.

As the center of the film, John Boyega plays as straight as possible just like he did in his breakout performance Joe Cornish’s “Attack the Block” (2011), another preposterous but interesting genre flick which depends a lot on Boyega’s considerable talent and charisma. Compared to his rather strained lead performance in “Naked Singularity” (2021), Boyega’s quietly intense acting here in this film looks much more convincing as dutifully carrying the film to the end, and he also has some fun when he is required to do some multi-tasking during the climatic part (This is not a spoiler, right?).

With Boyega firmly holding the ground, the two main cast members of the film have each own moment to shine. Although his prime period mainly represented by his Oscar-winning performance in Taylor Heckford’s “Ray” (2004) may be already passed, Jamie Foxx is still an interesting actor to watch, and he brings a flamboyant sense of fun to his supporting character. Besides, he is also matched well by Teyonah Parris, a wonderful actress who has steadily advanced since her key supporting turn in Justin Simien’s “Dear White People” (2014).

On the whole, “They Cloned Tyrone” is an enjoyable genre mix to be appreciated for its mood, style, and performance, and Taylor, who previously wrote the screenplay for “Space Jam: A New Legacy” (2021), did a solid feature film debut here. The movie is a bit overlong (The epilogue scene, which explains the title of the movie, is rather perfunctory in my humble opinion), but it succeeds as much as intended at least, and I will not grumble for now while savoring its several effective satiric moments.

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