Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie (2023) ☆☆☆(3/4): Still going on as before

Posted on May 16, 2023 by kaist455

Documentary film “Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie”, which is currently available on Apple TV+ now, is plain but undeniably touching for good reasons. While simply letting its main human subject talk in front of the camera, the documentary gives us a vivid and intimate presentation of his interesting life and career, and we cannot help but more moved to see how he is willing to go further during the rest of his later years.

The documentary mainly revolves around a series of interview sessions between director David Guggenheim and Michael J. Fox, who has always been remembered for not only his considerable success in TV and movie business but also his well-known struggle with Parkinson’s disease for more than 30 years. Although he completely retired from acting a few years ago because of his deteriorating physical condition, you can still feel that spirited charm from Fox’s casual appearance, and he is certainly ready to tell as much as requested by Guggenheim behind the camera.

In the beginning, Fox reminisces and reflects on the struggles during his early years. When he grew up in Canada, he was your typical hyperactive kid, and his extroverted personality certainly helped him a lot as he later came to participate in the drama club of his school. As recommended by his drama club teacher, he came to do the audition for a supporting role in a local TV sitcom series in the late 1970s, and his following little success eventually led him to Hollywood, though he had to struggle a lot even while he continued to get roles here and there during next several years.

Fox still remembers well how desperate things were for him during that time. He was certainly eager to grab any big opportunity, but that seemed to be out of his reach to his frustration as reflected by his unsuccessful audition for a certain crucial supporting role in Robert Redford’s debut feature film “Ordinary People” (1980). He really tried hard, but Redford and others did not show much interest from the beginning, and that role eventually went to Timothy Hutton, who subsequently won an Oscar for the movie.

Nevertheless, Fox kept trying despite running out of options, and then there came another chance he was quite willing to reach for. Although the producers of “Family Ties” were not so convinced about whether he was right for the role even when they were about to shoot its pilot episode, but, what do you know, Fox charmed and amused everyone on the set once the camera began to roll, and that was the beginning of his stardom during the 1980s.

While “Family Ties” eventually garnered him three consecutive Emmy awards as well as considerable popularity, Fox got a much bigger boost at the same time when he was cast for the lead role of “Back to the Future” (1985) at the last minute. At first, Steven Spielberg and his director Robert Zemeckis shot the film with Eric Stoltz instead because Fox was not available due to “Family Ties”, but they eventually decided that they really needed Fox, and Fox was quite ready for that even though he would not sleep that much during next several weeks as busily switching back and forth between the respective sets of “Family Ties” and “Back to the Future” every day.

As we all know, this professional dedication of his led him to a success beyond his imagination. Thanks to the immense popularity of “Back to the Future” and its following two sequels, Fox became one of the biggest stars in Hollywood, and he also came to marry Tracy Pollan, an actress with whom he instantly fell in love right from their first working day on the set of “Family Ties”. He certainly felt like being at the top of the world, and he frankly tells us about the positive and negative aspects of the rapid rise of his acting career, which also caused some strain in his relationship with his wife.

However, not long after his father’s death, Fox suddenly found that something was going wrong in his supposedly youthful body during one morning of 1990. At first, it seemed to be the consequence of another wild drinking night with his actor friend Woody Harrelson, but then, to his shock and surprise, his doctor notified to him that he was actually suffering the early onset of Parkinson’s disease.

While keeping this in secret to everyone except his wife, Fox tried to go on as much as possible, but he could not help but become morose and depressed while his career also seemed to reach to a sort of dead end, and he confided to us about how he often resorted to alcohol during that depressing period. Fortunately, with his wife standing by him as usual, he bounced back from the bottom, and then there came another successful TV sitcom series in his career.

Even during that time, he tried to hide his illness from others in one way or another, but he eventually revealed his ongoing struggle with Parkinson’s disease in public, and, to his surprise, his life and career became much better than before. While he kept working for more than 10 years, he became a good father and husband to his wife and their children, and he has also passionately devoted himself to more public awareness of Parkinson’s disease (He received the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award from the Academy Awards for that in last year, by the way).

Overall, “Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie” is an entertaining documentary mainly thanks to Fox’s likable presence, and Guggenheim did a commendable job of mixing Fox’s interview clips with various archival footage clips and some tasteful reenactment scenes. I must point out that it does not show anything particularly new here, but it is difficult not to be moved by Fox’s candid reflection on his life and career, and that is more than enough for recommendation.

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Crater (2023) ☆☆☆(3/4): Their little adventure on the Moon

Posted on May 16, 2023 by kaist455

“Crater”, which was released on Disney+ in last week, is a predictable but fairly enjoyable product which simply has some little fun with its young main characters on the Moon. I must point out that it is rather inconsequential compared to other recent notable space drama films ranging from “Gravity” (2013) to “Ad Astra” (2019), but the movie still works to some degree mainly thanks to the game efforts from its young main cast members, and it actually has some genuine poignancy when it eventually arrives at its expected ending.

At first, the movie succinctly establishes how much the humanity had advanced in the middle of the 23rd century. There was a time when the Moon was regarded as another new place to live besides the Earth, but now it is no more than a mere mining spot due to the discovery of a distant but inhabitable planet outside the Solar system, where many people are eager to live even though it takes no less than 75 years to go there.

However, going to that new planet for the humanity feels like a distant dream out of reach for many people working and living on the Moon. Most of them have been bound by the unfair longtime contract of their big mining company, and, to make matters worse, their children are usually destined to follow their footsteps as virtually being forced to be stuck in the Moon just like them.

In case of Caleb Channing (Isaiah Russell-Bailey), this adolescent kid happens to get an unexpected opportunity of going to that alien planet for free, but that comes with the price. His father Michael (Scott Mescudi, who brings a lot more than demanded by his rather thankless supporting role), who raised his son alone for seven years since his wife died, got himself killed due to some unspecified accident while working at a nearby mine, and Caleb’s ticket to that alien planet is no more than a little compensation from that big mining company.

Caleb is naturally not so happy or excited about this situation, and he is all the more saddened about being separated forever from his three close friends: Dylan (Billy Barratt), Borney (Orson Hong), and Marcus (Thomas Boyce). At least, his friends are happy for him getting a chance to leave the Moon, and they are ready to have a little adventure along with him area just because 1) Caleb’s father told his son to go to a certain place outside their colony not long before his unfortunate death and 2) both Caleb and they really want to have an experience to remember for the rest of their lives before Caleb’s departure.

However, Caleb and his friends need to hurry themselves a bit more because Caleb will be taken to that alien planet no less than 72 hours later due to some unexpected schedule change. What they need right now is someone who can quickly get them a password which is sort of a master key for the gates of the colony, and that person in question is none other than Addison Weaver (Mckenna Grace), a smart young girl who recently came to the Moon along with her divorced scientist father. Although she does not welcome Caleb and his friends that much at first, she quickly gets interested after coming to learn about their plan, because, well, she has been simply bored by how uneventful and monotonous the life on the Moon is for her.

Once Addison manages to obtain that password, everything goes fairly well for Caleb and his friends. Along with Addison, they sneak into the garage where they can steal one of those big Moon rovers, and then they soon get out of the colony to their delight and excitement. Now they only have to do some road trip to their final destination, and they certainly go through small and big episodic moments during their little journey on the Moon.

What they behold and experience along their journey will not particularly surprise or amaze you much especially if you are a seasoned moviegoer familiar with countless space drama flicks out there, but the screenplay by John Griffin diligently rolls its story and characters from one point to another for more story and character development, and we come to care more about Caleb and his friends as getting to know them and their strong friendship more. Yes, they sometime clash with each other just like any other kids around their age, but they still care a lot about each other, and that is why they willingly take some risk when one of them needs to be rescued as soon as possible at one point.

Although Caleb is the least developed character in the bunch, that is compensated by his more colorful friends to some degree, and it surely helps that the young main cast members in the film occupy each own spot well as required. While Isaiah Russell-Bailey dutifully holds the center, Billy Barratt, Orson Hong, and Thomas Boyce have each own moment to shine, and McKenna Grace, a wonderful young actress who has steadily advanced since her breakout performance in “Gifted” (2017), shows more of her considerable potential and talent here.

In conclusion, “Crater”, which is directed by Kyle Patrick Alvarez, does not bring anything particularly new or fresh to its genre territory, but it mostly works as an intimate adventure story about hope, dream, and friendship, and I was touched enough by its bittersweet ending waiting for its main characters from the very beginning. In short, this is one of those safe products mainly for young audiences out there, but it does its job as well as intended, so I will not complain for now.

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Trans (2021) ☆☆☆(3/4): A little but ambitious high school SF mystery drama

Posted on May 15, 2023 by kaist455

There were several times when I wondered whether I really understood everything in South Korean independent film “Trans”, a deliberately baffling high school SF mystery drama about an intriguing possibility of technological transcendence beyond singularity. I must confess that I am still not so sure about many things in the film after watching it at last night, but I appreciate how it deftly distinguishes itself via its own mood, style, and ideas, and the result is certainly one of more compelling South Korean films of last year.

The story mainly revolves around a very strange circumstance of a female high school student named Min-yeong (Hwang Jeong-in). As the story initially jumps to here and there in a seemingly random fashion, we come to gather that Min-yeong has been bullied by several mean classmates of hers due to her current struggle with anorexia, and her only consolation comes from her routine online conversation with some questionable Christian counselor at her residence, which is usually devoid of her frequently absent parents.

In the opening scene, something quite shocking happens outside Min-yeong’s classroom. The body of one of her bullies is found, and the rather disturbing condition of the body clearly suggests that somebody must have had lots of spite and grudge against the victim. Because she called the victim at the previous night for no apparent reason, Min-yeong is soon questioned by a local detective assigned to the case, and everyone else naturally regards her with growing suspicion.

Meanwhile, we also get to know about two certain male students in Min-yeong’s class. In case of No-cheol (Kim Tae-yeong), he has been also frequently bullied because of a series of lightening accidents which he managed to survive, and we cannot help but notice his artificial right arm during his first scene in the film. Although he could show some support and solidarity to Min-yeong, he simply observes her latest incident of bullying from the distance, and that makes a big contrast with I-tae (Yoon Kyung-ho), a smart and ambitious boy who saves her via his special electronic gun at the last minute.

I-tae later takes Min-yeong to his little lair/laboratory, and he throws lots of fancy technical mumbo-jumbos involved with human neuroscience and computer science as your average young mad scientist. According to him, not only human brain but also human science and technology are almost close to the next breakthrough for human evolution, and it looks like he is about to reach to the point of, yes, singularity via his modest but very ambitious science project. Mainly using a special device based on the special electronic coil equipment invented by Nikola Tesla, and he wants to test his wild scientific theory as soon as possible, and his experiment subject turns out to be none other than No-cheol.

While she surely has some reservation on I-tae’s ethically problematic science experiment, Min-yeong lets herself get more involved with him as drawn more to the possibility of the Brave New World for them. If his experiment turns out to be as successful as he wishes, No-cheol will open the door to infinite possibilities out there for them, and that certainly looks like a better alternative to Min-yeong’s current miserable existence.

However, things get a lot weirder for Min-yeong after the big success of I-tae’s experiment. It seems that she is also somehow going through the transformation toward becoming a “transhuman”, and she soon finds herself stuck in a sort of time loop, probably because, as I-tae told her, time and space cease to matter when you finally become a transhuman. As she goes through a certain day again and again, she comes to sense that something important has been hidden from her, and she also comes to have some doubt on whether she can maintain her humanity after her transformation is completed.

Even though you get quite confused at times, the screenplay by director/writer Do Nae-ri, who made her feature film debut after her short film “Confession” (2005), holds your attention and interest as gradually getting us accustomed to its heroine’s warped state of mind, and I like how it is willing to get wilder and weirder along its increasingly complicated narrative. At one point, we get a big dramatic moment when I-tae and Min-yeong enter the final step of their experiment, and you may be amused a bit by several silly but funny artistic touches in this big scene. Although the special effects in the film surely look rather modest and simple due to its small production budget, Do and her crew members did a commendable job of incorporating them into the screen, and her three main cast members, who did not have much acting experience before getting cast for the movie, are convincing as playing their characters as straight as possible. While Go Min-yeong ably holds the center, Yoon Kyung-ho and Kim Tae-yeong are equally effective, and their solid acting is the main reason why the finale works with considerable dramatic impact.

In conclusion, “Trans” is surely not something we see everyday, and I am willing to watch it again someday just for appreciating its distinctive mood, storytelling, and performance. I cannot wholly explain well what is about, but I admire a lot how it is about, and I think you should give it a chance someday if you are looking for something different.

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Tori and Lokita (2022) ☆☆☆(3/4): A grim refugee thriller from the Dardenne brothers

Posted on May 14, 2023 by kaist455

The Dardenne brothers’ latest film “Tori and Lokita”, which received the special 75th Anniversary Award when it was premiered at the Cannes Film Festival early in last year, is another solid social drama to distinguish their long and admirable filmmaking career. Although I wish it could delve more into its two titular characters’ fragile and desperate social status, the movie firmly held my attention while also making me understand and empathize more with them along the story, and that is more than enough to compensate for several weak points including its rather abrupt finale.

During its early part, the movie, which is set in some unspecified city of Belgium, gradually lets us get to know the current situation of a young Beninese boy named Tori (Pablo Schils) and an older African girl named Lokita (Mbundu Joely). As mentioned later in the story, Tori is allowed to stay in Belgium while being recognized as a refugee orphan by the government, but Lokita, who has incidentally disguised herself as Tori’s older sister for some time, still struggles to get a work visa because she cannot convince those government officials that she is Tori’s older sister. She does get some support and help from Tori as well as several other people for her latest interview, but she is not so confident from the beginning, and, to make matters worse, she also often suffers chronic anxiety attack.

As observing how Lokita and Tori try to live day by day, we wonder whether her anxiety attack was resulted from their harsh condition of life at present. Both of them temporarily stay together at a local shelter, and Tori has attended a local elementary school for a while, but they also have gotten themselves into a local drug business mainly because Lokita needs to not only send some money to her family in Africa but also pay her debt to two brokers who brought her into Belgium. At one point, these two brokers unexpectedly come upon Lokita, and we soon see how mean and heartless they can be.

Nevertheless, Tori and Lokita still hope that things will get better for them in the end. Although she is not his older sister, Lokita really cares about Tori, and Tori has no problem at all with accepting her as his older sister. Although the movie does not tell or show that much about how they got themselves associated with each other, the emotional bond between them feels palpable whenever they are together, and there is a little cheerful moment when they joyously sing together a Sicilian song in front of the customers of a local restaurant where they have worked under some criminal chef.

Lokita and Tori have been mostly content with earning bit by bit while delivering drug here and there as demanded, but then that criminal chef dangles a supposedly better job opportunity in front of Lokita. All she will have to do is watching over a small illegal marijuana farm during one month, but, of course, there is a catch. During that period, she must be totally isolated inside that illegal marijuana farm for security reasons, and she will even not be allowed to contact with Tori. Naturally, she hesitates a bit, but she comes to accept this job offer anyway because, well, she really needs money right now while feeling more uncertain about what may happen next to her and Tori.

Tori does not have much problem with Lokita’s choice because he knows too well how desperate their financial circumstance is, and Lokita tries to adjust herself to the following period of isolation in that illegal marijuana farm, but both of them soon find themselves becoming more desperate than before. While Lokita misses Tori more and more, Tori also wants to see Lokita right now, and that eventually leads him to one little but risky adventure which eventually takes him to Lokita.

Not so surprisingly, Lokita and Tori later embark on a little scheme of theirs while not telling anything to their criminal associates, and that is where the movie starts to build up some tension on the screen. As the handheld camera of cinematographer Benoît Dervaux, who previously collaborated with the Dardenne brothers in “Young Ahmed” (2019), steadily and patiently follows our two main characters, we become more nervous about what may happen to them at any point, and the movie draws us more into their increasingly dangerous situation even though we can already discern what is waiting for them from the very beginning.

I must tell you that I have some reservation on the finale mainly because it is delivered in a way which feels a little too hurried and contrived in my inconsequential opinion. I am not so sure about whether it is right, and I also cannot help but wonder whether the Dardenne brothers should give a bit more dignity and compassion to their two titular main characters. Nonetheless, we all can agree that 1) the finale feels devastatingly inevitable at least and 2) the movie is still held together well by the excellent natural acting from Pablo Schils and Mbundu Joely, which reminds us of how the Dardenne brothers have dexterously drawn memorable performances from numerous first timers in many of their films.

In conclusion, “Tori and Lokita”, which was recently selected as the opening film for the Jeonju International Film Festival in South Korea, shows the Dardenne brothers back in their element after “Young Ahmed” (2019), which showed them trying to expand their usual territory of the young and dispossessed at the bottom of the society but unfortunately ended up being the least satisfying work in their whole career. In case of “Tori and Lokita”, they are a bit more successful in comparison, and I sincerely hope that they will improve further in their next film in the future.

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Septet: The Story of Hong Kong (2020) ☆☆☆(3/4): Seven different stories in Hong Kong

Posted on May 14, 2023 by kaist455

Hong Kong anthology drama film “Septet: The Story of Hong Kong” attempts to cover seven decades of Hong Kong via seven different intimate segments. Like many other anthology movies, the movie is not entirely perfect due to the different level of achievement of each of its segments, but it is still enjoyable on the whole thanks to the considerable personal sincerity and affection toward its main subjects, and it is surely something to check out for you if you are familiar with a bunch of notable Hong Kong filmmakers behind this film.

The first segment, “Exercise”, is directed by Sammo Hung and it is set in Hong Kong during the 1950s. This is a very simple and innocent story about a strict kung fu master, played by Hung’s elder son Timmy Hung, and a bunch of young trainees under his teaching, but you will be amazed by those young performers who show much more physical agility and flexibility than most of us, and you will also be touched a bit as clearly sensing some autobiographical elements from Hung’s life.

Set in Hong Kong during the 1960s, Ann Hui’s “Headmaster” will grow on you more as you come to reflect more on those seemingly simple personal moments observed from its titular character and one of young female teachers working under him. Both of them are good teachers who genuinely care about their students, and then we gradually come to discern that there is something developing between him and that young female teacher, which, to his sadness, he belatedly comes to realize many years later. Around this main story, Hui also adds a little episode involved with three naughty students, and the unaffected natural acting of the child performers in the film will bring some warm smile to your face whenever they appear on the screen.

The third segment, “Tender Is the Night”, is directed by Patrick Tam, and it is about two young lovers who will have to say goodbye to each other on one day of the 1980s. Right from when their eyes met, they quickly and passionately fell in love with each other, but now the girl is going to leave Hong Kong along with her family, and she cannot help but feel angry as her lover has already been quite resigned about the end of their relationship. As these two characters pull and push each other during their last meeting, the mood becomes more bittersweet, and that eventually culminates to a sublime moment of loss and sadness.

In contrast, Yuen Woo-ping’s “Homecoming”, which is set in the 1990s, is more cheerful in comparison as a funny and heartwarming story about an old guy and his granddaughter who has just returned to Hong Kong for some important examination. Right from when his granddaughter arrives at his residence, both the old guy and his granddaughter become more aware of the considerable generation gap between them, but, what do you know, they soon get quite closer to each other than expected after he shows a bit of his old Kung fu skill for her at one point. Yes, there will be always some distance between them in one way or another, his granddaughter comes to love and care about her grandfather more than before, and he surely appreciates that a lot while becoming more conscious of his mortality.

The fifth segment, “Bonanza”, is directed by Johnnie To, who is incidentally one of the co-producers of the film and shows a bit of his humorous side here. It shows several short episodic moments observed from three friends living in Hong Kong in the 2000s, and their clumsy attempts for getting rich via all those frenzies surrounding the local stock market are rather repetitive but hilarious nonetheless. Now I am reminded of what late Chicago film critic Gene Siskel’s helpful advice on stock market to his longtime colleague/competitor/friend Roger Ebert: “You can never outsmart the market, if that’s what you’re trying to do. Find something you love, for reasons you understand, that not everyone agrees with you about, and put your money in it.”

Ringo Lam’s “Astray”, which is set in Hong Kong in the 2010s, is quite poignant not only because of its small but tender and reflective family drama but also Lam’s death in 2018. As wandering here and there around in the city, a middle-aged man played by Simon Yam cannot help but become wistfully nostalgic about how the city looked many years ago, and then he feels quite confused and frustrated while hurriedly looking for the spot where his wife and son are waiting for him. Not long after one sudden accident happens to him, he and his wife move to his family home outside the city, and he becomes more peaceful than before, though he cannot help but annoyed by how his son and several other young men are rather disrespectful to his old traditional values. In the end, as reflecting more on his relationship with his father in the past, he comes to accept what he cannot possibly change, and that is soon followed by a powerful personal moment to linger on your mind.

The last segment, directed by Tsui Hark, is unfortunately the weakest one in the bunch, but it is not wholly without entertainment at least. Although it is no more than a neurotically self-conscious comedy sketch set in the middle of the 2020s, all performers in this segment are clearly having a fun with their deliberate overacting at least, and I will not deny that I was delighted by the cameo appearance by one of Hark’s fellow directors.

Overall, “Septet: The Story of Hong Kong”, which was premiered at the Busan International Film Festival in 2020 but was belatedly released in Hong Kong in last year before getting released in South Korea in this week, is an engaging mixed bag to be admired and savored. It is a bit of shame that John Woo, who was supposed to handle its 1970s part, dropped out for his health problem at the last minute, but that is just one of minor flaws in the charming tapestries of Hong Kong and its history and people, and I assure you that you will have a fairly good time with this lovely cinematic package.

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Next Door (2022) ☆1/2(1.5/4): “Why don’t you just call the police first, you idiot?”

Posted on May 14, 2023 by kaist455

Yesterday, I went to my dentist uncle for my routine scaling and a bit of dental treatment, and I had to deal with the possibility of physical stress and pain although everything turned out to be fairly fine on the whole after around 30 minutes. To be frank with you, I would rather go through this uncomfortable process more than once instead of enduring the 93-minute running time of South Korean film “Next Door”, which is one of the worst South Korean movies of last year in my humble opinion. This wretched piece of work is a brainless insult to any moviegoer who simply wants to be entertained, and now I must say this; I disliked, detested, and despised every nerve-grating minute of incompetence and stupidity in the film.

The story premise of the screenplay by director/writer Yeom Ji-ho looks promising at first. Its pathetic loser hero, Chan-woo (Oh Dong-min), has been preparing for his another attempt on the police department examination in an one-room apartment building full of young people like him, but then one of his friends calls him for drinking together in the evening, and he does not say no even though he really has to focus on his examination study right now. After drinking too much during that evening, he wakes up in the next morning to find himself in the one-room apartment right next to his, and then he is shocked to find a body on the bloody floor.

Not so surprisingly, Chan-woo is quickly thrown into panic and confusion, and he comes to commit a number of stupid things which will make your eyes roll more than once. Instead of instantly calling the police, he quickly gets out of that one-room apartment just because of being afraid of becoming the prime suspect, which may jeopardize his current preparation for the upcoming police department examination. Unfortunately, he happened to leave his smartphone in that one-room apartment, so he comes to do a very risky act for getting back into that one-room apartment again and then retrieving his smartphone.

Of course, the situation becomes quite more problematic shortly after he manages to get inside that one-room apartment. Mainly because of the landlady who soon comes to his one-room apartment for its boiler repair, Chan-woo only finds himself trapped inside his neighbor’s resdience much longer than expected, and he becomes more agitated by the growing possibility of getting himself exposed at any chance.

Now, this is certainly a typical setup for the fusion between thriller and black comedy, but the movie does not provide much thrill or humor or interest for getting things to roll within its limited background. While the screenplay is often quite trite and predictable as lackadaisically throwing one plot turn after another along the story, it is also very annoying due to its cheap sense of humor as well as its glaring lack of character development, and we simply observe its rather banal and uninteresting hero’s accumulating plight without much care or interest. After all, he had it coming from the start, so we do not feel so sorry for him as observing him from the distance, but his pathetic struggles along the story are not even amusing or compelling enough to hold our attention.

This is not the fault of Oh Dong-min at all, who certainly tries hard to sell his character from the beginning to the end. Sadly, he is stuck with delivering numerous bad lines besides forced to utter the same Korean slang many, many, many times throughout the running time of the film, and this does not bring any comic or dramatic depth to his character while only adding more annoyance for us. Sure, the movie does not expect us to like his character, but, let’s admit it, folks, he is your average superficial South Korean male jerk, and I must tell you that I do not have much tolerance for such characters like him especially if there is not any interesting thing to observe and write about.

And the movie only gets worse during its second half, where it tries more idiotic things here and there around its hero. First of all, it ruins any remaining taut sense of isolation and desperation via the introduction of a few other characters in the story, and it also annoys us a lot more than before as its hero continues to be stupid as usual. At one point, he clumsily tries to “investigate” the crime scene for understanding what the hell is really going on around him, but his silly attempt only reminds us that he will not be a very good policeman even if he manages to pass the examination. He also gets several opportunities to call the police, but he always chooses to do wrong things instead, and, as you have already guessed, his misguided choices only make things worse for him.

During my viewing, I became all the more frustrated with how contrived the movie really is, and I even found myself loudly shouting “Call the police now, you idiot!” more than once during my viewing. Fortunately, I was watching it at my residence via Netflix instead of watching it at a movie theater along with other audiences, so I did not have to be embarrassed at all, and that was probably the only saving grace in my terrible experience with the movie.

By the way, the main reason I watched “Next Door” yesterday was pretty simple. Several days ago, one of my acquaintances asked me to watch and then rate “Next Door” and several other South Korea independent films including “Drown” (2022) and “Three” (2020) for an upcoming local movie award ceremony, and I am rather depressed to report to you that I was not satisfied enough with any of these three films. I did not have to pay to see them at least, but should have I said no, I wonder?

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Drown (2022) ☆☆(2/4): At an old motel

Posted on May 14, 2023 by kaist455

South Korean film “Drown” disappoints me in more than one aspect. Mainly revolving around an old motel run by its increasingly unreliable hero, the movie attempts a moody psychological thriller filled with anxiety and confusion, but it often falters due to its shallow narrative and thin characterization, and it does not even handle well some borrowed elements from other notable genre films such as, yes, “Psycho” (1960).

At first, the movie establishes how things have been frustrating for a middle-aged guy named Do-woo (Lee Joong-ok). For many years, he has run a little motel located in some rural region, but his motel business has been seriously declining during last several years due to many reasons including the decreasing number of guests. To make matters worse, there is another guest who committed suicide in his motel not long after the previous suicide incident, and this certainly does not help his motel business much to say the least.

In case of his private life, Do-woo does not have anyone close to him except his senile mother, who incidentally has a serious dementia problem. Because there was no one else to take care of her, Do-woo had to handle many things including medicine for his mother, and he has been devoted to his mother as much as Norman Bates, but his mother’s medical condition only gets worse day by day to his exasperation and frustration. While she is usually quiet and still without saying any word, she often goes into her tantrums without recognizing her son at all, and that certainly interrupts his motel business everytime.

After her latest big tantrum, Do-woo becomes so stressed that he comes to swallow some of his mother’s tranquillizer pills, and then something happens not long after he consequently comes to sleep during next several hours without any interruption. While his mother happens to occupy the reception desk in the meantime, somebody comes with a young woman, and, not so surprisingly, something bad happens shortly after that unknown figure checks into a motel room along with that young woman.

When Do-woo wakes up some time later, everything seems to be mostly fine and uneventful as before, but he soon comes to realize that something is quite wrong, because his mother is disappeared for no apparent reason. After trying to search for her alone by himself, he eventually contacts with the local police, and that is soon followed by an extensive search upon the motel and its surrounding area including a big nearby lake, though they still do not find any clue on his mother’s whereabouts.

As Do-woo becomes more anxious and disturbed due to his mother’s disappearance, another unknown figure comes to the motel. Because he previously saw this mysterious figure, Do-woo does not hesitate to let this mysterious figure stay at his motel, but then we gradually sense more of the bad influence from this mysterious figure, who seems to be quite interested in spending some time with Do-woo for no apparent reason. When some pretty lass comes just because she needs a place to stay at the motel later, the mood becomes a bit lighter than before, but Do-woo remains shy and introverted as usual, even when that young woman in question looks willing to get closer to him.

In the meantime, the situation surrounding the disappearance of Do-woo’s mother becomes more ominous than before. A local female detective assigned to the case soon comes to find about those two unknown guests who came to the motel around the time of his mother’s disappearance, and she soon begins to regard Do-woo with more suspicion because she senses that he did not tell everything to her from the very beginning.

Around that narrative point where Do-woo’s viewpoint becomes gradually unreliable, you may come to have some pretty good idea about what is really happening around him, if you are a seasoned moviegoer like me. All I can say for now is that the screenplay by director/writer Lim Sang-su, who is not incidentally related to prominent South Korean filmmaker Im Sang-soo, will not surprise you much in the end. Yes, there eventually comes a surprising moment of revelation for Do-woo later in the story, but we are already seeing that coming from the distance, and we become all the more frustrated when the movie tries to muddle the situation more without much dramatic impact.

In case of Lee Joong-ok and several other main cast members in the film, they try as much as possible with their rather superficial roles. Lee did a good job of embodying his character’s longtime desperation and frustration without showing them off at all, Kim Dae-geon and Kim Yeon-kyo are well-cast in their crucial supporting parts, and Byun Joon-hee, Kang Mal-geum, and Gong Min-jung manage to leave some impression despite being stuck with their underdeveloped roles from the beginning.

On the whole, “Drown” is not a lousy piece of work at all, and I appreciated its foreboding atmosphere coupled with some bleak realism, but I observed its story and characters without much care and attention. To be frank with you, I happened to be quite tired when I watched the film right after returning from Seoul, and I just became all the more tired with lots of dissatisfaction. Perhaps, I should give it another chance later considering how I did not feel that well during my viewing, but, for now, I am not so particularly willing to do that.

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Three (2020) ☆☆1/2 (2.5/4): A dryly chilling serial killing story from Kazakhstan

Posted on May 12, 2023 by kaist455

Not long after “Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan” (2006) was released, there came “Tulpan” (2008), a little overlooked comic gem from Kazakhstan which shows a lot about that country which was hilariously misrepresented in the former. Around the time when “Borat Subsequent Moviefilm: Delivery of Prodigious Bribe to American Regime for Make Benefit Once Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan” (2020) was released, there came “Three”, a small but chilling film inspired by a real-life serial case in Kazakhstan in the late 1970s. Although it is automatically compared to other similar genre films ranging from “Se7en” (1995) to “Memories of Murder” (2003), “Three” is often engaging while taking us back to its dry but realistic period background, and that compensates for its several notable flaws in terms of story and characters to some degree.

After the gruesome opening scene showing the serial killer in the story committing his latest act of killing and cannibalism, the movie introduces us to a young police officer who has just begun his first day in a local police station in an unspecified city of Kazakhstan. Like any other rookie cop, Sher Sadikhov (Askar Ilyasov) is ready to prove himself as much as he can, and his seniors including his direct superior naturally observe him with mildly detached amusement while going through another usual day of theirs.

However, there soon comes a big case which troubles all of them. The severed head of some woman is discovered, and Sher and other cops begin to search for any possible suspect. When some guy, who later turns out to be the boyfriend of that murdered women, comes to the police station for his confession, it looks like all they will have to do now is recording his confession, but they all come to sense that this guy is lying, and it is eventually revealed that he has a rather pathetic motive behind his false confession.

Nevertheless, this guy also turns out to be a very valuable witness to help the investigation. When more suspects are brought to the police station, he suddenly becomes quite nervous at one point, Sher and his colleagues instantly sense that there is certainly the killer in this group of suspects. Two persons in the group eventually come to draw more attention, and Sher later visits one of them without much expectation.

Of course, it does not take much time for Sher (and us) to realize that there is something fishy about that suspect. While this suspect looks like your average loser on the surface, there is also something creepy about his attitude, and, what do you know, he turns out to be the one Sher and his colleagues are looking for. He subsequently does another shocking thing right in front of his drunken friends, and that is just a tip of the horror of what he has committed for months.

However, things get more complicated when this serial killer somehow escapes when Sher and his colleagues come for his arrest. Because Sher gets injured a bit on his shoulder at that point, his older sister Dina (Samal Yeslyamova), a schoolteacher who has lived with him for years since they lost their dear parents, becomes quite upset, and Sher is embarrassed a lot because of that. Sure, she cares a lot about him, and he also cares about her, but he cannot help but become annoyed by how much she is still devoted to him while not taking care of herself that much in contrast.

And then Dina is suddenly disappeared not long after she argued a lot with Sher, and Sher becomes quite concerned about because it is highly possible that she becomes the latest victim of the serial killer. Although he is not fully recovered from his injury, he is quite willing to participated in the ongoing search, and his direct superior allows that despite some reservation.

Around that time, we are supposed to care more about what actually happened to Sher’s older sister, but she is not particularly developed well even though she is one of a very few substantial female characters in the story. While Samal Yeslyamova, who won the Best Actress award for “Ayka” (2018) at the Cannes Film Festival, brings some genuine warmth to the screen, but we do not get to know that much about Dina besides her relationship with her brother, and she ends up being no more than a mere plot element.

During its last act, the movie also attempts to make some points on how much the Soviet government was willing to ignore and cover up the case just for preserving the public image of its country at that time, but that is where it becomes a lot less subtle than before. We even get an urgent chase scene unfolded inside a moving train, and the mood certainly becomes quite violent as Sher finally confronts the killer again. While Askar Ilyasov is effective as his character is driven more by his growing obsession with the case, Zhandos Aibassov is as disturbing as required by his murderous role, and Igor Savochkin and Nurzhan Sadybekov are also solid as two senior police officers around Sher.

“Three” is the second feature film of director/producer/co-writer Ruslan Pak, an Uzbekistani filmmaker of Korean descent who previously made “Hannan” (2011). Although I am not so satisfied with “Three”, it still shows at least that he is a competent filmmaker who knows how to draw our attention via mood and details, and I sincerely hope that he will impress me more in the next time.

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Return to Seoul (2022) ☆☆☆1/2(3.5/4): A manic pixie adoptee girl returning to South Korea

Posted on May 10, 2023 by kaist455

“Return to Seoul”, which was the official submission of Cambodia for Best International Film Oscar in last year (It was later included in the shortlist, by the way), is an interesting work to observe and admire for good reasons. As calmly but sensitively observing its conflicted adoptee heroine’s quiet but intense struggle in South Korea, the movie serves us a series of sublime emotional moments often alternatively baffling and striking, and we come to have some human understanding and empathy on her even though we still regard her from the distance along with the movie itself.

The first act, which is set in 2013, opens with its heroine’s arrival at a little inn located somewhere in the middle of Seoul, South Korea. While she was supposed to go to Tokyo, Japan, Frédérique “Freddie” Benoît (Park Ji-Min) chose to come to Seoul instead just because of an impulsive decision of hers, and, fortunately, she quickly comes across someone who can be a guide/friend/translator for her during her following staying period in South Korea.

Although the movie does not tell or show a lot about Freddie, we gradually gather some details of her life and herself. She was born in South Korea, but then she was abandoned not long after her birth, and then she eventually got adopted by some nice French couple. While everything certainly looks so alien to her in South Korea, that does not stop her carefree spirit at all when she is when she is drinking with her new friend at a local restaurant, and she surely enlivens the mood a lot. As watching how much she is driven to live for any good moment of joy and freedom, I wrote down this in my mental note: “This is the first manic pixie adoptee girl movie I have ever seen.”

Meanwhile, Freddie comes to learn about a local foundation center for South Korean adoptees looking for their biological parents. She seems not so interested at first, but, what do you know, she later goes to that local foundation center for getting to know anything about her biological parents. Although she did not prepare anything for the following procedure, both of her biological parents are soon located and then notified of her wish to contact with either of them, and she and her new friend later go down to Gunsan, a little seaside local city where her biological father has resided with his family. She is certainly welcomed a lot by her biological father and his family when she eventually arrives there, but she cannot help but feel uncomfortable as being more aware of the cultural/lingual gap between her and her ‘new’ family. As a matter of fact, she even attempted to go back to Seoul despite being in the middle of the bus trip to Gunsan, and you can see how much anxious and confused she is behind her rather detached façade.

Her biological father and his family try to be nice and comforting to Freddie, but we come to wince more than once as they annoy and bother her a lot even though they and she are total strangers to each other from the beginning. In case of her biological father, he is a pathetic middle-aged loser who also often drinks a lot, and, as a South Korean audience, I must tell you that I have frequently seen such guys like him not only on the screen but also in my real life. At one point, he is so wallowed in alcohol as well as self-pity that Freddie wishes more to see her biological mother, but, sadly, her biological mother does not seem to get involved with her again no matter how much Freddie and that foundation center tries.

The second act, which is set in 2015, shows Freddie living in Seoul now, and we observe how casually and aimlessly her current life is. She is living with some young tattoo artist, and he seems to love and care about her a lot, but she is rather distant to him in their open relationship. She does not hide at all who was her latest blind date via Tinder, and she even lets him and herself have a sort of little threesome moment with a fellow South Korean adoptee of hers when they all happen to be in the middle of a wild private birthday party for her.

When Freddie eventually gets tired more of being in Seoul, the movie jumps forward to the last act, which is set in 2020 as reflected by the sights of numerous people wearing mask on the streets and alleys of Seoul. At first, Freddie, who has just returned to Seoul after spending some years outside South Korea, seems to be more stable and well-adjusted than before with her French boyfriend, but we soon come to sense lots of discontent and conflict from her even though she does not signify much as she and her boyfriend have a cordial lunch with her biological father and aunt.

All these and other individual moments in the film do not seem to add up much when it eventually arrives at the epilogue part, but they come to convey to us a growing sense of isolation and alienation surrounding our heroine, and Chou and his crew members including cinematographer Thomas Favel did a fabulous job of bringing a considerable amount of palpable realism to the screen. For example, a number of real locations in Seoul and some other areas of South Korea are effectively utilized for bringing more local atmosphere to the movie, and I was certainly delighted a bit by a few shots of my hometown Jeonju later in the film.

Although several notable South Korean performers including Oh Kwang-rok appear as the crucial supporting characters in the story, they look believable as plain ordinary people, and they seldom overshadow the exceptional lead performance from Park Ji-Min. Despite never having any acting experience before this film, Park, who closely collaborated with Chou on bringing more life and authenticity to the story and her character (Her character is actually inspired by a friend of Chou, by the way), creates a vivid and complex human character to observe, and her performance is strong enough to hold our attention even when her character becomes quite distant and unlikable.

Overall, “Return to Seoul”, which is Chou’s second feature film after “Diamond Island” (2016), will require some patience from you due to its rather opaque storytelling and slow narrative pacing, but it will engage you more than expected if you just go along with its indelible mood and Park’s strong acting. As a Korean adoptee drama made by a French-Cambodian filmmaker, the movie is certainly curious from the start, and I am happy to report you that it is much more than being merely curious on the outside.

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The Pope’s Exorcist (2023) ☆☆1/2(2.5/4): A usual demonic stuff

Posted on May 9, 2023 by kaist455

Maybe because I am your average seasoned moviegoer, “The Pope’s Exorcist” mildly amuses me without scaring me that much on the whole. As I probably said before, I have seen heaps of movies about demonic possessions since I watched “The Exorcist” (1973) for the first time in 1996, and there were some good ones while there were also bad ones. I must say that “The Pope’s Exorcist” does not belong to the former group, but it is a well-made flick which shows some competence and amusement at least.

The movie, which is set in 1987, closely follows the story formula of “The Exorcist”. During the opening scene, we are introduced to Father Gabriele Amorth (Russell Crowe), and we see how he executes his latest exorcism ritual on some Italian lad who seems to be possessed by some demon. Although it is possible that this young man is simply an extreme case of mental illness, Father Amorth skillfully handles the situation as a well-experienced expert, and it looks like everything ends up being pretty well except for that poor big black pig at the scene.

However, he is not regarded well in Vatican, though he has considerable reputation as the chief exorcist representing Vatican while trusted and protected by the Pope himself. As he admits in front of cardinals, most of his cases have been just serious cases of mental illness, and he simply opens the door for professional psychiatrists via his theatrical ritual, but he also believes in the existence of devils because of a few inexplicable cases which are strongly suggestive of that.

Anyway, the Pope, played by Franco Nero with some mild gusto, soon assigns Father Amorth to a serious case happening in some rural area of Spain, which looks more like Ireland under its gloomy weather because the movie was actually shot there in last year. An American widow and her two kids recently moved into an old abbey which happened to be the only asset left by her dead husband, and she hopes that the following renovation will earn some money for her family, but, of course, there quickly come several bad signs here and there as she and her family go through their first several days at the abbey. In the end, one of her kids end up looking quite disturbed to say the least, and it does not take much time for a young local priest to realize that they really need an expert who can handle this frightening incident.

Father Amorth comes to the rescue by his little motorcycle (Isn’t it better to go there by an airplane, considering how urgent the circumstance looks?), and he discerns right from the beginning that he is dealing with a genuine case of demonic possession (Is this a spoiler?). It seems that whatever is possessing that poor kid has some old score to settle with Father Amorth, and Father Amorth really needs to be careful about this powerful demon.

What follows next does not surprise you much if you already watched “The Exorcist” and its countless imitators. While that possessed kid hisses or threatens a lot, many disturbing things happen here and there around Father Amorth and several others around him, and it also turns out that the abbey has a very dark past right beneath its old ground. Things seem to get more interesting when the movie attempts to juxtapose a certain infamous part of the history of the Catholic Church with its supernatural main subject, but, alas, the movie only comes to make a superficial excuse on one of the greatest sins committed by the Catholic Church.

As some of you know, Father Amorth is a real-life figure, and the movie is actually based on his two books “An Exorcist Tells His Story” and “An Exorcist: More Stories”. Even if you have not read them yet (I have not either, by the way), you can clearly see how the movie goes all the way for more exaggeration, and that only makes it look only quite generic and clichéd. In case of that poor American family in the film, these supporting characters are not so developed well from the beginning, and that reminds me of how crucial the quiet but realistic first act of “The Exorcist” is in many aspects. That classic movie takes some time for establishing a realistic background and a bunch of credible characters living inside the background, and that is why what eventually happens along its story is still compelling and powerful even though it comes to lose some of its shock and awe during last 50 years.

Nonetheless, Russell Crowe is having some fun with his inherently showy role compared to many other main cast members of the film, who are mostly stuck in their colorless supporting roles in contrast. Although he seems to be away from the prime period of his acting career nowadays, Crowe has willingly become a colorful character actor during his later years like Laurence Olivier did, and his engaging presence is more than enough to compensate for his questionable delivery of Italian accent and dialogues. Come to think of it, how can we possibly expect any authenticity from a decidedly unrealistic exorcist flick?

In conclusion, “The Pope’s Exorcist”, which is directed by Julius Avery, is rather middling while not bringing any particularly new or fresh to its very familiar genre territory, but I was not bored when I watched it yesterday. It is not recommendable enough, but you will not probably be disappointed that much if you keep your expectation as low as possible.

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