Thelma (2024) ☆☆☆(3/4): One spirited old lady

Posted on September 21, 2024 by kaist455

The most marvelous thing about “Thelma” is how its lead actress makes the movie more special in addition to being perfectly cast for her titular role. Although she is soon going to have the 95th birthday, June Squibb has been more prominent than before as one of the most dependable character actresses in Hollywood since her late Oscar-nominated breakthrough turn in Alexander Payne’s “Nebraska” (2013), and now she gladly takes the center at last as bringing a lot of heart and spirit to the film.

At the beginning, we get to know a bit about the daily life of Squibb’s character. Although she is over 90, Thelma does not have much problem with living alone in her residence located somewhere in a suburban neighborhood around LA. While her daughter and son-in-law are usually too busy to pay much attention to her, her adult grandson Daniel (Fred Hechinger) is the one who occasionally comes to her house and handles his grandmother’s daily matters because, well, there is nothing much to do for him besides that at present, and there is an amusing moment when he patiently guides her on how to use the Internet with her computer.

On one day, Thelma receives a call supposedly from her grandson, which urgently requests her to send a substantial amount of cash as the bail to get him out of a county jail as soon as possible. Needless to say, this turns out to be a voice-phishing scam, and she belatedly comes to realize that not long after sending the money via mail. While consoled a bit by her family members, she soon becomes determined to locate that voice-phishing criminal, and, fortunately, there is the address for a certain P.O. box where her cash was sent.

However, Thelma still needs a bit of extra help, so she looks for any friend who may help her, but she is reminded again of how her life has been getting smaller and emptier. Many of her friends were gone in one way or another, but a certain close friend of hers is still alive and well in a local facility for old people. That person in question is Ben (Richard Roundtree), and he happens to have an electronic 2-person scooter. Despite his initial reluctance, he eventually joins Thelma’s rather risky quest, and Thelma surely feels a little more excited for having her friend behind her.

As these two characters are slowly moving toward their final destination, the movie takes some time for more character development. At one point, Thelma and Ben drop by an old friend of theirs for a certain hidden purpose, and the mood becomes humorous when Thelma is trying to find something upstairs while Ben is buying time downstairs, but they also notice how things have been depressingly static and barren for their friend, who simply seems to be spending her whole day in her living room sofa.

While being reminded more of her approaching mortality, Thelma is not daunted at all because she is willing to go for more as enjoying her life, and we get a few comic scenes where she and Ben have to be a little more physically active. Although she is not as virile as Tom Cruise at all, Squibb demonstrates here that she can be quite feisty and spirited just like my grandmother who is also over 90 now, and we laugh more whenever her character seems to recognize someone in the past just like many old persons often do.

Meanwhile, the movie sometimes shifts its focus to Thelma’s family members including her grandson, who are certainly alarmed when she goes out for her little mission without telling them anything about that. Although this part feels rather perfunctory, the movie shows some care to these supporting characters as they come to show more sincerity as trying to locate where the hell Thelma is now. As Thelma’s daughter and son-in-law, Parker Posey and Clark Gregg provide extra humor to the film, and Fred Hechinger is also fine in his earnest supporting performance. Although Daniel may be your average slacker, he really cares a lot about his grandmother, and he also becomes a bit more serious about where his life has been going.

In the end, the story arrives at the expected climactic part along with Thelma and Ben, but the screenplay by director/writer/editor Josh Margolin does not hurry the story and characters at all even at that point. I will not go into details here for not spoiling the fun from the brief but effective appearance from a certain recognizable actor, but I can tell you instead that Squibb deftly holds the center to the end with the steady support from Richard Roundtree, who sadly passed away in last year.

Overall, “Thelma” is a small but charming comedy film which reminds me again of how fortunate I and many other moviegoers have been for watching Squibb appearing here and there in a number of various notable films such as Martin Scorsese’ “The Age of Innocence” (1993) and Todd Haynes’ “Far from Heaven” (2002). Believe or not, she actually began her acting career in 1948, and she only started to appear in movies after she made a debut in Woody Allen’s “Alice” (1990). According to Internet Movie Database (IMDB), she already has three new films to be added to her long filmography, and I sincerely hope that she will keep moving on during several more years at least while putting more dent on the ageism in Hollywood show business.

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The Nature of Love (2023) ☆☆☆(3/4): Her messy pursuit of romance

Posted on September 18, 2024 by kaist455

Canadian French film “The Nature of Love” is about one intelligent adult woman’s messy pursuit of romance. As following the ups and downs in its heroine’s romance story, the movie makes some sharp points on love and relationship, and the result is alternatively humorous and poignant before eventually reaching to the inevitable point where she must be really honest about her feelings.

At the beginning, the movie observes how things are mostly stable and comfortable for Sophie (Magalie Lépine-Blondeau), a forty-something lady who has taught philosophy at some university in Montreal, Canada. She has lived with a guy named Xavier (Francis-William Rhéaume) during last several years, and we see that both of them have been pretty fine with their current married life. Although they use separate bedrooms in their apartment, they are quite frank about themselves to each other, and there is an amusing scene where Sophie teasingly asks her husband whether he was really attracted to a certain young woman they met via a close friend of theirs.

And then there comes an unexpected moment of sexual attraction for Sophie on one day. When she comes to their country house outside the city, she encounters a hunky local handyman named Sylvain (Pierre-Yves Cardinal), and she cannot help but attracted more to him as he casually points out many stuffs to be fixed in the country house. After their first meeting, she cannot help but think more and more of this handsome dude, and then, what do you know, Sylvain turns out to be quite attracted to her, too.

Once they confirm their mutual attraction to each other, Sophie and Sylvain let themselves driven more by it, and we are accordingly served with several carnal moments between them. As they spend more time together, they become more fixated on each other, and this bothers Sophie a lot. Although she and Xavier actually agreed to be flexible about their relationship, her feelings toward Sylvain only get stronger day by day, and there eventually comes a point where she spills out everything in front of her husband, who is not that surprised but feels quite hurt nonetheless when Sophie tells him that she will soon leave him for Sylvain. 

For a while, Sophie feels really happy and excited to be around Sylvain, but, not so surprisingly, it does not take much time for her to see more of Sylvain’s less attractive sides. For example, Sylvain is your average working-class dude who is far less sophisticated than Sophie, and we become more aware of the considerable social/cultural gap between him and Sophie – especially when they happen to have a dinner with his family at one point. In addition, Sylvain also can be quite rude and harsh to Sophie over petty matters, and that is more than enough to make her very disillusioned about their relationship.

While its heroine comes to struggle over her matters of heart in one way or another, the screenplay by director/writer Monia Chokri, who also incidentally played Sophie’s best friend in the film, observes her increasingly messy circumstance with more humor and understanding. We get some laughs as she makes several unwise choices along the story, but we also come to understand her confusion and conflict more. Yes, she simply wants more romance and excitement in her life, and you will surely emphasize with her more if you have ever been as messy as her in your pursuit of love and relationship (Full Disclosure: I have been in such a state more than once during last several years since I came out as a gay in 2016). 

In the end, everything in the story culminates to the climactic scene where our heroine should make a big decision for herself, and I admire how deftly Chokri handles this crucial moment. While nothing is directly expressed across the screen, a small action made by our heroine feels quite dramatic nonetheless, and we can clearly sense her silent but firm decision on her life.

The movie depends a lot on the romantic mood generated between its two lead performers, who often spark the screen with the palpable chemistry between them. As the center of the film, Magalie Lépine-Blondeau is engaging as flawlessly illustrating her character’s complex feelings during several key scenes of hers in the film, and she is complemented well throughout the film by Pierre-Yves Cardinal, whom you may remember for his solid supporting performance in Xavier Dolan’s “Tom at the Farm” (2013). As Sophie’s less-than-perfect husband, Francis-William Rhéaume holds his own place well around the story, and he is especially good when his character desperately attempts to get closer to his ex-wife later in the story.

In conclusion, “The Nature of Love” is pretty familiar in terms of story and characters, but its story is presented well with enough intelligence and emotion in addition to giving us some valuable insights on love and relationship, which remind me of what my late mentor/friend Roger Ebert wrote in his review on Woody Allen’s “Husbands and Wives” (1992): “True love involves loving another’s imperfections, which are the parts that tend to endure.” Like the main characters of that incisively funny but painful comedy film, Sophie comes to learn that hard truth around the end of the story, but I think she will be eventually okay even though many things remain very uncertain around her. At least, she has now a full control on her life and herself as before, doesn’t she?

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Transformers One (2024) ☆☆☆(3/4): One of better Transformers flicks

Posted on September 17, 2024 by kaist455

Animation feature film “Transformers One” is one of the better Transformers flicks during last 17 years. Yes, I did not like most of those Transformers movies except a very few cases including “Bumblebee” (2018), so this may not sound like much of a compliment (I still shudder at how much I suffered due to “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” (2009) and several following pointless sequels, by the way), but I must tell you that “Transformers One” leaps way, way, way beyond the dreadfully low standard of these awful products at least.  

The early part of the film quickly establishes the history of the alien planet where its main characters and many other robots live. For many ‘cycles’, most of them have worked as miners because their underground city constantly needs a precious energy source after a big battle with some other alien race, and they all certainly hope that their current leader, Sentinel Prime (voiced by Jon Hamm), will eventually find a certain invaluable item outside and then free them from their relentlessly demanding mining work someday. 

However, a young robot named Orion Pax (voiced by Chris Hemsworth) is not someone who will just wait for any possible salvation. Quite determined to find any clue which may lead him to that invaluable item in question, Orion is ready to try anything for his ultimate goal, and he frequently causes new headaches for his two close colleagues D-16 (voiced by Brian Tyree Henry) and Elita-1 (voiced by Scarlett Johansson).

When a big annual race is about to be held in the city, Orion comes to have a rather impulsive plan for proving himself more to others including Sentinel Prime. He participates in that race along with D-16 without telling anything to D-16 in advance, and we accordingly get the first main action sequence in the film, which feels quite frantic at first but seldom gets us confused thanks to the strong visual sense of direction.    

Anyway, Orion and D-16 consequently get themselves demoted to a more miserable job, and that is the beginning of their little adventure outside their city. Thanks to a little help from their accidental robot friend, they soon find themselves exploring the surface of their planet along with him and Elita-1, who reluctantly joins their quest for that invaluable item.

Now the story feels pretty much like your average dystopian tale, and the screenplay by Eric Pearson, Andrew Barrer, and Gabriel Ferrari is rather predictable in the following narrative development, but director Josh Cooley, who received an Oscar for his previous animation film “Toy Story 4” (2019), and his crew members fill the screen with small and big background details to be appreciated. While the result may not look that impressive compared to the standard of Pixar or Ghibli animation films, the film is actually packed with much more style and personality compared to many of live action Transformers flicks, and it surely reminds me again that the Transformer robots are more suitable for animation than live action film. In my reviews on many of recent Transformers movies, I frequently complained that I could not hardly distinguish one robot from another except Optimus Prime and Bumblebee. In contrast, the robot characters in “Transformers One” are much more colorful with enough detail and personality to be appreciated, and I was particularly amused by a herd of robot deer shown during the middle of the film (How do they eat and live, I wonder?).

Above all, the movie gives us the story and characters we can actually care about. While Orion’s narrative often feels conventional, it is engaging to watch how he is changed via his earnest quest for proving himself, and the story also becomes a bit more gripping for the dramatic character arc of D-16, who becomes quite different after he and his colleagues later come to learn about how they and many other robots have been deceived and exploited for a long time. The film inevitably goes for a lot of action during its last act, but we remain engaged in the story and characters nonetheless, and that is the main reason why the finale works even though it was pre-determined from the very beginning.

Furthermore, the robot characters in the film sound relatively more individual as the main voice cast members are allowed to bring more spirit to their respective roles. While Chris Hemsworth did a commendable job of sounding both noble and earnest with some sense of humor, Scarlett Johansson, Keegan-Michael Key, Jon Hamm, Steve Buscemi, and Laurence Fishburne are also solid in their game efforts, and Brian Tyree Henry, who has steadily risen as one of the most dependable actors in Hollywood during last several years, is an inarguable standout as powerfully illustrating his character’s narrative with a devastating sense of classic tragedy.

On the whole, “Transformers One” surprised me for being much more entertaining than expected. Yes, this is still a standard origin story, but the overall result is definitely a significant improvement compared to many Transformers flicks at least, and it is even more recommendable than several forgettable animation films of this year including, say, “Despicable Me 4” (2024). While I still have some reservation at this point, I am glad to see that there is a bit of hope and potential in its franchise at last, so I guess I can have some expectation on whatever may come next after this solid piece of entertainment.

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Speak No Evil (2024) ☆☆☆(3/4): A less disturbing but competent remake

Posted on September 16, 2024 by kaist455

When I heard about the production of an American remake of 2022 Danish film “Speak No Evil” in last year, I instantly had a few reasonable concerns. Considering that the original version is one of the bleakest “feel-bad” movies I have ever watched during several recent years, I naturally worried about whether I could endure more, and I also worried about whether how much of the original story and characters would be changed in the American version for being more, say, “audience-friendly”.

Although it does provide a less disturbing version of the original version, I am glad to report to you that the remake version is a fairly competent genre product with enough interest to hold my attention. No, it does not surpass the sheer nihilistic evil of the original version at all, but it did its job pretty well with its modified story and characters while also often skillfully making us uncomfortable and unnerved as expected, and I appreciate that to some degree.

The opening part of the remake version is pretty much same as the beginning of the original version except some changes in the character background. This time, we are introduced to an American couple, Ben (Scoot MaNairy) and Louise (Mackenzie Davis), and their 11-year-old daughter, and we also get to know a bit about how their family life has been rather problematic since Ben decided to move to London for his professional career a few years ago.

Anyway, Ben and Louise are trying to enjoy their little vacation along with their daughter somewhere in Italy, and that is how they come across Paddy (James McAvoy) and Ciara (Aisling Franciosi), a British couple who instantly draws Ben and Louise’s attention not long after they arrive along with their mute young son at one night. Looking like your average confident alpha male, Paddy surely makes Ben look meeker, and Paddy’s seemingly passionate marital relationship with Ciara certainly makes an interesting contrast with Ben and Louise’s rather plain status.

Nevertheless, Paddy and Ciara gladly befriend Ben and Louise when these two couples come across each other again later, and they even suggest to Ben and Louise that Ben and Louise should visit their country house in Devon, England someday. Although they still do not know that much about Paddy and Ciara, Ben and Louise eventually decide to visit Paddy and Ciara along with their daughter not long after they return to England, and Paddy and Ciara look quite eager to greet Ben and Louise with hearty hospitality.

However, of course, we begin to notice a number of bad signs here and there, and so are Ben and Louise, to some degree. For example, Paddy and Ciara’s country house is indeed located in somewhere in Devon, but its location is so remote and isolated from the world outside that Ben and Louise could almost lose their way before eventually arriving at their destination.

Furthermore, Ben and Louise often find themselves quite bothered by Paddy and Ciara’s rather rude and unpleasant behaviors. For example, Paddy blatantly offers a piece of cooked duck meat to Louise even though Louise previously told him that she is a vegetarian, but Ben and Louise hesitate to say no because they do not want to disrupt the supposedly pleasant mood between them and their hosts.

From that point, Paddy and Ciara continue to annoy or disturb their guests bit by bit, and the screenplay by director/writer James Watkins has a vicious fun with how Ben and Louise still hesitate to be honest about how uncomfortable they really are with Paddy and Ciara’s frequent rudeness. Besides being constantly running out of her patience, Louise becomes more exasperated by her husband’s meekly indecisive attitude, and this consequently brings more strain on their martial relationship, which turns out to be more troubled than it seems on the surface.

Around the narrative point where Paddy and Ciara eventually reveal what has been behind their back all the time, the movie shifts itself on a full-throttle thriller mode, and that is where the movie deviates more from the original version. As a result, it becomes relatively less dark and impactful than the original version, but it still engages us at least after building up enough ground in terms of story and characters. While the main characters of the original version are merely the monsters or puppets of its cruel and heartless genre exercise, the main characters of the remake version are depicted with a little more depth here, and we actually come to care a bit about what is being at stake for them during the climactic part, which incidentally often feels like a morbidly reversed version of many home invasion flicks such as Sam Peckinpah’s “Straw Dogs” (1971).

It helps that the main cast members of the movie are quite committed to their respective roles. While James McAvoy has the most fun in the bunch as gleefully swinging back and forth between casual charm and unnerving menace throughout the film, Aisling Franciosi also brings a fair share of tension the story, and James McAvoy and Mackenzie Davis complement well McAvoy and Franciosi’s showier acting. As another crucial part of the story, young performers Alix West Lefler and Dan Hough are also solid, and Lefler is particularly excellent when her character must hold herself as much as possible under a very tricky circumstance for her and her parents during the last act of the story.

Overall, “Speak No Evil” may feel rather redundant because it comes out only 2 years after the original version was shown in US, but it is not as disastrous I worried at first. Sure, it is indeed safer and milder than the original version in many aspects, but it is mostly effective on the whole, and I will not deny that I was relieved to see that I did not feel that bad when the movie was over.

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Blesser (2023) ☆☆☆(3/4): Trying to raise her autistic son

Posted on September 16, 2024 by kaist455

South Korean film “Blesser” vividly shows how life can be like a sheer hell for a woman who happens to have an autistic kid. While it will surely try to pull your heartstrings via one personal hardship after another unfolded along the story, the movie holds our attention via its earnest storytelling and strong lead performance, and it certainly earns a little moment of hope and optimism around the end of the story.

When she is having a honeymoon week in 2008, Sang-yeon (Kim Jae-hwa) seems to have everything in order. She is a promising young political reporter of some prominent newspaper, and she is confident that her married life will not affect her professional career much even though she is going to take some break after getting pregnant with the twin babies. As a matter of fact, her boss is willing to take her back once her maternal vacation period is over, and her husband is also ready to support her as much as possible during next several years.

However, things unfortunately do not go as well as Sang-yeon hoped. When she eventually gives birth to her two kids, everything looks okay on the surface, but then she and her husband begin to notice something odd about one of their two kids a few years later. While their daughter grows up to become your average plucky little girl, their son looks rather slow in terms of mental development, and then Sang-yeong and her husband belatedly come to learn that their son actually has a serious case of developmental disability involved with autism.

Quite shocked and devastated by this unexpected news, Sang-yeon tries to deal with her son’s disability as much as possible, but she only finds herself saddled with more despair and frustration day by day, and the movie shows us more of how hard it really is to raise a kid with developmental disability. As time goes by, her son becomes more and more difficult to handle, and her resulting stress and exhaustion naturally affect her relationship with her husband and their other kid. While her husband feels pressured a lot as he has to provide more for supporting his wife and their son, their daughter already feels quite neglected as her mother is usually occupied with handling her brother.

At least, the situation turns out to be not entirely hopeless for Sang-yeon. She approaches to an old school senior of hers who also has a kid with serious developmental disability, and her senior gladly gives her a number of valuable advices including the one on his education issues. To make him a bit more socially adjusted, Sang-yeon must try a lot of things on her son, and one of the things is sending him to a local elementary school, where he may learn social skills to some degree before eventually being transferred to a special school for kids with developmental disability like him.

Of course, as many of you already expected, this also turns out to be quite challenging for Sang-yeon right from the very first day. While quite concerned about her son’s condition, she also must be on good terms with the parents of the classmates of her son, and this seems to work fairly well for Sang-yeon and her son for a while – before she later come to learn more about the social prejudice against her son’s disability.

While struggling with one hardship after another, Sang-yeon feels more like being against the wall, and we are accordingly served with a series of heart-wrenching moments, but the screenplay by director Lee Sang-cheol and his co-writer Shin A-ga, which is inspired by the memoir written by a former newspaper reporter not so different from Sang-yeon, thankfully does not resort to wallowing in pity and despair like your average misery porn. Yes, Sang-yeon is surely driven to the edge more than once throughout the film, but she somehow regains her strength via her problematic but ultimately strong relationship with her son. Sure, he is frequently quite distant and impossible to say the least, but he shows some affection to his mother at times, and there is a little poignant moment when he unexpectedly gives a little mental support to his mother when she is at another bottom of desperation.

I wish the movie delved more into how Sang-yeon and many other similar mothers try hard for fighting against the social prejudice against their dear kids, and a subplot involved with one smarmy politician who casually throws an empty promise to Sang-yeon and her fellow mothers is rather half-baked in my inconsequential opinion. Nevertheless, the movie still engages and then touches us via its strong heroine and her numerous struggles along the story, and Kim Jae-hwa, who looks and feels quite different here compared to her hysterical comic turn in “Extreme Festival” (2022), is often heartbreaking as ably conveying to us many ups and downs in her character’s story. There are several scenes where she is required to be quite melodramatic, but Kim brings enough sincerity and realism to these emotionally heightened moments, and we come to care and empathize with Sang-yeong’s struggle more instead of merely pitying her.

Overall, “Blesser” may feel like a public service movie at times, but its heart is right in the place because of its sincere and thoughtful storytelling as well as Kim’s solid lead performance. I had a pretty good idea on what and how it is about before the movie began, and it does not do anything particularly unexpected on the whole, but, as a guy on the mild range of autistic spectrum, I must admit that I could not help but become quite emotional during my viewing. If it could melt the heart of a seasoned autistic moviegoer like me, it can surely appeal to any other decent audience out there, and I sincerely hope that it will be watched by many local audiences during this Chinese Thanksgiving holiday week in South Korea.

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Concerning My Daughter (2023) ☆☆☆(3/4): Facing her daughter’s girlfriend

Posted on September 15, 2024 by kaist455

South Korean independent film “Concerning My Daughter” tries two different things together. On one side, it is a typical queer drama about one mother trying to deal with her lesbian daughter who suddenly comes with her lover. On the other side, it is also a harrowing story about aging and death as closely observing the mother’s struggle to do the right thing for a senile old lady under her care. Although these two stories seem to be simply rolling in parallel without much interaction between them, the movie handles both of its two stories with equal care and sensitivity, and it is moving to observe how these two stories eventually converge around the end of the movie.

In the beginning, we see how things have often been difficult for its unnamed heroine, who is simply listed as “Mom” in the end credits. She is a plain ordinary middle-aged widow who has earned her small living via working as one of the caregivers at a local facility for old people, and we see her paying a lot of attention to one particular old lady. While she was once a prominent public figure for founding some well-known charity foundation, this old lady has been going through the later stage of Alzheimer’s disease, and our heroine cares a lot about her mainly because there has not been anyone to visit her except the occasional visits from a few folks from that charity foundation.

And then there comes an unexpected change into our heroine’s daily life. When her daughter, who has taught at some local college, soon has to leave her current residence due to some financial problem, she suggests to her daughter that she should move back into their family residence where she has lived alone for years since her husband’s death, but she is caught off guard to see that the daughter brings in a young woman who has been her lover for 7 years.

Because she has been well aware of her daughter’s homosexuality, the mother is not shocked or enraged at all, but we soon begin to sense the considerable awkwardness among the three people in the house. Still believing that her daughter’s homosexuality is a temporary thing, the mother prefers to face her daughter’s lover as less as possible, but her daughter’s lover tries her best for being nice and courteous to her lover’s mother, though there is always a cold sense of disapproval whenever the mother comes across her daughter’s lover inside or outside the house.

However, as a woman who still cares a lot about her daughter’s welfare, the mother comes to know more about what her daughter and her daughter’s lover have to deal with everyday, and we accordingly get some glimpses on how homophobic the South Korean society can possibly be. When a fellow professor of the daughter was fired by their college just for being a lesbian, the daughter boldly comes forward to protest along with a number of supporters, and the mother happens to witness her daughter’s latest struggle at one point.

However, this does not change much the mother’s prejudice against homosexuality. Having watched how her favorite patient and many other old ladies miserably spend the remaining few days of their lives alone without no one to be around them, the mother has been afraid of her daughter tumbling into such a dire circumstance someday, but she still cannot accept that her daughter’s lover will be the one who may stand by her daughter, even after she comes to have a bit of honest conversation with her daughter’s lover.

Never overlooking the irony of its heroine’s refusal to give her daughter and her daughter’s lover the same compassion and empathy she has given to her favorite patient, the screenplay by director/writer Lee Mi-rang, which is based on the novel of the same name by Kim Hye-jin, patiently builds up the story and characters via a series of small episodic moments, which let us get to know more about the mother and several other main characters around her. In case of our heroine’s favorite patient, she is a rather distant figure due to her worsening medical condition, but we also come to understand more of why our heroine’s tries to do a lot more for this helpless old lady than she is supposed to do as a mere employee, and we naturally come to care more about her following efforts along the story.

Although it feels a bit contrived as heading to the eventual resolution of its narrative, the movie is still carried well by another good performance from Oh Min-ae. While looking much more restrained here compared to her flamboyant turn in “Missing Yoon” (2022), Oh did a good job of presenting her character’s complex human sides, and it is poignant to see how her character is changed a bit around the end of the story while readying to move forward for whatever may come next for her life.

The three other main cast members in the film are effective in their respective parts. While Heo Jin brings a bit of life and personality to her increasingly senile character, Lim Se-mi and Ha Yoon-kyung flawlessly embody the strong romantic relationship between their characters right from their first scene in the movie, and you may come to root for them more as watching they struggle along the story in one way or another.

On the whole, “Concerning My Daughter” is an engaging queer drama film to be appreciated for its strong points, Considering how the South Korean society has been quite callous and ignorant about the civil rights of sexual minority people for many years (My city government actually defunded a local film festival just for trying to screen it in public, for example), it surely deserves some more attention in public, and I hope it can actually give a moment of empathy and understanding to many parents of LGBTQ kids out there.

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House of the Seasons (2023) ☆☆☆1/2(3.5/4): An ordinary family story

Posted on September 14, 2024 by kaist455

South Korean independent film “House of the Seasons” clicked so well with me right from the beginning, and I was all the more amazed by how it never lost its grip on me after that. At first, it looks like another typical Korean family drama, but then it carefully establishes its main characters with big and small details to be observed during its first act, and I found myself much more engaged than expected during the rest of the movie.

The first act of the film mainly revolves around an ancestral rite of one big family led by an old man named Seung-pil (Woo Sang-jeon) and his wife Mal-nyeo (Son Sook). For many years, they and their family have run a modest but fairly successful tofu factory in a little country town outside Daegu, and the opening scene shows how several family members of theirs including Seung-pil and Mal-nyeo’s daughter-in-law Hye-sook (Cha Mi-kyung) work along with their employees at the factory.

We subsequently see Mal-nyeo and several other female family members preparing the dishes to be presented during the ancestral rite, and this certainly made me a bit nostalgic. Yes, I still remember well how my mother often did the same thing along with her family members including my grandmother, and I also have some regret on not being that helpful to them except setting up tables and wiping out a heap of tableware as clean as possible.

And then we see the arrival of some other family members including Hye-sook’s eldest son Seong-jin (Kang Seung-ho), who has incidentally been struggling in his acting career for a while. Although his grandparents have expected him to join the family business someday just like his parents did around the time of their wedding, Seong-jin still wants to pursue his acting career as much as possible, and that certainly causes some personal friction between him and her mother later, who still often regards him as a little boy who needs to grow up more.

Nevertheless, the mood among the family members feels mostly pleasant as they ready themselves for the ancestral rite. Under Seung-pil’s solemn supervision, everyone in the house gathers to honor and remember Seung-pil’s dead parents who incidentally passed away around the beginning of the Korean War in 1950, but there comes a brief humorous moment among Hye-sook and several other female family members, and the mood gets more lightened up when the family later has a big dinner together.

However, we gradually come to sense old bitter feelings among the family members, especially when Hye-sook’s husband Tae-geun (Oh Man-seok), the eldest son of Seung-pil and Mal-nyeo, becomes quite petty and pathetic as he drinks more or more. He eventually clashes with his father, so the mood naturally becomes quite nervous around everyone, and then Seong-jin tells everyone that he does not want to join the family business at all.

Now this looks like your average dysfunctional family story, but the screenplay by director/writer/co-producer Oh Jung-min, who made a feature film debut here after making several short films, surprises us as regarding its main characters with more insight and empathy along the story. For example, we later get to know a bit about the past of Seung-pil and Tae-guen, who respectively turn out to be the victims of the darkest times of the South Korean history during the 20th century. We also come to see more of how Mal-nyeo has been the one holding the family together, and there is a brief but quietly touching moment between her and her grandson, who still cares about his grandmother despite being much less close to her than before.

After fully establishing its main characters, the movie simply observes what happens among them as time goes by along with seasonal changes, and Oh and his crew members did a splendid job of filling the screen with a calm and reflective mood coupled with some lovely landscape shots. Although the camera usually observes the main characters from the distance, several key scenes of theirs in the film are presented with palpable emotional intensity, and we are often saddened as they become more distant to each other for understandable human reasons despite being quite devastated by their common personal loss in the middle of the story.

Oh also draws the solid ensemble performance from its main cast members, who are all believable in their respective roles in addition to ably conveying to us the old history among their characters. While Kang Seung-ho dutifully occupies the center, the other cast members in the film including Woo Sang-jeon, Cha Mi-kyung, and Oh Man-seok have each own moment to shine one by one along the story, and the special mention must go to Son Sook, who constantly hovers around the story even during her absence.

Overall, “House of the Seasons”, which is incidentally released in South Korea as “Jang-son” on this Wednesday (It means the eldest grandson by the first-born son in Korean, by the way), is a small but sublime family drama to be cherished for many good reasons including its effortlessly engaging mood and narrative, and I particularly appreciate how it subtly pulls out an almost perfect poetic moment around the end of the story. Yes, many things remain unresolved for its main characters, but life will still go on for them anyway, before their respective closing times eventually come, of course.

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I, the Executioner (2024) ☆☆1/2(2.5/4): Same as before

Posted on September 13, 2024 by kaist455

South Korean film “I, the Executioner”, which is the sequel to director/co-writer Ryoo Seung-wan’s 2015 film “Veteran” (It is simply released as “Veteran 2” today in South Korean theaters, by the way), attempts to excite and entertain audiences as much as its predecessor did, and it succeeds to some degree even though it was often difficult for me to get engaged in whatever is going on the screen. Like its predecessor, the movie provides a number of competent action scenes, but I still could not care that much about its rather superficial story and characters, and there is also a certain glaring issue which kept distracting me throughout my viewing.

Hwang Jung-min, who previously chewed every moment of his with gusto as the fictional version of an infamous real-life South Korean dictator in “12.12: The Day” (2023), is back as Seo Do-cheol, your average tough cop who will stop at nothing for getting his job done. During the opening sequence, he and his fellow cops deftly raid on an illegal gambling site somewhere in the middle of Seoul, and the movie soon provides its first action scene as Do-cheol and several other cops corner and then clash with their main target.

Anyway, Do-cheol and his colleagues’ next case turns out to be much trickier than that simple criminal case. A certain prominent professor was killed, and, what do you know, this murder is revealed to be the latest one committed by a mysterious vigilante figure who has already done several other killings in the name of justice. All of the victims targeted by this vigilante figure were criminals who managed to get unpunished or less punished than they actually deserved, and these acts of killing have already drawn lot of attention in public thanks to one trashy online news channel which gladly reports on these killings for more viewership.

When this vigilante figure subsequently targets one particular criminal who is going to be released, Do-cheol is assigned to protecting that criminal in question, and he is naturally not so pleased about that. Nevertheless, he tries to do his job anyway regardless of his personal feelings on the situation, and he is also helped a bit by a young cop named Sun-woo (Jung Hae-in), who shows his considerable grit and toughness when Do-cheol and his colleagues struggle to protect that criminal from an angry mob.

As Do-cheol and other cop characters try to capture their very wily and dangerous opponent, the movie accordingly provides several good action sequences including the one busily unfolded around the Namsan Tower. Again, Ryoo demonstrates here that he is a skillful filmmaker in case of physical action, and Hwang and several other cast members really look like throwing themselves into actions, though I am sure that lots of stunt performers were hired for the movie.

However, the movie still failed to engage me in terms of story and characters. Although Hwang is a good actor, his character is not particularly interesting enough to hold my attention, and he only comes to show more of his usual mannerism without bringing more life and personality to his character. In case of several other cop characters in the story, they are merely broad characters just like Do-choel, and Jung Hae-in, Oh Dae-hwan, Jang Yoon-ju, and Kim Shi-hoo are simply required to fill their respective spots around Hwang.

I also do not like a subplot involved with his wife and their adolescent son, which is perfunctory at best and contrived at worst in my humble opinion. How it is later connected with the main plot is pretty predictable to say the least, and Jin Kyung is under-utilized again as Do-cheol’s ever-suffering wife, who is incidentally one of a very few substantial female characters in the story besides Kim’s female cop character.

In addition, the movie could be more interesting if it were willing to delve more into the moral and ethical issues associated with the vigilante figure in the story, but it eventually resorts to a simple cat-and-mouse game between Do-cheol and his opponent, and that is not even compelling at all. To be frank with you, you will easily guess the identity of the vigilante figure before the first half of the movie is over, because it will show and tell a bit too much from the beginning.

And there is a serious matter involved with one of the main cast members. I guess Ryoo wanted to use Oh Dal-soo simply as one of the returning cast members, but I and many other local audiences still remember that Oh was accused of sexual violence not long after the #MeToo movement was started in South Korea. After being “silent” during next few years, Oh recently began to appear here and there, and “I, the Executioner” is certainly another major stepping-stone in his “comeback”. Considering that one of the vigilante figure’s targets in the story happens to be involved with a #MeToo scandal, I cannot help but notice the hypocritical aspect of the movie and the people behind it, and this negative impression of mine on the film is further exacerbated by Oh’s substantial appearance in the film.

In conclusion, “I, the Executioner” does not surpass its predecessor much for having same weak and strong points, but it will probably satisfy you enough if you like “Veteran” more than I did. Because it is released here right before the Chinese Thanksgiving holiday week, it will probably earn enough money to guarantee the next sequel, but, folks, I have already lost more interest after watching how it just tries to sell same old stuffs.

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Didi (2024) ☆☆☆(3/4): His suburban summer in 2008

Posted on September 12, 2024 by kaist455

“Didi” is a coming-of-age tale which feels both specific and universal. While its adolescent hero and his family background are quite specific, but his emotional struggles with not only his family but also himself are universal to say the least, and the movie closely observes him and several other figures around him with a lot of care and empathy.

The titular character of the film is Chris Wang (Izaac Wang), a 13-year-old Taiwanese American boy who is often called “Didi” in his family (It means “younger brother” in Chinese, by the way). His father has been absent for years due to his job in Taiwan, but he has earned enough at least for his wife Chungsing (Joan Chen) to live in a nice Californian suburban neighborhood along with their two kids and his aging mother, and Chungsing is naturally the one who has to take care of all those domestic things for her two kids and mother-in-law.

The story is incidentally set during the summer of 2008, and we see how Chris and his older sister Vivian (Shirley Chen) frequently clash with each other in their house. Although she is soon going to leave the house for her college education, Chris often irritates his older sister, and Vivian does not tolerate her willful younger brother at all. No matter how much Chungsing tries, Chris and Vivian still do not get along with each other well, and that certainly frustrates their mother as well as their grandmother, who often criticizes her daughter-in-law everyday.

Like many other kids around his age, Chris usually go outside for more fun and freedom to have before his upcoming middle school graduation, and we see him hanging around with his several neighborhood friends. At one point, they are invited to a pool party held at the house belonging to one of their schoolmates, and that is how he comes to befriend a pretty girl. They come to interact more with each other via Facebook, and some of you may be amused by some little period details, which will definitely remind you of how much digital technology has been advanced during last 16 years.

In the end, Chris comes to have a sort of date with her during one evening, He tries to make himself look cool as much as possible, but it eventually turns out that she is actually more matured and experienced than him, and that leads to a rather amusing moment when he becomes quite nervous and embarrassed due to a little active action of hers.

He also gets more interested in making video clips after encountering a trio of older boys who happen to need someone to shoot their skateboarding. Although he does not know that much about how to handle a video camera, Chris attempts to teach himself bit by bit, and it looks like he seems to make some progress as shooting his new friends in one way or another.

Meanwhile, there comes more conflict between Chris and his mother, who turns out to have a fair share of discontent and disappointment behind her usually calm façade. As her kids have grown up nearly enough, Chungsing tries to go for her old artistic passion, but her efforts are not recognized much by others including Chris, who simply regards her latest painting without much care.

Although this expectedly leads to a big melodramatic moment later in the story, the screenplay by Sean Wang, who was Oscar-nominated for his deeply personal short film “Nǎi Nai & Wài Pó” (2023) before making a feature film debut here, sticks to its somberly observant attitude as showing more compassion and understanding to Chris and several other characters. While Chris is sometimes quite annoying as your average rebellious teenager, we can sense his confusion and frustration nonetheless, and we also come to care about his family members, who gradually come to as understandable human characters with each own issue to deal with.

Under Wang’s competent direction, the main cast members are solid in their respective parts. Although his character is more or less than a plain ground for more colorful characters in the story, young performer Izaac Wang diligently carries the film with his earnest performance, and Shirley Chen has a surprisingly heartfelt moment when Vivian shows some real care to her older brother in one particular scene. While Chang Li Hua is also solid as Chris and Vivian’s grandmother, Joan Chen, a Chinese American actress who has steadily worked for more than 35 years since her breakout performance in Bernardo Bertolucci’s Oscar-winning film “The Last Emperor” (1987), gives one of the best performances in her long acting career, and she is particularly excellent when her character comes to show more of her feelings and thoughts to Chris around the end of the story.

Overall “Didi”, which won not only the Audience Award but also the Special Jury Award for its ensemble cast when it was premiered at the Sundance Film Festival early in this year, is a small but likable film which distinguishes itself enough in terms of story and characters. Although I think it could be improvised a bit more (A subplot involved with Chris’ several friends feels rather underdeveloped, for example), the movie is still fairly engaging on the whole, and Wang surely makes a good start for whatever may come from him next in the future. In short, this is another interesting debut feature film of this year, and I think you should give it a chance someday.

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We Grown Now (2023) ☆☆☆(3/4): Their childhood in Cabrini-Green, 1992

Posted on September 12, 2024 by kaist455

“We Grown Now” is a little but intimate coming-of-age drama about growing up in the Cabrini-Green neighborhood of Chicago in 1992. Mostly sticking to the viewpoint of two young African American boys living there during that time, the movie often glimpses on the grim reality of their small world, but it also shows some warmth and sensitivity via not only their friendship but also their parents who really care about them.

At the beginning, we are introduced to the two young heroes of the movie: Malik (Blake Cameron James) and Eric (Gian Knight Ramirez). Their respective families have been close neighbors for years as living together in one of the apartment buildings in Cabrini-Green, and the opening scene shows them having another usual fun with several other kids at a nearby playground.

As they go through their daily life, we get to know a bit about their respective families. While Malik has been raised along with his younger sister by their single mother Dolores (Jurnee Smollett) and their grandmother Anita (S. Epatha Merkerson), Eric has lived with his older sister under the care of his single father Jason (Lil Rel Howery), and the movie sometimes observes how much their parents struggle to make ends meet for themselves and their respective families day by day.

To Malik and Eric, it seems nothing will possibly separate them as they cheerfully spend time together in one way or another, but then, of course, they are reminded of how dangerous their neighborhood can be. Not long after the tragic death of a young kid around their age, the police and the authorities put more restriction on their neighborhood in the name of law and order, and Dolores as well as Jason become more concerned about their kids’ safety and welfare, even though there is really nothing they can do about protecting their kids from the harsh reality of the outside world.

However, Malik and Eric remain rather innocent about what is happening around them. At one point, they decide to go outside their elementary school just because they are just bored, and we accordingly get a lovely scene where they go to the downtown area of Chicago for visiting the Art Institute of Chicago, where they cannot help but marveled by lots of impressive artworks. As looking at several paintings involved with American slavery and racism, Malik is reminded of those old personal stories told by his grandmother, and this stimulates his young receptive mind more to our little fascination.

Of course, Dolores is not so pleased about what her son did with his best friend, and neither is Jason, who scolds his son as punishing him a bit. While she understands well how close her son has been to his best friend, Dolores does not want her son to hang around with Eric more, and that naturally causes some conflict between them, though she is still nice to Eric because, after all, he is not a bad kid at all.

Meanwhile, there later comes the unexpected opportunity for a better job to Dolores, and she naturally becomes quite conflicted. Mainly because she has spent her whole life in the middle of Chicago, moving to somewhere outside the city for that job in question seems impossible to her at first, but she comes to consider this possibly good option more as her neighborhood becomes a more hostile place than before.

This situation eventually leads to the conflict between Malik and Eric later in the story, but director/writer Minhal Baig, who previously made a feature film debut with “I Night” (2016), maintains the calm and sensitive mood of the film as before. While the overall mood is sometimes interrupted by the harsh reality surrounding its main characters, the movie also provides a number of gentle personal moments tinged with poetic qualities reminiscent of the works of Terrence Malick, and Baig and her cinematographer Pat Scola did a terrific job of filling the screen with enough period atmosphere and details to be appreciated.

As the movie gradually immerse us into its vivid mood and background, we come to understand and care about its two young heroes, and young performers Blake Cameron James and Gian Knight Ramirez are believable in their unadorned natural performance. Ably conveying to us their characters’ close friendship, they never hit any false note during several key scenes between them in the film, and the bond between their characters is palpable even when their characters come to conflict a lot with each other later in the story.

In case of a few notable adult performers around James and Ramirez, they fill their respective spots well without overshadowing James and Ramirez at all. While Jurnee Smollett, who also participated in the production of the film as an executive producer, and S. Epatha Merkerson have each own moment to shine, Lil Rel Howery, who will be always remembered for his scene-stealing supporting turn in Jordan Peele’s Oscar-winning film “Get Out” (2017), feels rather under-utilized in comparison, but it is nice to see more of the serious side of his considerable acting talent at least.

In conclusion, “We Grown Now”, which won the Changemaker Award when it was shown at the Toronto International Film Festival in last year, is a solid piece of work to be admired for its mood, storytelling, and performance. Yes, Cabrini-Green will always be associated with Bernard Rose’s horror film “Candyman” (1992) in my mind, but “We Grown Now” showed me a bit gentler presentation of this notorious neighborhood, and I surely appreciate that.

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