Have been meaning to start blogging long back, but it never materialized. But today on an overdose of South Korean cinema, well beyond midnight, I thought why not write a piece on this which has entertained me beyond expectation. So here it goes, according to me most underrated artists & cinema industry belongs to this Asian country. The cinema from this part of world started blooming very late in early 20th century, and it was not without the efforts of writer-director chan wook park. When you watch any one of his movies, you would start appreciating the genius that he is. After seeing my first movie, 'Oldboy', I thought he was good. Then I went on to complete the vengeance trilogy ('Lady vengeance' and 'Sympathies for Mr. vengeance'), and CWP had a fan in me & and by no means these are CWP's best work.
Slow pace is his forte, and the way the human emotions are portrayed in his movies is unparalleled, as a writer he does sketch his characters with extreme care & believability. Everything in his movie is perfect and realistic, especially the characters. Well, you would expect the lead in 'Oldboy' to be so vengeful after been kept away from normal life for 15 years or the father to be vengeful after his daughter is kidnapped & killed in 'Mr vengeance' or the protagonist to be so lifeless & cold in 'Lady vengeance' as she is jailed for 13+ yrs on a false charge. While all the actors have done a great job, credit has to be given to CWP for these beautifully sketched characters & great direction. Many, while discussing his movies, say how violent his movies are. My take on this is till you feel that the violence shown is not justified or doesn't fit the movie/sequence/character you can complaint about it, but when that's not the case anything and everything is fine. Probably that's the reason I like so many of CWP's movies. My respect for him as a writer increased manifold after watching 'Thirst', but I will come to that later.
Another good thing that he does is cast Kang-ho song in most of his movies, for the uninitiated this guy is one of the most versatile actors in the world. He can do justice to a role of a doting father who would avenge his daughter's kidnapping & death (sympathies for Mr. vengeance), or a small town cop who does all he can to catch a serial killer and in the process beats up anyone & everyone but still ends up failing (memories of murder), or a weird train-robber cum bandit cum treasure hunter (the good, the bad, the weird). But before I move completely away from CWP, and start heaping praises on kang ho song, will let you know the reason why I started blogging. It was watching "Thirst", which is the best collaborative work of CWP & KHS.
<Spoiler alert> The movie is about a passionate priest, played by KHS, who always thinks about welfare of mankind. He gets involved in a failed medical experiment, and gets transfused with vampire blood, hence becoming vampire himself. The movie progresses to show his love story with a bored, exploited, girl whose parents are dead and is married off to the son of the family she grew up with. As he turns into a vampire his life style changes from ascetic ways to pleasure loving ways. The lovers start an illicit relationship during which she gets the priest to sideline her husband & convert her into a vampire as well. She plans her revenge with the family using the new lover in her life. I love the way in which CWP tries to show the priest hidden inside the vampire, like when he steals blood from a coma patient while taking his excellent care, he denies his fellow priest his vampire blood, and the best is when he falsely shows himself as a rapist of mental patient so as to make people believe that he is not a priest or a life saver, etc. <spoiler alert ends>
Innovative treatment for a vampire based movie, performances are top notch & setting is perfect. This has to be one of the better vampire movies, much better than "from dawn till dusk" (though I like all Tarantino) kinda movies. It would be in the league of "Daybreakers" & "Let me in", equally good if not better than these. Highly recommended stuff. Even though it is slightly difficult to imagine vampire movie without holy cross/holy water, lot of blood, random killing, vampires or their hunters wearing tight leather, etc. But the movies mentioned above did their best in changing all these notions & present the subject with refreshingly new ways & this is where 'thirst' wins the approval of its viewers.
Damn, this post is completely mixed up by now, all I wanted to talk about was how much in awe of Korean cinema I am. And all the 9 movies which I have seen so far, have impressed me immensely.Among the movies which i liked but didn't mention so far on this blog, the best would be "The chaser" followed by "The host" & "I saw the devil". But will not get into details of these movies, as the post would get even more mixed up.
Slow pace is his forte, and the way the human emotions are portrayed in his movies is unparalleled, as a writer he does sketch his characters with extreme care & believability. Everything in his movie is perfect and realistic, especially the characters. Well, you would expect the lead in 'Oldboy' to be so vengeful after been kept away from normal life for 15 years or the father to be vengeful after his daughter is kidnapped & killed in 'Mr vengeance' or the protagonist to be so lifeless & cold in 'Lady vengeance' as she is jailed for 13+ yrs on a false charge. While all the actors have done a great job, credit has to be given to CWP for these beautifully sketched characters & great direction. Many, while discussing his movies, say how violent his movies are. My take on this is till you feel that the violence shown is not justified or doesn't fit the movie/sequence/character you can complaint about it, but when that's not the case anything and everything is fine. Probably that's the reason I like so many of CWP's movies. My respect for him as a writer increased manifold after watching 'Thirst', but I will come to that later.
Another good thing that he does is cast Kang-ho song in most of his movies, for the uninitiated this guy is one of the most versatile actors in the world. He can do justice to a role of a doting father who would avenge his daughter's kidnapping & death (sympathies for Mr. vengeance), or a small town cop who does all he can to catch a serial killer and in the process beats up anyone & everyone but still ends up failing (memories of murder), or a weird train-robber cum bandit cum treasure hunter (the good, the bad, the weird). But before I move completely away from CWP, and start heaping praises on kang ho song, will let you know the reason why I started blogging. It was watching "Thirst", which is the best collaborative work of CWP & KHS.
<Spoiler alert> The movie is about a passionate priest, played by KHS, who always thinks about welfare of mankind. He gets involved in a failed medical experiment, and gets transfused with vampire blood, hence becoming vampire himself. The movie progresses to show his love story with a bored, exploited, girl whose parents are dead and is married off to the son of the family she grew up with. As he turns into a vampire his life style changes from ascetic ways to pleasure loving ways. The lovers start an illicit relationship during which she gets the priest to sideline her husband & convert her into a vampire as well. She plans her revenge with the family using the new lover in her life. I love the way in which CWP tries to show the priest hidden inside the vampire, like when he steals blood from a coma patient while taking his excellent care, he denies his fellow priest his vampire blood, and the best is when he falsely shows himself as a rapist of mental patient so as to make people believe that he is not a priest or a life saver, etc. <spoiler alert ends>
Innovative treatment for a vampire based movie, performances are top notch & setting is perfect. This has to be one of the better vampire movies, much better than "from dawn till dusk" (though I like all Tarantino) kinda movies. It would be in the league of "Daybreakers" & "Let me in", equally good if not better than these. Highly recommended stuff. Even though it is slightly difficult to imagine vampire movie without holy cross/holy water, lot of blood, random killing, vampires or their hunters wearing tight leather, etc. But the movies mentioned above did their best in changing all these notions & present the subject with refreshingly new ways & this is where 'thirst' wins the approval of its viewers.
Damn, this post is completely mixed up by now, all I wanted to talk about was how much in awe of Korean cinema I am. And all the 9 movies which I have seen so far, have impressed me immensely.Among the movies which i liked but didn't mention so far on this blog, the best would be "The chaser" followed by "The host" & "I saw the devil". But will not get into details of these movies, as the post would get even more mixed up.
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