Review: K-Horror TWO MOONS Scrapes the Bottom of the Barrel

By Pierce Conran

I’m glad that I’m not a particularly big horror buff, because if I was, Korean cinema would seem like a real letdown these days. The last few years have done little to convince anyone of the quality, and frankly necessity, of K-horror. Once a strong niche revenue driver for the industry, with a number of interesting if not always stellar entries finding their way to theaters and DVD, of late about three increasingly lackluster productions get dropped on the marketplace per annum. It’s a story of diminishing returns, as the genre seems to be on the way out. At least until something or someone can come along to save it…

2012’s third K-horror Two Moons, following the soporific Don’t Click and the frustrating Horror Stories, is definitely not the messiah that will save the struggling genre. Director Kim Dong-bin previously made the horrors Ring Virus (1999) and Red Eye (2005), both of which were warmly received by audiences or critics. With pretty much nothing going for it, his latest is one of the worst K-horrors to be released in years.

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Review: Pieta - What Does It Matter as Long as a Boy Loves His Mother?

By John A. Riley

A cavalcade of joyless masturbation, even more joyless coition, animal entrails splattered across the tiled floor of a bathroom, mutilation and misogynistic violence. And that’s just the first ten minutes of Kim Ki-duk’s 2012 film Pieta. Set in a grimy industrial area of Seoul, it deals with Kang-do, a brutal debt collector who meets a woman claiming to be the mother who abandoned him in childhood. Together they begin a deadpan, incestuous parody of domestic life together. This newfound love melts Kang-do’s heart, exposing his deeply-hidden vulnerability and leading to a visceral and tragic conclusion.

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Review: Korean Indie Koala Oozes Charm

Simplicity is in rare supply in Korean cinema these days, so when a film like Koala comes along, it does so as a breath of fresh air. Nary an overwrought emotion, sad backstory nor superfluous tangent can be seen here. Instead, this refreshing new indie is straightforward and endearing as it leaves us to ponder the all too recognizable fates of its young and affable protagonists.

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Revenge Week: Dirty Blood's Dangerous Payback

Part of MKC's Revenge Week (July 8-14, 2013).

As a society Korea has been slow to change despite its economic growth. At times it can seem like a gigantic, perpetually simmering pot of discontent that seems dangerously close to boiling over. One aspect of Korean society that is often brushed under the carpet is repressed sexuality and while it isn’t something you will encounter much in TV dramas, music and the news, the Korean film industry, of late, has been vocal in its depiction of the widespread abuse that rages through the country. Truth be told, it is often used opportunistically and many of the works in question tread a very fine line.

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Revenge Week: Don't Cry Mommy - A Necessary Lesson Poorly Delivered

Part of MKC's Revenge Week (July 8-14, 2013).

It’s a funny thing to think you understand something and then experience it first hand, only to realize how naïve you’ve been about the subject. Truth be told, that’s happened to me a few times since arriving in Korea. Having lived in so many places before and being well versed in Korean cinema, my hubris and I felt quite comfortable in our knowledge of a country we’d never been to. My ego has taken a few digs since then but far more devastating has been my steep learning curve regarding social issues.

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Revenge Week: 26 Years - The Ultimate Revenge Narrative

Part of MKC's Revenge Week (July 8-14, 2013). This is not a new piece but it just seemed too a propos not to include.

Just like anyone else, I come from a country (Ireland) with historical scars that refuse to completely fade away. The sad fact is that these days my connection with my home is tenuous at best. Nevertheless, as we approach the centenary following the Easter Rising of 1916, this terrible event that saw a group a passionate Irishman stand up to their English oppressors, only to be brutally suppressed, is still an indelible part of who I am.

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Edinburgh 2013: Juvenile Offender (범죄소년, 2012)

Part of Connor McMorran's coverage for MKC of the Edinburgh International Film Festival (June 19-30, 2013).

As much as we may like to think society is for the most part a well-oiled machine, there are still far too many people who slip through the cracks. Abandoned, unable to change themselves or the situation they face, they seek to reintegrate into a society which has no desire to welcome them. For most of its life, and especially since the end of World War II, film has been used to highlight and discuss the daily problems faced by those who exist on the outside of society. From the Italian neo-realists and their pleas to humanity, through to the angry white males of British kitchen sink dramas reacting violently in protest to the systems of society, film is used to give these people a voice that would otherwise go unheard.

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Edinburgh 2013: National Security (남영동 1985, 2012)

Part of Connor McMorran's coverage for MKC of the Edinburgh International Film Festival (June 19-30, 2013).

Though 2012 was an important year in Korean cinema for many reasons, one of the more interesting ones is that it saw the return of director Chung Ji-young. 2012 was essentially bookended by his two films; Unbowed was released in January, and National Security arrived at the end of November. Both films featured highly political narratives based on real life events, yet National Security struggled to bring in anywhere near the same audience numbers as Unbowed.

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Edinburgh 2013: Virgin Forest (원시림, 2012)

Part of Connor McMorran's coverage for MKC of the Edinburgh International Film Festival (June 19-30, 2013).

Perhaps because of his long-term struggle with leukaemia, highly influential film theorist Andre Bazin based a lot of his ideas around the concept of death. More specifically, he argued that film could be seen as a way to embalm time, capture time and allow people to linger in the memories of others following their death, just as portraits, or embalming, had done in the past. As technology progresses at an astonishing rate, the moving image, and with it the photographic image, has become ever present in society, capturing almost anything and everything in our world.

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Edinburgh 2013: Pluto (명왕성, 2012)

Part of Connor McMorran's coverage for MKC of the Edinburgh International Film Festival (June 19-30, 2013).

We often claim that mainstream cinema becomes unbelievable in its attempts at spectacle. This is usually the case, but such statements should force us to examine exactly why we watch films in the first place. What function should films ultimately aspire to in society? Entertainment? Art? Isn't the whole thing, as I tend to think, entirely subjective? Regardless of how we feel, it may be beneficial to rethink the role of spectacle and genre cinema and its ties to reality. As humans, we make narratives about ourselves, about our lives and struggles. However, mainstream cinema demands a certain detachment from reality, as it exists in a strange reality where expected narrative resolutions allow characters to overcome almost any kind of obstacle.

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Edinburgh 2013: I Catch a Terrible Cat (こっぴどい猫, Japan) 2012

Part of Connor McMorran's coverage for MKC of the Edinburgh International Film Festival (June 19-30, 2013).

If there can be one major complaint of post-modern cinema, it is that it is far too aware. Not only of itself as a piece of cinema, but also of the limitations of genre. This can often lead to an over-eager attempt to break or push genre boundaries, or to reject genre in favour of observational, dialogue-heavy, or highly referential cinema. Thankfully, Rikiya Imaizumi’s I Catch a Terrible Cat manages to avoid such pitfalls whilst also providing a rather interesting and playful look at the romance genre.

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Channeling the Classics: The Russian Novel (러시안 소설) 2012

Though I scarcely have the time to read these days there are a few classic works of literature I always go back to. On the one hand the French Naturalists taught me morality and on the other the great Russian novels forced me to grapple with existentialism and taught me about love. Tolstoy, Dostoyesky, Pushkin, Lermontov, and more had the ability to tip the balance of life from one extreme to the next, all in the flick of a page. Leafing through ‘Anna Karenina’ was a two-week journey through the human kaleidoscope of love and suffering, while the brief weekend it took to absorb ‘A Hero of our Time’ was like a torrid love affair, which, like its protagonist, shone bright and brief.

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The Grand Heist (바람과 함께 사라지다) 2012

The heist film is a unique offshoot of the crime genre. It inhabits a region where the violence is all style, the risks are all calculated, and the group trumps the man. In this postmodern media-drenched world that we live in, the heist genre can probably lay claim to being the first to tear down the fourth wall and poke fun at the artifice of cinema. From Edwin S. Porter’s The Great Train Robbery to the wheeling-dealing hustler Danny Ocean from the Ocean’s Eleven franchise, viewers have been addicted to the hip style of the caper.

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UDINE 2013: Korean Horror Comedies and Ghost Sweepers (점쟁이들, 2012)

Korean cinema has proven on many occasions that it can be quite brazen when it comes to generic codes. It can sometimes seem like a kid has been let loose in a well-stocked kitchen as he begins to mix and match the most incongruous ingredients in an oversized pot. While many concoctions have succeeded in offending viewer’s delicate palates, just as many bizarre recipes cooked up in the studios have delighted and surprised film lovers around the world.

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UDINE 2013: The Thieves (도둑들, 2012)

Part of MKC's coverage of the 15th Udine Far East Film Festival.

The most anticipated Korean film of the year, with its dazzling cast and international locations, opened late last month and has since become the biggest domestic box office behemoth in years. The Thieves, Choi Dong-hoon’s fourth feature, following The Big Swindle (2004), Tazza: The High Rollers (2006), and Woochi: The Taoist Wizard (2009), is his most ambitious yet. It is a vibrant and complex heist movie with one of the most high profile casts ever assembled for a local production.

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UDINE 2013: A Muse (은교, Eungyo, 2012)

“No Muse-poet grows conscious of the Muse except by experience of a woman in whom the Goddess is to some degree resident…A Muse-poet falls in love, absolutely, and his true love is for him the embodiment of the Muse... But the real, perpetually obsessed Muse-poet distinguishes between the Goddess as manifest in the supreme power, glory, wisdom, and love of woman, and the individual woman whom the Goddess may make her instrument... The Goddess abides; and perhaps he will again have knowledge of her through his experience of another woman...”

-       Robert Graves

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UDINE 2013: Divorce, Korean Style: All About My Wife (내 아내의 모든 것, 2012)

Part of MKC's coverage of the 15th Udine Far East Film Festival.

(by Rex Baylon)

There used to be a time when America was known as a manufacturing giant. In agriculture, electronics, and automobile design America seemed not to have any contenders. With regards to film, Hollywood was the first and last word when it came to cinema. Even as the US began its slow decline, the soft power of American cinema never seemed to waver even through all the social upheaval of the twentieth century; while presidents came and went, one hit wonders rose and fell, and wars were won or lost, Hollywood never lost its luster in the eyes of foreign and domestic audiences.

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UDINE 2013: A Gothic Fantasy: A Werewolf Boy (늑대소년, 2012)

Part of MKC's coverage of the 15th Udine Far East Film Festival.

(by Rex Baylon)

Of all the film cultures in the world that embrace the ideals of romantic love it is only in South Korea where the connection between the ghosts of the past, the shifting of the seasons, and the tragic melodramatic love story can exist and thrive. While the French may have their amour fou, the Italians and Spanish their unbridled passion, and the Americans their once witty rom-coms South Korea has, for over a decade now, been cornering the market on never-can-be romances. If one were to retrace the genesis of this popular genre you wouldn’t need to go further back than 2002 with the broadcast of Winter Sonata on television screens all over the peninsula. Part of the Endless Love quadrilogy of stories that charted the ups and downs of a couple who meet in adolescence, were separated by some uncontrollable force, reunited later in adulthood, and then depending on the whims of nature and the show’s producer would either come back together again or be painfully ripped apart from one another.

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UDINE 2013: National Security (남영동1985, 2012)

Part of MKC's coverage of the 15th Udine Far East Film Festival.

Corruption, injustice and terror have always been a sad reality of politics. Over the years, many filmmakers have gone to great lengths (sometimes even putting their lives in peril) in a bid to give a voice to the victims of political malfeasance and to shed light on the frequently covered-up truths within the halls of power. Notable examples include Pontecorvo’s The Battle of Algiers (1966) and Costa-Gavras’ Z (1969). Among the pantheon of political works it is true that those that endure are the ones that shock; works that can elicit an audible gasp from audience members. However, a filmmaker must be careful not to go too far and should also pay due consideration to narrative and filmic requirements when presenting a politically charged narrative on screen.

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Fribourg 2013: National Security (남영동1985, Namyeong-dong 1985) 2012

Playing at the 27th Fribourg International Film Festival (March 16-23, 2013)

Corruption, injustice and terror have always been a sad reality of politics. Over the years, many filmmakers have gone to great lengths (sometimes even putting their lives in peril) in a bid to give a voice to the victims of political malfeasance and to shed light on the frequently covered-up truths within the halls of power. Notable examples include Pontecorvo’s The Battle of Algiers (1966) and Costa-Gavras’ Z (1969). Among the pantheon of political works it is true that those that endure are the ones that shock; works that can elicit an audible gasp from audience members. However, a filmmaker must be careful not to go too far and should also pay due consideration to narrative and filmic requirements when presenting a politically charged narrative on screen.

Chung Ji-young made a big comeback following a 13-year absence this time last year when Unbowed debuted at the 16^th edition of the Busan Film Festival. Hot on its heels and proving that it wasn’t a fluke, he has returned with a searing indictment of the brutal Chun Doo-hwan administration that terrorized Korea for the better part of the 1980s.

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