KILLING ROMANCE Will Make You Fall in Love with Korean Cinema All Over Again

By Pierce Conran

Almost 20 years ago I walked into a theatre in Dublin, taking a chance on a strange-looking movie that no one had heard of. I was rewarded with one of the best cinema experiences of my life. I grinned from ear to ear from start to finish, as I laughed, and cried, and marvelled at the constant madcap ingenuity rocketing from the screen into my bewildered eyeballs. That film was Save the Green Planet.

I’ve been fruitlessly searching for that feeling ever since, until now.

Click to read more»

Review: FUTURELESS THINGS, A Bright, Gleaming Comedy Well-Stocked With Laughs

By Rex Baylon

Towards the latter half of Kim Kyung-mook's Futureless Things, a niggling question kept popping into my head, "Why a convenience store? What makes a convenience store the perfect spot for this peculiar film?" I racked my brain trying to find an answer, hoping that maybe if I could discover the answer Kim's film might not be so muddled for me. Thinking about all the seemingly random events that transpired during the film's 105 minute runtime I came away with one thought: set anywhere else, this film, a not-so subtle commentary on the modern day South Korean psyche, would have been bogged down by a lot of dramatic cliches if it had been shot in an office, a classroom or even a cafe, in turn diluting a lot of the satire and replacing it with obtuse social commentary.

Click to read more»