The Divine Move: Go Ahead and Hit Me Again

In the iEra, the nerds may have risen to power but they still don't know how to take a punch or land a roundhouse kick. So when a poorly-groomed gamer (Jung Woo-sung) whose specialty is Go ends up unjustly sentenced to the slammer, all he wants in exchange for giving master boardgame tips to his jailer is to receive ongoing martial arts training from his fellow convicts so he can kick some serious ass when he gets out. The prison fighting lessons in The Divine Move are built around the philosophy that good fighters must be beat up to learn how to beat up others. Sound crazy? Well, my grandfather took a similar approach with my father and it worked for my dad so I had no reason to doubt that it would work here too.

When you see Jung remove his shirt during one of his final prison brawls, you'll likely gasp at how effective such training can be. The actor is shredded to a point that makes you think this prison comes with a nutritionist/dietician, too. His character hasn't let his Go skills deteriorate while in the big house either. As luck would have it, he's sequestered next to a blind genius of Go whenever he ends up in solitary confinement; the two square off by tapping out moves through the wall. Further luck: Someone's left behind some chalk. And so he's a Go graffiti artist. He's a street-style fighter. He's an uncharted player. Plus he's a master networker.

That last talent allows him to entice a fine crew to exact his grand revenge, my favorite of the lot being a one-handed techie (Ahn Kil-kang) who has a nice variety of attachable parts including a hammer for self-defense. These are nerds who are no longer satisfied with outwitting former tormentors. They want blood on their knuckles, not just on their hands. Those jerks who killed our hero's brother (Kim Myeong-soo) are going to get iced, one (Lee Beom-su) quite literally in a freezer showdown to the death. Getting the girl (Lee Si-young) — a master Go player herself — is just Cho Beom-gu's fantasy fulfillment for all the nerdy gamers watching the movie (which they should!).

Insadong Scandal: Beyond the Bechdel Test

The art-forgery caper Insadong Scandal definitely doesn't pass the Bechdel test. Not only are there no conversations between two women that don't have to do with men. There aren't any conversations between two women at all. But the movie does have three fun female characters — a ruthless gallerist (Eom Jeong-hwa), an unrelenting police detective (Hong Soo-hyun) and a leather-clad gangster (Choi Song-hyeon) — that in another movie, would easily have been cast as men. For that I thank writer-director Park Hee-kon. He's at least creating strong roles for women. I'm less appreciative of his writing for men and his casting of the actors who play them.

As the duplicitous master restorer who turns everyone's life upside down, Kim Rae-won looks like he's modeling clothes when he's supposedly copying famous paintings. He's the type of performer who feels most natural when he's singing karaoke and who's most likable when he's getting slugged. Jeong Jin plays an auctioneer with a perm that looks like a joke that can't get a single laugh. As to journeyman actors Kim Byung-ok and Kim Jeong-tae — as sidekicks of good and evil — they're both on automatic pilot. You can bet they spent their time in their trailers reading scripts for other projects with more lines and less cliches. The best of the guys is probably Lim Ha-ryong, a bad-guy-turned-good who has a long monologue on the art of forgery that is definitely the most educational part of the movie.

Not that you'll leave Insadong Scandal truly informed about anything. The one thing I learned after viewing the movie is that Insadong is actually the gallery district of Seoul — the Soho of yore, the Chelsea of now. It in no way felt like a modern day Williamsburg. Eom's high-end wardrobe is a Fashion Week runway of clingy pleasures and there's not a single hipster in sight.

Happy End: Daddy Needs a Life More Than a Job

When actor Choi Min-sik is good, he's very, very good (Oldboy, Crying Fist, I Saw the Devil). But when he's bad, he's actually pretty bad. Happy End may show Choi at his worst. Playing a blubbering househusband unwilling to assume the household duties after he loses his job, and his wife (Jeon Do-yeon) becomes the family checkbook, Choi's Seo Min-ki is the embodiment of male prerogative. He believes, he has every right to spend his days reading romances at the local bookstore then jabbering about a soap opera with a lady neighbor all night long on the phone, even when the baby's crying, the kettle's boiling and his wife's catching up on paperwork. He doesn't care if the Mrs. is overextended. He's too busy feeling sorry for himself.

You can imagine Mr. Sulky-pants is going to get a lot sulkier when he learns that his wife isn't just clocking extra hours at the job. She's also working off some stress in the bed of a former beau (Ju Jin-mo) who as she says herself, her nails digging into his back and butt, "You've got a fantastic body." (Or something like that.) She may be living a life of deception but truer words were never spoken. Plus, since this hottie is the director of the website where she works, we know the dude's got computer skills, too. Is divorce an irrational next step?

That's not the story that writer-director Jung Ji-woo has scripted, though. You see, Mrs. Seo is committed both to her marriage and getting banged. Even if that means doping her baby to go on a bender. Maybe that's what happens for the respectable bourgeoisie who hold family above all. But if respect is the be-all, end-all, then Mr. Seo is going to end-all to be-all in the end. The murderous plot he concocts to do this has registered with one viewer as completely implausible and unlikely to fool a trained detective. But said viewer wanted to see Mr. Seo put away for life for the crime of whining. Surely, there must be some country that outlaws self-pity.

Gabi: Russian Coffee: A Half-Empty Cup

One man sees coffee as love.
Another man sees coffee as the dream of an Empire.

I like a cuppa joe as much as the next guy but Chang Youn-hyun's historical thriller Gabi: Russian Coffee imbues the beverage with a potency that staggers the mind. Evidently, coffee can make you fall madly in love. It can save you from being murdered. It can get you insider access to a paranoid king. And it can inspire that same king to build a cafe in your dead father's honor as a way to restore status to the family name. I always thought it was enough that coffee could help you stay awake when you got sleepy. Boy, was I wrong.

Tanya (Kim So-yeon), the court barista, knows better than me, too. She knows that the coffee-making method taught to her by her lover Illych (Ju Jin-mo) produces a brew capable of seducing — by way of its floral scent and bitter taste — even the currently in-hiding Emperor (Park Hee-soon) of Korea. Furthermore, she knows which type of cup to use, how to fold a filter, and the right way to pour. She also enjoys the philosophical small talk that can make sipping the hot beverage so enjoyable for master and servant alike.

What she doesn't know, or at least hasn't yet to come to learn, is that you don't assassinate someone just to save your own skin and you can't trust your torturers, especially when one of them — a fellow spy (Yoo Sun) — is also in love with your self-sacrificing boyfriend. Perhaps too much caffeine has clouded her judgment.

As such, Gabi: Russian Coffee is a silly movie. You can understand why actress Lee Da-hae dropped out of the production less than two weeks before the shoot began. She must have read the script and thought, "Hell, I'd rather be a barista in real life."

Commitment: Boy Band Boy Is the Man

What's the most effective way for a K-pop singer to be taken seriously as a movie star? Follow the example set by Choi Seung-hyun, a.k.a. rapper T.O.P. from the Korean boy band Big Bang. Here, in director Park Hong-soo's espionage thriller Commitment, Choi has winningly taken on the role of Ri Myung-hoon, a North Korean assassin who's been so indoctrinated into the cause that he can barely register emotion on his face. From the outside at least, he's a killing machine. Bullied at high school? No reaction. Stabbed in the side? Not even a wince. Killing someone? Closed lips. At most, a glare. Admittedly, there's one scene in which Ri breaks down and cries -- his two sisters, one blood (Kim Yoo-jeong), one not (Han Ye-ri) -- have both been kidnapped, after all. But soon enough, this teen assassin is back to serving up stoic face. And you know what? It works.

Haven't we seen enough tongue-in-cheek James Bonds and Jason Bournes, enough smirking Bruce Willis anti-heroes and improbably cheerful Jackie Chan clowns. Choi's cold, merciless, unfeeling take on the spy abroad gives more by giving us so much less. It also makes the fights scenes -- of which there are many -- more intense. When the good guy doesn't have time to weak or make a wisecrack, you know that the martial arts action is taking his utmost attention. It's all about your level of commitment.

But then the South Koreans have always taken the North Koreans seriously, whether it's as estranged friends (J.S.A.: Joint Security Area) or respectable foes (The Berlin Files). Only the Americans have insisted that the North Koreans were bumbling idiots, most notably in the Seth Rogen/James Franco misfire of a frat boy comedy, The Interview. And we saw where that arrogance landed them. North Korea may be off the grid (and even off its rocker) but that doesn't mean they're incapable or incompetent or impotent. And now Hollywood knows that too. Might I recommend a few documentaries?

Fatal: Cheap Isn't a Bad Thing

Rape. Crime. Poverty. Murder. All these things tend to get glamorized in the movies, whether that's the director's intent or not. With flawless faced actors shot in supersaturated colors and from provocative angles, the abhorrent becomes art and subversively appetizing so even when a brutal scene manifests some of the terribleness of it all, with that high gloss, with that visual splendor, it also all looks pretty damned pretty. Which is one of the reasons, Lee Don-ku's harrowing rape-revenge pic Fatal is so affecting. It looks horrible. The ramshackle apartment settings, the discount clothing, even the cast itself never truly look good because Kang Moon-bong's cinematography won't let any of it do so. Appearing to be entirely shot on low-quality film stock about to expire and therefore robbed of any color or contour, Fatal feels sordid in part because the reality unfolding before you never appears lovely, painterly or eye-catching. You're never seduced by the images. Ever. Nothing looks good because nothing is good.

But intentionally crappy cinematography isn't going to make a movie even if the anemic images suit the material. Lucky for us, Lee's storytelling delivers the goods. For with Fatal, Lee has concocted a new kind of Asperger's Syndrome antihero: the boyish, eternally awkward outsider Sung-gong (Nam Yeon-woo) who may be coming to the rescue of rape survivor Jang-mi (Yang Jo-a) and sacrificing his job (admittedly dead-end) and his friends (admittedly dead beat) but who is no knight in shining armor. He's damaged goods, a victim of systematic bullying who's obsession with Jang-mi is "creepy stalker" as much if not more than it's love. Despite all his well-meaning gestures and efforts, the most caring and thoughtful action available to him might have been to just get the hell out of the young woman's life and make attrition and restitution unbeknownst to her somewhere far away. Like the Vatican City. Did he really have to attend the same Evangelical church as Jang-mi to find salvation? What's the opposite of Amen?

Midnight FM: This Number Has Been Disconnected

Remember the good old days before cell phones were used as masking tape in movies, as quick fixes to get us from Point A to Point B with the least effort possible? Watch Midnight FM and then think how much better this thriller would be if popular radio talk show host Sun-Young (Ae Soo) wasn't constantly leaving one of her two cell phones in different rooms and then scrambling to answer the misplaced cell so she can discuss how her psychopathic stalker fan (Yu Ji-tae) is going to murder her sister, her niece and her daughter. All she needs to do is honor that faxed playlist that unfortunately someone threw out. It's her final night on-air and this guy wants to make her work!

Take all that taunting conversation happening during the commercial breaks and put it on-air, have her try to figure out what's going on strictly through audio, see her listeners struggle along with her, have coworkers interrupt because of initial shared ignorance of what exactly is going on, have her weave it all into a polished show... Now that would be a fascinating movie. That's not Midnight FM though, which spells out way too much and and then throw out late night into an extended car chase that only occasionally has her patched into the network to deliver intro to songs and share half-baked insights about Taxi Driver, Pump Up the Volume and Casablanca.

You can see why some fans would find her infuriating. As scripted by Kim Sang-man, she's a bit arrogant, a bit too American in her tastes. Throughout her show (which despite all the blackmailing and fainting has likely a fairly typical song list), she never once mentions South Korean movies or music, despite the absurd popularity of K-pop and the ubiquity of karaoke in Korean flicks. Her heart belongs to Leonard Cohen! You're hardly surprised she's leaving the radio station to study in America. That her mute daughter -- suffering from a neck injury of unknown origin -- might benefit from U.S. medical expertise seems mostly an afterthought. Given how much she likes to dominate conversation, you may harbor a sneaking suspicion that Sun-young is glad her cute young daughter can only tap out yes and no as a way to communicate. This family only has room for one speaker and she's killing it on the airwaves!

Bloody Innocent: Best Friends, Lovers No More; Best Friends, But Not Like Before

A sweet little girl named Myung-hee (Kang Cho-hee) is raped and murdered then left in a ditch alongside a country road one awful, rainy night. Whodunit? The two leading suspects are Dong-sik (Jeong Se-in), the young ruffian who had a crush on Myung-hee, and Seung-Ho (Lee Da-wit), his best friend, who also had a thing for the girl. We know it's one of the two because the only people who'd do this would have to be adolescent boys who harbored warm feelings for her. So goes the logic of Kim Dae-hyun's nonsensical thriller Bloody Innocent. Which makes the prosecution and life-imprisonment of Dong-sik's mentally ill brother Kyung-sik even more exasperating. Clearly the local police have a faulty logic of their own, one which equates underdeveloped intelligence with amorality.

Flash forward a few times and the finger-pointing continues: Dong-sik (now played by Sin Seong-rok) must've done it because he's a member of the lower classes and it's just the kind of heinous act a poor kid would do! He's trash from start to finish! No. Actually Seung-ho (now played by Kim Da-hyeon) is the rapist-killer. Rich people are plain evil. Their good deeds and success inevitably cover up a past spotted by inhumane jealousies! Money is the ultimate corruptor! More deaths pile up: the young prostitute who happens to be Dong-ski's sister; the boyfriend-john who beats the hell out of her for no reason at all; a cyanide-ingesting Kyung-sik who mysteriously poisons himself with tainted milk despite being lactose-intolerant. There's also a group of feminist kidnappers and an ominous woman who sells umbrella, who make quick appearances and just as fast, disappear.

When the one who actually did it confesses his guilt to the one who did not, the latter man, like us, is somewhat baffled as to WHY. What was the point? Is it really so bad not to win the girl when you're a kid? And do you spend the rest of your life holding a grudge for the one that got away? On the flip side, are you sad when someone who's been murdering people you care about gets murdered himself? I, for one, was relieved when the anonymous cop's gun was shot and took out the knife-wielding nut. I'd like to think the "bloody innocent" protagonist breathed a sigh of relief, too.

Stoker: Park Chan-wook Comes to America

So the actors aren't speaking Korean. So what? Stoker is nevertheless a Korean movie because it's still very much a Park Chan-wook movie. A vexatious coming-of-age tale shaped by sociopathic genetics, Stoker -- like so many Park flicks before it -- is a deviously crafted thriller with Park misleading you then revealing clues that make you retrace your steps only to you realize that you were never misinformed, just uninformed. Here are the players this time around: Evelyn, a recent widow (Nicole Kidman) who always felt like the odd man out with her now-dead husband and ice-cold daughter; India, said offspring (Mia Wasikowska) who has her own outsider status at high school where she gets straight A's but has no friends; Uncle Charlie (a really good Matthew Goode), a mystery man who shows up from out of nowhere then stirs up some heat with mother and daughter. Let the intergenerational rivalry begin.

Like Bong Joon-ho's Snowpiercer earlier this year, Park makes some fascinating casting choices for his Hollywood debut. Aside from the aforementioned trio, he's brought on board Jacki Weaver (a two-time Oscar nominee who remains someone that no one's heard of), Dermot Mulroney (the former heartthrob who's now pudgy and gray), and perhaps most delightfully, Harmony Korinne (the indie screenwriter behind Kids, Gummo and Ken Park). Though Korinne's time on screen is fleeting, Park's nod to this fellow auteur is kind of perfect. Park and Korinne are both fearless directors who've got aesthetics unlike anyone else. I also was pleased that Park stuck with his longtime cinematographer Chung Chung-hoon which ensures that Stoker always looks like a Park film as much as it feels like one or sounds like one, even in English.

Given how enthralling Stoker is, I suspect the reason it didn't do better at the box office stateside is that the movie touches on so many taboos -- incest, child-killing, teenage sexuality -- with a disturbingly sweaty hand. Park never condemn atrocities. He bears witness, glosses them up a bit, then stands back leaving you to feel the horror. Alone. Stoker's unsettling for sure.

Head: Lady Reporter Puts Brother Before Story and Scores Story

When people ask me what it is I like so much about Korean movies, I sometimes get tongue-tied. I may cough up a pat answer about '70s noir and nice clothes and strong women or I may talk about when my obsession started nearly ten years ago while covering the New York Korean Film Festival for The Brooklyn Paper. But it might be easier in the future to tell them, "Just watch Head" and leave it at that. Jo Woon's dark comedy about a reporter (Park Yeh-jin) desperate to trade a famous scientist's severed head for the return of her kidnapped younger brother (Ryu Deok-hwan) has pretty much all the elements that keep me coming back to Korean movies week to week. This is the sensibility that intoxicates. This is what I connect to. This is the key. Here's a simple breakdown.

I like how Head challenges authority (the church, the police force, the workplace, your elders). I like the movie's morbid sense of humor (the funeral home setting, the running gag of the head in a styrofoam cooler, the way the kidnap victim's body is marked up like a cow for slaughter then redressed in a pregnant woman's housecoat that's too small). I like Head's physical extremes, its quick shifts from comedy to thriller, its refusal to fall into a sappy romance, the way it builds stories within stories within stories.

And yes, I like that there's a resourceful woman at Head's center, a feisty bitch dressed to the nines who fights back when attacked, who screams from frustration more often than fear, who's a competitor as well as a kook, an underdog that never feels like a victim. That she has a cute younger brother and an even cuter rival reporter with whom she shares a intimate past -- albeit probably not much more than a one night stand -- also helps.

Head isn't a perfect movie. But it's a really, really fun one and it embodies what I've come to see as the Korean POV. I'd recommend it to anyone who wants to know what's so great about Korean film. In fact, if you haven't figured it out, I'm recommending it to you right now!

The Outlaw: Quitting the Force to Be More Forceful

Officer Oh (Kam Woo-seong) doesn't play by the rules. Oh, no. He's a renegade cop who believes you gotta step outside the law to serve the law. Needless to say, that approach -- while lowering crime rates -- has landed him in trouble with Internal Affairs infinite times. But lately he's gone from outside the law to off the rails. When his long missing wife (Kim Min-joo) and the daughter (Hyeon Na-gyeong) he never knew are pointlessly stabbed to death in a restaurant bathroom, he turns in his badge and picks up a torture porn mask then goes for the kill on two murdering party animals (Peter Ronald Holman, Tak Tu-in) and the negligent members of a justice departments that let those jerks off Scot free.

Catering to an audience that craves shock and gore, writer-director Kim Cheol-han packs a lot of on-screen violence in The Outlaw. You see multiple throats slit, a finger shot off, and men mercilessly beaten with chains. Whether it's good guys or bad guys inflicting the violence varies. Gannibalism? Bad guy. Rape? Bad guy. Impromptu laryngectomy? Good guy, actually. Is Kim attempting to show that too many years in Homicide will lead a cop to adopt the very methodology of those he's out to imprison? Perhaps. But he's also a director who simply likes to show brutality. Why else show Oh having a group hug with his family's bloody corpses?

Fun fact: While researching The Outlaw on asianwiki.com (which is devoted to Asian movies and TV), I discovered that the website sometimes includes the actor's blood type alongside his height, weight and age. Why this is relevant or important, I don't know but if you were curious, Kam Woo-seong is Type O. I also googled up Korean blood type personalities and learned that Type O carriers tend to be "outgoing" and "optimistic" so maybe he was miscast in this role as an anti-social misanthrope. Some actors sure love to play against type!

Howling: A Wolf Is a Woman's Worst Friend

I'm not sure writer-director Yoo Ha totally understands dog psychology. In his mongrel murder mystery Howling, the vigilante K-9 trainer (Jo Young-jin) and his emotionally stunted daughter (Nam Bo-ra) seem to hold dogs in too high esteem! They think their beloved pet Jil-poong is a mind-reader capable of assassinating bad guys from intuited commands. Contrast that perplexing perspective with the low regard held by the homicide department. These cops consider dogs completely unpredictable -- is this one a killer without provocation? an informant that might lead them to the killer? or a humanoid creature doomed to run on all fours as he stares at mankind with all-knowing and piercing blue eyes? I suppose you could argue that any inaccuracies in this animal portrait have to do with Jil-poong's unusual pedigree: He's half wolf! But Yoo's shortcomings as a cinematic behaviorist don't end with his canine characterization. Take a look at how he portrays his human heroine.

Detective Eun-young (Lee Na-yeong) is an independent type who does her best work when she's left to her own devices. In group settings, however, she tends to grovel and seek unneeded backup from people who don't want to help her, regardless of their shared goals. Although her instincts are good, her gunmanship is erratic at best: One minute, she's shooting her partner by accident; the next, she's taking out the tire of a fast-moving car. On a motorcycle, she's radiates confidence racing down the highway. On foot (walking, running, limping), Eun-young always looks kinda lost. You can see why she's so fascinated by Jil-poong's unwavering gaze. She wishes she too could sustain that kind of eye contact, whether it was with a hyper-testy cohort like Detective Young-Cheol (Lee Sung-min), her misogynist partner Sang-gil (Song Kang-ho) or her generally unsupportive chief (Sin Joeng-geun). Since this movie isn't scifi horror, she can't become the dog. She's female, not feral, not fierce, not fortunate.

Helpless: Save a Little Pity for the Killer, Too

Say what you want about nature versus nurture, there's something invigorating about a movie that sees its primary murder suspect as a victim. In Helpless, that could-be killer is Seon-yeong (Kim Min-hie), a sweet and pretty bride-to-be whose initial bad credit history uncovers an even darker past including prostitution, identity theft and a handful of dead former female friends. In some ways, Seon-yeong was born into this crappy life. Her father's mounting debts led to loan sharks breaking up her first marriage then turning her into a sex slave. While Seon-yeong manages to escape that fate in one way, it permanently damages her and follows her wherever she goes. A survivor without a moral compass, she basically does whatever it takes to get by. She's been conditioned by extremes.

Veterinarian -- and dupe -- Min-ho (Lee Seon-gyu) might've been her ticket out. He promises a life in which he will bring home the bacon then cook it if she just stays home to make babies as sweet and pretty as she is. Could she have changed to become his perfect wife? We'll never know. And it's not as if writer-director Byun Young-joo has you wishing that Min-ho had never enlisted the help of his cousin (Jo Seong-ha), a disgraced detective dismissed from the force for taking bribes, to dig up her sordid past. But you can understand why her potential guilt doesn't destroy Min-ho's love for her so much as it wreaks havoc on his brain. Love isn't rational. And in a way murder isn't either.

Kim is perfect as the film's central cipher as is Lee as her distraught fiance. Jo turns in solid work as the jaded ex-cop as do Choi Duek-mun as a sympathetic police officer with his own corrupt back story and Kim Byul as a chipper veterinarian's assistant who keeps stumbling across further clues. Byun's tight screenplay is based on a Japanese thriller All She Was Worth by Miyabe Miyuki whose work has inspired even more films in her own country. And you can see why.

A Million (Movie - 2009)

• Movie: A Million
• Revised romanization: 10 eok
• Hangul: 10억
• Director: Jo Min-Ho
• Writer: Jo Min-Ho, David Cho
• Producer: Kim Ji-Yeon, Lee Nam-Seok, Jo Seong-Kyu, David Cho
• Cinematographer: Ryu Jae-Hun
• Release Date: August 6, 2009
• Runtime: 114 min.
• Distributor: SidusFNH
• Language: Korean
• Country: South Korea 

Cast

Park Hae-Il as Ki-tae Han
Shin Min-A as Yu-jin Jok
Park Hie-Sun as Director Jang
Lee Min-Ki as Cheol-hee Park
Lee Cheon-Hee as Wook-han Choi
Jeong Yu-Mi as Ji-eun Kim
Ko Eun-Ah as Bo-yeong Lee
Yu Na-Mi as Su-yeon Hong
Kim Hak-Seon as Seung-ho Ha
Jeong Seok-Yong as cameraman 

Belakangan ini lagi suka nonton movie bergenre thriller nih. Ini dia salah satunya. Movie berjudul A Million ini di rilis tahun 2009. dan dibintangi dengan banyak aktor dan akris ternama seperti Park Hae il, Shin Min Ah, Lee Chun Hee, Go Eun Ah, Lee Min Ki, dll.

Barawal dari sebuah berita menghebohkan di internet mengenai game yang bernilai 1 juta won bagi pemenangnya. Dari banyak peserta yang mendaftar terpilihlah 8 orang dari berbagai profesi yang berbeda. Mereka adalah Han Gi Tae, Jo Yoo jin, Park Chul Hee, Kim Ji Eun, Choi Wook Hwan, Lee Bo Young, Ha Seung Ho, dan Hong Seung Ho.

Ke delapan orang tersebut segera diterbangkan ke luar negeri dan dibawa ke dalam hutan yang terpencil. Sebelumnya Director acara tersebut menjelaskan tentang aturan mainnya. Akan ada 7 game dan si tiap game akan ada 1 orang yang tereliminasi. Nah, bagi yang dapat bertahan sampai akhir, ialah pemenenangnya yang mendapatkan hadiah 1 juta won.

Game pertama pun dimulai. Setelah menyelesaikan game tersebut, Director Jang memerintahkan mereka untuk menuliskan nama seseorang yang mereka ingin eliminasi pada secarik kertas. Dan terpilihlah Choi Wook Hwan sebagai peserta yang pertama kali di eliminasi.

Setelah tereliminasi Wook Hwan tidak terlihat lagi. Esoknya game kedua dimulai. Di pertengahan game kedua ini Lee Bo Young menemukan mayat Choi Wook Hwan di sungai. Lee Bo Young pun kaget dan segera berteriak-berteriak karena panik dan ketakutan. Ia pun mengatakan tidak ingin melanjutkan permainan ini lagi dan karena itulah saat itu juga Lee Bo Young dibunuh oleh Director Jang.

Mulai dari sini lah para peserta yang lain menyadari bahwa mereka akan mati satu per satu. Untuk itulah mereka memutuskan untuk kabur dan keluar dari hutan untuk kembali ke korea. Namun ternyata tidaklah semudah yang dibayangkan. Mereka sulit untuk menemukan jalan keluar, selain itu Director Jang juga memasang kamera tersembunyi di seluruh hutan, jadi kemanapun mereka pergi, Director Jang tetap bisa memantau mereka.

Walau para peserta memutuskan untuk tidak mengikuti permainan lagi, namun tanpa sadar mereka masuk dalam permainan itu karena pada dasarnya peraturannya adalah yang bertahan hidup paling akhirlah yang menang. Mereka harus bertahan hidup dalam hutan yang lebat tanpa makanan dan minuman sedikitpun. Satu per satu dari mereka pun mati.

Lalu siapa kah yang akan bertahan paling akhir? Dan sebenarnya apa tujuan Director Jang dalam permainan ini? Mau tau jawabannya mending nonton sendiri...

Sebenernya salah satu alasan aku nonton film ini karena mau liat Lee Chun Hee dan Go Eun Ha di film ini. Tapi sayang, mereka adalah peserta yang mati paling awal. Hehe...

Komentarku untuk film ini, seru, menegangkan, penuh kejutan, ga bisa ditebak. Bagi penggemar film bergenre thriller, crime, dan mysteri, film ini cocok banget.

Bagi penggemar Shin Min Ah yang biasa liat dia main di film genre comedy, romance, drama. Sebaiknya juga ngeliat akting dia di film yang satu ini. Tapi kalo boleh jujur sih aku kurang suka ma karakter Shin Min Ah di film ini. Di antara 8 peserta game, dialah yang sifatnya paling baik, type sifat tokoh utama yang selalu peduli pada orang lain, yang selalu ingin menolong orang lain. Tapi aku suka aktingnya di adegan akhir film ini. Menunjukkan kalau dia itu juga manusia biasa yang tidak selalu baik.

Detectives In 40 Minutes (Movie - 2009)

Aka: 4Gyosi Churi Yeongyeok, Detectives In 40 Minutes, 4th Period Murder Mystery
Year: 2009
Directed: Lee Sang-yong
Genre: Thriller, Mistery
Runtime: 01:26:26
Country: South Korea
Language: Korean
Subtitles: English

Cast.
Yoo Seung-hoAs Han Jeong-hoon
Kang So-ra As Lee Da-jeong
Jo Sang-geun As Problem child, Kim Tae-gyoo
Jeon Joon-hong As Professor – MBC, Byeong-soo
Jeong Seok-yong As Old unmarried professor, Kang Gook-man
Park Cheol-min As Professor – Crazy Dog, Han Kang-man

Semua berawal dari kematian seorang siswa secara tiba-tiba akibat keracunan. Tidak lama setelah itu ada lagi siswa yang meninggal di dalam kelas dan sayangnya yang menemukannya mayatnya adalah Han Jeong-hoon, seorang siswa teladan di sekolah tersebut. Dan kebetulan memang sebelumnya Han Jeong-hoon dan siswa yang terbunuh itu pernah berkelahi. Apalagi saat itu Han Jeong-hoon juga memegang pisaunya.

Dan siapa sangka bahwa akan ada orang yang rela membantunya. Ia adalah Lee Da-jeong, siswa yang di anggap aneh oleh teman-temannya yang lain karena sifatnya yang pendiam dan selalu menutupi wajahnya dengan rambut. Lee Da-jeong memang penggemar cerita-cerita bertema detektif. Makannya Lee Da-jeong memutuskan untuk menyelidiki sendiri siapa pembunuhnya.

Kejadian tersebut berlangsung pada jam pelajaran ke empat saat pelajaran olah raga. Siswa-siswa yang lain sedang berada di lapangan. Maka dari itu kasus ini harus diselesaikan sebelum bel pergantian pelajaran berbunyi dan waktunya hanya 40 minute. Dapatkah pembunuhnya terpecahkan dalam waktu 40 minute tersebut? nonton aja ya...

Alasan aku nonton ini pasti semua udah tahu yaitu karena Yoo Seung Ho. Aku ngefans sama dia udah lama. Dulu dia itu aktor cilik. Pertama kali liat dia di Sad Love story. Dia jadi Kwon sang woo waktu kecil. Tapi mulai ngefans sama dia semenjak nonton Hearty Paws, di film itu aktingnya OK banget. Abis itu baru deh aku nonton dia di film don't tell papa. Dia juga sering banget ngebintangi MV-MV. Dan film ini adalah film pertamanya sebagai tokoh remaja dan bukan anak-anak. Makanya aku penasaran banget. Hehehe...kalo ngomongin Yoo Seung Ho emang ga ada abisnya.

Dari segi cerita, bolehlah. Bagus kok. Tapi aku kok ga ngerasa tegang kaya nonton film horor lainnya. Tapi bisa ngebuat aku ikut tebak-tebakan siapa pembunuhnya. Inilah serunya kalo nonton film detektif. Pembunuhnya ga teduga banget deh. Untuk film ini aku kasih nilai 79 deh.

The Case of Itaewon Homicide - (Movie 2009)

   

* Movie: The Case of Itaewon Homicide (literal title) / Where the Truth Lies
    * Revised romanization: Itaewon Salinsageon
    * Hangul: 이태원 살인사건
    * Director: Ki-seon Hong
    * Writer: Maeng-yu Lee
    * Producer:
    * Cinematographer:
    * Release Date: September 10, 2009
    * Runtime: 100 min.
    * Language: Korean
    * Country: South Korea

# Jin-yeong Jeong - Prosecutor Park
# Geun-seok Jang - Pearson
# Seung-hwan Shin - Alex
# Kwang-rok Oh - Attorney Kim Byeon
# Chang-Seok Ko - Alex's father
# Jong-ki Song - Jong-pil Jo (murder victim)
# Jung-ki Kim - Judge
# Il-hwa Choi - Jong-pil's father

Film ini berdasarkan kisah nyata tentang kasus pembunuhan yang terjadi di Itaewon pada tahun 1997. Cerita diawali dengan adanya kasus pembunuhan di sebuar restoran Burger King di Itaewon. Seorang pemuda bernama Jo Jong pil terbunuh di toilet dengan beberapa tusukan di tubuhnya. Setelah diselidiki ditemukan dua tersangka pembunuh pemuda tersebut. Kedua orang itu adalah dua orang pemuda keturunan Korea - American yaitu Pearson dan AJ ( Alex Jung) teman Pearson yang sekaligus anak dari seorang pejabat ternama.

Alex dan Pearson sama-sama tidak mengakui pembunuhan itu. Mereka malah saling menuduh. Pearson menuduh Alex yang membunuhnya dan Alex menuduh Pearson yang membunuhnya. Saksi-saksi pun akhirnya didatangkan. Saksi - saksi tersebut adalah teman-teman Alex dan Pearson yang saat itu juga makan di restoran itu. Namun karena tidak ada yang benar-benar melihat kejadian pembunuhan tersebut, maka kesaksian mereka dianggap lemah dan belum dapat membuktikan siapa yang jadi pembunuhnya. Kasus tersebut semakin di selidiki semakin rumit.

Aku beli film ini karena film ini diilhami dari kisah nyata. Awalnya aku mengira cerita yang ingin ditonjolkan di film ini adalah tentang perjuangan seorang pemuda yang tidak bersalah yang dituduh sebagai pembunuh. Namun ternyata aku salah. Inti dari film ini adalah bahwa keadilan itu sulit didapat. Ada dialog dalam film ini yang mengatakan bahwa "keadilan tidak akan pernah bisa mengalahkan hukum". Awalnya aku bingung mendengar kalimat tersebut. Namun setelah menonton sampai akhir barulah aku mengerti. Bahwa Hukum saat ini tidak selalu adil. Tergantung pada siapa yang memutuskan, siapa yang dihukum, dan siapa korbannya.

Ending film ini mengecewakan. Tidak seperti yang aku harapkan. Tapi aku jadi tahu ternyata Hukum dimanapun sama saja. Yang kuat yang menang yang lemah yang tertindas. Nilai yang aku kasih untuk film ini 6.9 deh. Saranku dari pada beli nih film, mending minjem aja sama yang punya, hehehe.... Tapi bagi penggemar Jang Geun Suk, klo mau denger dia ngomong bahasa inggris dengan fasih, mending beli aja. Udah beredar kok dvdnya...