wavetwister04
Lifetime Total
1+
Lifetime Trivia
1+
IMDb Member
17 years
Reviews
H (2002)
Twists for Twistiness' Sake
On the whole, I enjoyed this film. It starts out with a series of nice, gruesome post-mortem and death scenes, and carries the creepy ambiance most of the way through. Unfortunately, as the twists begin to unravel, so does the quality of the film.
For the sake of those who haven't seen the film, I won't spoil any of the myriad twists, but I will say that you better pay very close attention to this film or you'll miss some illuminating plot points, as I did.
Unfortunately, this has to do with the number of suspects/characters in the film, and the difficulty an American viewer will have keeping all the names separate. Characters are often referred to by name without being on screen (as is the nature of a police thriller), and I found myself, more often than not, seeing said names and thinking, "wait, which one is he?" Still, I doubt I'd have had the problem if the characters in question were more than just your standard serial murder movie cutouts. I watch a lot of Korean cinema, and this is the first time I've ever had this problem.
This speaks to the general quality of the film which, while engaging, is certainly not going to stun most viewers with its artistry. The acting is passable (at best), the writing is sparse and convoluted (though not devoid of entertainment value, to be sure), and the editing is flat-out terrible. That's not something that usually stands out for me in a film, but in this case it was a flagrant issue with the film. You'll find yourselves following the characters to a raid on a suspect's house only to forget why this guy was a suspect in the first place, and random cuts to side characters doing sweet F.A. don't do much to ease the difficulty of following the bouncing (murder)ball.
There are two kinds of "end of the movie twists" out there. There's the "Oh my god, I didn't see that coming, but I should've" twists, and then there are the "uh...what?" twists. Sadly, the final revelation of this film is one of the latter. I've seen debate on the message boards regarding the supposed "final, final twist," but I have to say that it's a pretty loose interpretation to call the final moments of the film yet another twist. It's more of a "book-end," and effective as such.
Where this film fails most is in the expectations it builds. It's an excellent concept for a serial murderer flick, and they spend a lot of time building an interesting emotional landscape that's inevitably forsaken for gimmicky plot devices that, while not wholly unbelievable (though highly improbable), are pretty much just plain silly. Had they stuck with the emotional and psychological themes and forsaken the twists, this would be an excellent film.
As it stands, it is not excellent, but it's certainly not terrible. If you're a fan of Asian thrillers, you could do worse than this one.
-J
For the sake of those who haven't seen the film, I won't spoil any of the myriad twists, but I will say that you better pay very close attention to this film or you'll miss some illuminating plot points, as I did.
Unfortunately, this has to do with the number of suspects/characters in the film, and the difficulty an American viewer will have keeping all the names separate. Characters are often referred to by name without being on screen (as is the nature of a police thriller), and I found myself, more often than not, seeing said names and thinking, "wait, which one is he?" Still, I doubt I'd have had the problem if the characters in question were more than just your standard serial murder movie cutouts. I watch a lot of Korean cinema, and this is the first time I've ever had this problem.
This speaks to the general quality of the film which, while engaging, is certainly not going to stun most viewers with its artistry. The acting is passable (at best), the writing is sparse and convoluted (though not devoid of entertainment value, to be sure), and the editing is flat-out terrible. That's not something that usually stands out for me in a film, but in this case it was a flagrant issue with the film. You'll find yourselves following the characters to a raid on a suspect's house only to forget why this guy was a suspect in the first place, and random cuts to side characters doing sweet F.A. don't do much to ease the difficulty of following the bouncing (murder)ball.
There are two kinds of "end of the movie twists" out there. There's the "Oh my god, I didn't see that coming, but I should've" twists, and then there are the "uh...what?" twists. Sadly, the final revelation of this film is one of the latter. I've seen debate on the message boards regarding the supposed "final, final twist," but I have to say that it's a pretty loose interpretation to call the final moments of the film yet another twist. It's more of a "book-end," and effective as such.
Where this film fails most is in the expectations it builds. It's an excellent concept for a serial murderer flick, and they spend a lot of time building an interesting emotional landscape that's inevitably forsaken for gimmicky plot devices that, while not wholly unbelievable (though highly improbable), are pretty much just plain silly. Had they stuck with the emotional and psychological themes and forsaken the twists, this would be an excellent film.
As it stands, it is not excellent, but it's certainly not terrible. If you're a fan of Asian thrillers, you could do worse than this one.
-J
Rise (2007)
Oh No Liu Di'int.
A friend got this on netflix instead of "Rize," the excellent Crumping documentary. After my initial protests, we watched it anyway. Lucy Liu, Robert Forster and vampires. How bad could it be?
Quoth Nigel Tufnel: "None more."
Liu's usual edge and wit are dulled to the point of non-existence. Veteran actor Forster is barely used. Carla Gugino has never looked less sexy. The plot (which, I understand, was fleshed out in a director's cut) is so convoluted that you'll constantly wonder if this film actually had a writer.
At a certain point, we realized that the only enjoyment we were deriving from the film was from our own Mystery Science Theater 3000-ing. There's very little else to be enjoyed in this film, unless you're a die-hard vampire flick fan and simply enjoy anything within the genre.
Others have lauded this film as a smart, sexy, blood-soaked revenge tale.
1) Sexy? Yeah, about as sexy as herpes. 2) Blood soaked? To the point of boredom. 3) Revenge tale? Yeah, I think there was something about revenge in there. Maybe. It's hard to tell when a film goes from point A to point C while leaving out any details as to what point B might have been. 4) Smart? Any film in which a protagonist attempts to save someone's life by tying a tourniquet around the person's neck can't exactly be classified as smart. "Here, let me save your life by cutting off the blood flow to your brain." Even better...it works.
Then again, that makes about as much sense as anything else in this yawn-fest. I understand the fervor surrounding anything to do with vampires, but this one is a real stinker. Do yourself a favor - skip this and check out "The Wisdom of Crocodiles" instead.
NB - the only reason I didn't give this piece of tripe a 1 out of 10 is because I was in fact able to watch it to completion. Then again, I've always been a bit of a cinematic masochist.
Quoth Nigel Tufnel: "None more."
Liu's usual edge and wit are dulled to the point of non-existence. Veteran actor Forster is barely used. Carla Gugino has never looked less sexy. The plot (which, I understand, was fleshed out in a director's cut) is so convoluted that you'll constantly wonder if this film actually had a writer.
At a certain point, we realized that the only enjoyment we were deriving from the film was from our own Mystery Science Theater 3000-ing. There's very little else to be enjoyed in this film, unless you're a die-hard vampire flick fan and simply enjoy anything within the genre.
Others have lauded this film as a smart, sexy, blood-soaked revenge tale.
1) Sexy? Yeah, about as sexy as herpes. 2) Blood soaked? To the point of boredom. 3) Revenge tale? Yeah, I think there was something about revenge in there. Maybe. It's hard to tell when a film goes from point A to point C while leaving out any details as to what point B might have been. 4) Smart? Any film in which a protagonist attempts to save someone's life by tying a tourniquet around the person's neck can't exactly be classified as smart. "Here, let me save your life by cutting off the blood flow to your brain." Even better...it works.
Then again, that makes about as much sense as anything else in this yawn-fest. I understand the fervor surrounding anything to do with vampires, but this one is a real stinker. Do yourself a favor - skip this and check out "The Wisdom of Crocodiles" instead.
NB - the only reason I didn't give this piece of tripe a 1 out of 10 is because I was in fact able to watch it to completion. Then again, I've always been a bit of a cinematic masochist.