The historical drama is a tale that is constantly over-shadowed by its real-life counterpart’s undoing. No matter which way the film may elude to direct itself, the foreboding presence of certain real-life individuals makes clear to an audience which way the film will steer. This is especially the case when dealing with the infamous Kim…
Category: Asian Cinema
62nd BFI London Film Festival: Last Child Review
There is nothing more distressing for parents than to lose a child. It is no wonder that the topic is one of the hardest to convey on the screen, especially so since the grief and unimaginable suffering take on many different faces and stages. The complex, confusing and isolating feelings associated with the loss of…
26th Raindance Film Festival: Room Laundering Review
In Japan, a ‘jiko bukken’ is the name given to stigmatized properties where the last tenant has died of unnatural causes. Supposedly – according to Room Laundering at least – Japanese landlords must disclose to possible residents if the last tenant died of something out of the ordinary. Leaving landlords stuck with unrentable properties, that…
LEAFF 2018 Pre-Fest Screening: Along with the Gods: The Last 49 Days Review
Following the success of Along with the Gods: The Two Worlds, writer-director Kim Yong-hwa returns with a sequel, with the story picking up right where it left off. I wonder how many underworld trials I would have to go through if I were to be resurrected; I can only hope that it would not be…
LEAFF 2018 Pre-Fest Screening: Along with the Gods: The Two Worlds Review
South Korean cinema is known for its wealth of excellent thrillers, horror films, historical dramas and melodramas, but its fantasy genre has been known more for the misses than the hits; it always seemed that the industry found itself slightly out of its depth when it took on the more massive, epic-level projects – or…
In Conversation with Lee Jin-mu, South Korean Actor, Model and Filmmaker
Can one scene from a film change a young boy’s life? That seems to be the case for Lee Jin-mu, a South Korean actor, filmmaker and a model, who got struck by the acting bug when he saw an emotional scene from Eyes of Dawn, one of the most popular TV dramas of the 1990’s:…
Dear Ex Review
When Song Zhengyuan dies, he leaves everything he has to the most important person in his life: his gay lover Jay (Roy Chiu). To his wife Liu Sanlian (Ying-Shiuan Hsieh) this comes as a shock, as it leaves nothing for her and their teenage son Chengxi (Joseph Huang). She’s livid, and jumps at the chance to…
20th Udine Far East Film Festival: One Cut of the Dead Review
Is there anything that has yet to be seen in the zombie film genre? You might think there isn’t, but One Cut of the Dead, which earned itself not only a standing ovation from the audience in Udine, but also missed winning the festival audience-favourite title by a handful of votes, landing on second place,…
20th Udine Far East Film Festival: 1987 – When the Day Comes Review
When in 1987, Park Jong-chul, a 21-year-old activist and a student of Linguistics at Seoul National University, died while being questioned by the Anti-Communist Investigations Bureau about whereabouts of the campus leader and the fellow ‘revolutionist’, no one expected that the South Korean political landscape was about to change forever. The authorities insisted that the young…
20th Udine Far East Film Festival: The Battleship Island Director’s Cut Review
Hashima Island is a small Japanese island, located a mere 15 kilometers off the coast of Nagasaki; it is full of concrete buildings and has a seawall that protects it from the waves. Its shape is the reason for the other name the island is known for: Gunkanjima (Gun-ham-do, 군함도 in Korean) – “Battleship Island”. The…
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