SHH! Film Society

[The FallenAngel]

I'll throw out a few movies I'd like to see get reviewed by you guys: Grosse Pointe Blank, Heat, or Collateral.

 

[The Apatow Crew]

How about this one for the month of October.

Fright Night.

It's a some what of a 80's classic.

 

[Jennifer Walters]

I own it on DVD, so I wouldn't be opposed to it being our next film.

 

[chaseter]

Oldboy - 2003 [2005 worldwide]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0364569/

Let me first off just say wow. I usually hate foreign films because I hate to read subtitles. It takes your eye away from the movie and part of your concentration to quickly read lines to get everything in and understand what is going on. But this is not the case for this film and it perfectly fits in with an elite few such as Pan's Labyrinth. And that brings me to the next warning...do not watch films that have been voice dubbed. It ruins everything about the film and what the actors and director originally made.

The story is a tragic thriller about Dae-su, a family man who is kidnapped and then held captive for no apparent reason to him. He slowly looses his sanity with the only source to the outside world being television. Dae-su tries to grip his loosing battle and begins training alone, preparing for the mental and physical battles ahead...a battle lasting 15 years in captivity after finding out his wife is dead and his daughter has been in foster care.

After Dae-su is set free for no obvious reason, he has completely lost touch with humanity and it is seen with his conversation with a suicidal man on the roof. This is where the beautiful cinematography and directing starts to be noticeable. We then get a call from Woo-jin, Dae's captor, and he begins to play a sick game with Dae-su. This is where the movie begins to get intense and certainly a teeth clencher...if you have any teeth left unlike the prison managert: And then we see a wonderful one man battle against with a claw hammer! Just crazy and amazing! We find out that Woo-jin is actually a tortured soul himself, inflicting pain on others to end his own and one of the greatest and tragic scenes I have ever seen concludes his story. I don't want to give away much so I will stop talking about the plot

The music is also wonderful and set the tones for this movie and just makes everything even better. The only real complaint I have is that some of the shots are of course the hoaky Japanese zoom in on faces Kung-Fu sort of style but it is really nothing major. But, I must say that this film is beautiful and a rare thing indeed. I now have to go buy this thing! I recommend that you go this movie as soon as you can and watch it...just a fantastic piece of cinema from an unexpected place. It has everything and this movie is a near masterpiece.

****1/2 out of 5 stars

GO RENT IT

 

[Hunter Rider]

OLDBOY (2003)

Well I just finished watching and am writing this review immediately after, so it's quite hard b/c my emotions are all over the place. There is a sense of being cheated but also knowing Ive just seen a special film.

I say cheated b/c this is a revenge movie that doesn't play like any Ive ever seen before so as i sat there i was expecting certain things to happen and they didn't, so it's more of a case of it outsmarting me that is perhaps lingering lol. The thing with Oldboy is it's actually 2 revenge tales playing out at once, only one avenger is the cat and the other is the mouse.

The premise is very simple, Oh Dae Su starts the film in the police station for a drunk and disorderly, his friend comes to get him out, they go to phone his daughter whose birthday it is, he talks to his daughter then his friend does, while his friend is talking to her he puts on the angel wings he's bought her for her birthday, he drifts out of the picture and a few seconds later his friend turns around to find he is gone and only the wings remain in the rain soaked street.
We next see him getting his meal given to him through a prison door and he has been there 3 months and is demanding answers. We then go through a 15 year period in around 10 minutes with some facts being thrown at us such as Oh Dae Su's wife being a news story as she has been murdered a year after he disappeared and he is the prime suspect. We also See a bunch of world events that give us a timeline and he starts trying to dig his way out through the wall as well as training himself to fight.....Then all of a sudden he is released and so begins the journey to find out why he was imprisoned and to get revenge.

The first thing to strike me was that for a movie in this vein, the lead character "Oh Dae Su" is not very likable at all, The usual format is we see the main character in his happy period, we come to identify with him and like him, then something terrible happens and we feel for him before rooting for him in his quest for revenge.....Only like most conventions Oldboy ignores them. Oh Dae Su is a *****e bag and comes off as a sleazy loser in the only scenes we see him in prior to him getting imprisoned, after he is released he is basically a fractured man on the brink of insanity and out of touch with his humanity until he meets a girl called Mido, who helps him.

So at 15 minutes in I'm getting a bit restless as I can't find a way into the movie on a personal level, then the mystery angle starts to evolve and i become gripped with finding out the "Why" posed by Oh Dae Su's slick tormentor.
The way this film is crafted is something to behold, the way it peels away layers bit by bit is captivating and even though at times it gets so ugly you want to turn away.....you can't.

As the final act unspools you initially get a "that was it ?" feeling over the reason Oh Dae su has been put through this, then the tormentor plays his final card and it knocked me out, so disturbing, a truly terrible revenge and not from the source you expect, this is basically a revenge movie in reverse, playing with standard revenge flick conventions and structure.

Direction from Chan Wook Park is sublime, there are no doubt countless things i didn't pick up on my viewing that i will see when I watch it again, there are so many superb visual touches that elevate basic scenes, the look of Oldboy is a grimy almost nihilistic one, with splashes of gaudy colour here and there.
The way he reveals important plot points in the movie is majestic, like the way he shoots Oh Dae Su's flashback to his school years, it's a semi dreamlike feel but is a fantastically cool way to explore the exposition. The art of Park is also keenly apparent in the way he reveals the final horrendous twist, like a slow motion gut punch.

Much was made of the violence in this movie when it was released but i didn't think it was that bad, the much vaunted fight in the hallway done in one tracking shot was pretty weak and fake looking.

Ive left plot details scarce in the review b/c i highly recommend the film and the less you know the more you'll enjoy it, if you dug movies like 'Memento', 'The Usual Suspects' and 'Seven' then i think you'll enjoy this.


****/*****

 

[Dark Donnie]

For our next film to review we decided on the Korean release Old Boy. Old Boy is directed by Park Chan-wook, and stars Choi Min-sik as Oh Dae-Su, Yu Ji-tae as Lee Woo-jin, and Kang Hye-jeong as Mido. Old Boy is a film that I've heard so much about, but never got around to giving it a view. To be honest sub titled films never hold my interest. This one however was completely different. It's a gripping thriller with a brilliant mix of drama, revenge, and mystery. There is even some full on martial arts fights sprinkled in.

The film has many qualities I liked, one of the main ones being the performances. Choi Min-Sik's portrayal of our main character Oh Dae-su is brilliant. His performance literally takes you on the highest of highs to the lowest of lows, all the way to the shocking ending. You can also tell he threw himself into this role judging by the flashbacks where he put on a noticable amount of weight. The other main characters(Mido, Woo-Jin) are portrayed quite exceptional as well. Other pros would be the score and music selection. Some of the choices fit beautifully with there respected scenes.

I don't want to delve to much into the plot, but are story centers around a Korean man name Oh Dae-su. The story begins with Oh Dae-su, a drunken mess in the police station. Oh Dae-su friend, Joo-Hwan comes and bails him out. After leaving the station Oh-Dae-su and Joo-Hwan make a phone call to Oh Dae-Su wife and daughter to let them know everything is ok. As Joo-Hwan is talking on the phone, Oh Dae-Su disappears with no explanation. Cut to days later Oh Dae-Su is imprisoned, and has no reason why. Cut to months then even years later, 15 to be exact, Oh Dae-Su learns that his wife has been murdered, and his daughter sent away to foster parents. Succumbing to the idea he might not be released he makes several attempts at suicide, and even tries to escape, until out of the blue he is given his release.

Trying to piece together what happened and how he ended up imprisoned he comes in contact with Mido, a sushi chef at a restaurant he visits. Oh-Dae-su later comes in contact with Woo-jin, the man that hired the group to kidnap Oh Dae-Su. From here Woo-jin tells Oh Dae-su he has 5 days to find out why he was captured or Mido would be killed. From here were lead on a dark journey that lays out Woo-jin's motives for kidnapping Oh Dae-su as well as the big twist at the end that is to shocking for words. The pacing and camera working leading up to the reveal are beautfully done by director Park Chan-wook.

This is probably the best foreign films I've seen to date, and easily one of the more powerful films in general I've ever seen.

****/*****

 

[Carmine Falcone]

I must watch this....so I won't read your reviews. I noticed they were positive though...

Make the next one another foreign flick while you're at it. Watch Aguirre: Der Zorn Gottes next, I wonder what y'all think about that one. It might be hard to get ahold of though, I'm not sure.

 

[Movies205]

Oldboy

Park Chanwook’s Oldboy fits into the category of “not-my-cup-of-tea” which is funny since three or four years ago when I first saw it, I loved it. My main problem with it is that the whole premise and film is simply just downright silly. I either will watch movies for the entertainment value ala the comedy or action flick or for some deeper meaning ala the drama. Oldboy is a thriller which is an odd genre in that it relies on the character/meaning of the drama but the spectacle of the action flick to keep it going. So while I enjoyed the spectacle, I did not particularly buy the drama.

Before I digress into a diatribe on the thematical issues of Oldboy, I shall discuss its greatest strength: cinematography/editing. I think anyone interested in film should watch Oldboy since it has such an amazing balance when it comes to the composition of the actual film. For example, one of the most famous scenes from the film is when the main character takes on like thirty men in a hallway. One of the reasons it has become renowned is because it is a two minute long take that remains perfect lit and composed. The average shot length in a film is six seconds and to be able to have that beautiful choreography is amazing. I’m also very impressed with the aesthetic of the film in which Chanwook keeps to this very moody saturated color look, but will constantly accentuate it with various bright colored objects, it just a beautiful film to look at overall.

However big a cinematic masterpiece the film might be, its lost on me for the fact that I do not buy it. From a scriptwriting perspective, it is an amazingly well written script that follows a wonderful three-act structure to the T without ever getting stale. Also the way it keeps tight with the amount of characters is equally impressive, but I simply do not buy it. So again I cite this as being a problem with myself and not the film. I just find the fundamental motivations of the characters to be silly and also mean-spirited. I just can’t derive pleasure from people’s teeth being pulled and tongues being cut out. It just makes me a little sick to be honest. With that said, due to the wonderful structure of the script the end scene is wonderfully entertaining in how they have the big reveal.

In the end, I have no issue with the revenge thriller but I do not think this took that thematic theme really anywhere new. A man is locked up for fifteen years and the deepest this film can get is focusing on how much he wants to kill in revenge? I was a big fan of the film (have not had the pleasure of reading the book) The Counte of Monte Cristo because it dealt with loss as well as a world that's moved on and how petty revenge is. While this movie does deal with that in some respect, its far more interested in the spectacle it can create than the actual depth its premise can offer. So in the end, it is an exceptionally well made piece of cinema made on a rather gimmicky and unrealistic premise that if you can swallow then I recommend it highly. However, for those of us that need a little more than style and some actual meat and potatoes I find this to be rather elementary.


3 out of 5 Stars - Only because its so well made, but I felt like turning it off half-way through

 

[Movies205]

My thoughts 3 1/2 years ago when I first saw it:

Oldboy
Directed by Chan-wook Park

Oldboy is a very different kind of film because it's not character driven but it's the mystery that drives it. You'll find yourself glue to the screen not because you care for the character but because the story is so engrossing and Chan-wook Park has laid out a fabulous mystery before us. It is almost the perfect thriller, it keeps tossing you pieces of the puzzle through out the movie, but the problem is there pieces that don't connect so the entire movie you're trying to figure out how one thing is connected to each other so as the movie goes on and you get more and more pieces to it, you start to figure it out and then at the end it's one of those blow your mind kind of ending because you find out you were buildnig the whole god-damn thing upside down. But the reason it isn't perfect is because the movie stands more for the mystery and not about teh character, this is what you find yourself far more engrossed in, and once you figure it out, you really would like it just to end. The problem is after he get out of his "prison" there isn't much there to connect to, the main character becomes somewhat of a hollow being bent on vengence, sure he shows some emotion with mido but over-all you really can't learn to can't for the guy. Now I've read a couple of reviews that bring up the fact that it's style over substance so when I went in I was expecting something like Hero, but this is simply not the case here. You're not going see any real fancy camera tricks, or beautiful cinematography, what you're going to get is a well crafted mystery. The fight scenes are somewhat awkward and not very enthralling to say the least, not that I was expecting matrix style fighting or anything but this film would of benefitted from getting a better choreographer which would of bumped up the cool factor. Also all the little love scenes which are made useful at the end were kind of boring especially the sex scene, like I said before this movie is more about the mystery then the character so I didn't really care for that stuff. I mean there are some nice bits of seeing how a man would react if he was kept from the world for 14 years but to me it wasn't that interesting. Now don't get me wrong it poses some very provoking philosophical questions about people especially one line in the movie that said quite bit but in the end it's about the mystery. Now something that should be mention is that like I said before the ending is mind-blowing and it's one of those movies that after you see it, you're just going keep pondering about for a while, which to me is something I love, a movie that gives me somethign to think about. So in conclusion this movie is damn well worth going to the theater to see or rushing out to buy it on DVD when it comes out.

4.5 stars out of 5

Date watched July 9, 2005

P.S. Big thanks to kritic cuz I never would of gone out to see this movie at midnight in the city if he hadn't recommended it and it was a terrific film

Have I become a stuffy film viewer?

 

[chaseter]

^Nah...this isn't a repeat viewing movie that you can watch over and over but this was still an unexpected hit for me and I think a hidden gem in cinema.

 

[Movies205]

^Nah...this isn't a repeat viewing movie that you can watch over and over but this was still an unexpected hit for me and I think a hidden gem in cinema.

Like I said in my review, its an exceptionally well made film and I could cite numerous scenes that did a lot of cool things, but I just don't buy the premise, I find it all too melodramatic. Hence why I openly admit, its not my cup-of-tea...

 

[Sarge 2.0]

Werner Herzog's Nosferatu

Hell, any Herzog is worth viewing at least once.

David Lynch's Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me. His most underrated film, by far.

Wim Wender's Paris, Texas and Wings of Desire.

All worth checking out.

 

[Hunter Rider]

Is the premise far fetched ? No doubt, but i find that with a lot of thrillers, so the question is do you decide to meet the film in it's own skewed reality.

Now while the movie is one of those that is never as good the second time b/c it's all about that final reveal, once you know the impact is gone, and in this case it does not have any likable or badass characters, I still think I'll watch it again b/c there are things visually I am sure i missed and perhaps some clues to the terrible twist.

On a side note, Oldboy is probably the most hyped movie to come out of the Korean onslaught, but I think 'A Bittersweet Life' was better and recommend it to any of the reviewers who don't usually watch Asian movies but enjoyed Oldboy.

 

[chaseter]

Well now it is time for our Halloween movie! Suggest away.

 

[Hunter Rider]

Well now it is time for our Halloween movie! Suggest away.

Haven't we still got reviews to come in for Oldboy yet ?

And i suggest Scream.

 

[Movies205]

Is the premise far fetched ? No doubt, but i find that with a lot of thrillers, so the question is do you decide to meet the film in it's own skewed reality.

Now while the movie is one of those that is never as good the second time b/c it's all about that final reveal, once you know the impact is gone, and in this case it does not have any likable or badass characters, I still think I'll watch it again b/c there are things visually I am sure i missed and perhaps some clues to the terrible twist.

Visually its awesome but I can not like you said meet the film on its own skewed reality because the characters are just so two dimensional and just playing to what I guess we suppose would happen. Like I said, I just don't find it to be very deep and because of that I don't particularly like the characters and so I can't really get that emotionally attach to the thriller aspect.

 

[Movies205]

Well now it is time for our Halloween movie! Suggest away.

No time for discussion

 

[Hunter Rider]

Visually its awesome but I can not like you said meet the film on its own skewed reality because the characters are just so two dimensional and just playing to what I guess we suppose would happen. Like I said, I just don't find it to be very deep and because of that I don't particularly like the characters and so I can't really get that emotionally attach to the thriller aspect.

I think it's a film that gained a lot of praise from first time reviews, it's one of those that is very much about the way it plays with the traditional structure of the genre and also with some of it's conventions, it's tricksy nature and killer twist only work once obviously. As I said in my review it was my interest in finding out the Why that hooked me in, not the character.

I actually found Oh Dae Su and interesting study for the viewer, testing our humanity, b/c he is dislikable, he's at times weird and annoying and he is neither cool, sympathetic or badass, so he has none of the movieland touchstones for a leading character in this type of film, so it asks us to feel for his plight on a very humane level.

 

[Movies205]

I think it's a film that gained a lot of praise from first time reviews, it's one of those that is very much about the way it plays with the traditional structure of the genre and also with some of it's conventions, it's tricksy nature and killer twist only work once obviously. As I said in my review it was my interest in finding out the Why that hooked me in, not the character.

I actually found Oh Dae Su and interesting study for the viewer, testing our humanity, b/c he is dislikable, he's at times weird and annoying and he is neither cool, sympathetic or badass, so he has none of the movieland touchstones for a leading character in this type of film, so it asks us to feel for his plight on a very humane level.

You make a valid point, but my beef with it is okay I'm going suspend my belief, now what am I getting out of it? The fact that you cleverly tell a story? I don't think it really explores Dae Su humanity adequately enough as say "The Counte of Monte Cristo". For example, when I watch Transformers I suspend my belief because I get to see huge robots tear the **** out of each other, what exactly am I suspending my belief for in this film? And like you said if its for the thriller aspect, its a one trick pony.

Again though the editing/cinematography is the true star of this film.

 

[chaseter]

Yes the cinematography was indeed the star of the film and the music was pretty good too...although hoaky at times...it still made the point.

 

[Hunter Rider]

You make a valid point, but my beef with it is okay I'm going suspend my belief, now what am I getting out of it? The fact that you cleverly tell a story? I don't think it really explores Dae Su humanity adequately enough as say "The Counte of Monte Cristo". For example, when I watch Transformers I suspend my belief because I get to see huge robots tear the **** out of each other, what exactly am I suspending my belief for in this film? And like you said if its for the thriller aspect, its a one trick pony.

Again though the editing/cinematography is the true star of this film.

All you get is the visuals I'd say, the action is not great and the film is 85% about the twists that only work the once, that is why your review is different to mine I think. Myself, Donnie and Chase were seeing it for the first time so we got a value from it missing for the second time viewer like yourself.

I'd say on repeat viewings they are the star cinematically, but i think the story is the star first time around, at least it was for me. the editing is truly superb though, I agree.

 

[Movies205]

Yes the cinematography was indeed the star of the film and the music was pretty good too...although hoaky at times...it still made the point.

Got to agree with the Hokeyness but it did serve its purpose.

HR, this might be the case since I had seen it before. Also I'm only stoking the fires of movie discussion, only to get to a better understanding of film, as always HR your opinions are enlightening

 

[Hunter Rider]

Got to agree with the Hokeyness but it did serve its purpose.

HR, this might be the case since I had seen it before. Also I'm only stoking the fires of movie discussion, only to get to a better understanding of film, as always HR your opinions are enlightening

The music was very operatic and melodramatic, attempting to ape the classic Greek tragedies I'd say.

I enjoy a good movie discussion, taking in various views and thoughts.

 

[Sarge 2.0]

I reiterate my suggestions, but if you're looking for a Halloween themed suggestion, Herzog's Nosferatu still stands, and Lost Highway would make for a nice Halloween film. As would Kubrick's The Shining. Certainly not the crappy t.v. miniseries version. Ick.

 

[War Party]

For horror, I would like to see you guys review either:

Jacob's Ladder
The Thing
Hellraiser