Samaritan Girl (Samaria)

Director - Ki-duk Kim
Country of Origin - South Korea
Nick's Rating: (2 out of 10)


This film has so much possibility to be amazingly good, and many critics have nothing but praise for this film, but I cannot in my right mind suggest this film to anyone who wants to see a well written, acted and directed Korean film. I really wanted to like this film but I was troubled so much by the plot line that it took away any enjoyment that I might have had. Let me start by explaining the over all plot of this movie. There are these two teenage Korean friends and one is a prostitute and the other is basically her pimp. This is a truly awesome premise, nothing bad can come of this scenario right? Wrong. Dead wrong actually. The friend that acts as a prostitute accidentally dies, or she commits suicide, I still can't tell what happens to her because of the truly unbelievable scene where her character slowly dies from falling, err . . . jumping perhaps? Personally I think it's pretty bad when you witness a character's death and you can't even decipher what actually happened. I honestly think Ki-duk Kim was trying to make her look fragile but ended up making her just look like an idiot who accidentally kills herself. And now we can see the actual plot form to where we see the friend, who is totally against prostitution by-the-way and is only helping her friend because she cares for her or whatever, take on all of her clients. Yes, you read correctly, she becomes a prostitute. This is a storyline that most pornos only dream of pulling off. And it seems that this movie can't pull it off either. The only thing worth any praise is the ending, no not because the film has ended but because the ending is actually pretty good, so just fast-forward to the ending . . . better yet, just don't bother. So please don't waste your time with this movie it will only anger you into doing something stupid like writing about this movie in a blog.

-Nick

Tae Guk Gi (Brotherhood of War)

Director - Je-gyu Kang
Country of Origin - South Korea
Nick's Rating: (8 out of 10)


I guess you could call this the "Saving Private Ryan" of South Korean films. Not as bloody but, in my opinion, just as well written and acted. What I appreciated most about this movie was the South Korean perspective of the Korean War. We here in the U.S. hear so much about the Vietnam War and yet the Korean War gets put to the back burner time and time again in our education, so I took this movie as a personal learning experience. This movie is about two brothers and one's promise to protect the other during the war. They are polar opposites, so when it comes time to fight one is a born leader while the other just tries to survive. The one problem that I had with this film is that they portray the younger brother as considerably weaker and much more of a pacifist than his older brother, so much so that I got angry at his overall demeanor and kinda wanted him to just hurry up and die. Other than that the film is extremely intriguing. The visuals are very stunning and stay true to the grittiness of the battlefield. To observe how the Korean War evolved as different countries got involved (or uninvolved), as well as the evolution of the characters, makes this film well worth your time.

-Nick