This is the review I posted on Netflix after watching this streamed Korean mystery/thriller:
All in Crime
Debra Granik's WINTER'S BONE
The Ozark back country depicted in this film is one that Facebook and Twitter have ignored. Or maybe it’s the other way around.
Monthon Arayangkoon's THE VICTIM
This Thai ghost story/crime thriller is convoluted, intense — and scary.
Daniel Barber's HARRY BROWN
In my book, Michael Caine can do no wrong — this vigilante movie is another example.
Takashi Shimizu's REINCARNATION
This is one creepy movie!
Na Hong-Jin’s “THE CHASER”
Following the success of Silence of the Lambs, movie and TV audiences have been treated to many pale imitations, most of which have failed to excite or provide any serious dramatic interest
Steven Spielberg's CATCH ME IF YOU CAN
“Oh yeah, this is what the credits for an Otto Preminger comedy would look like!”
Tony Scott's “THE TAKING OF PELHAM 123”
This is an enjoyable Summer action vehicle that’s held together by Scott’s taught action direction, witty dialog, and effective performances by Washington, Travolta, and Gandolfini.
Alex Proyas' “DARK CITY”
This is what I wrote in my blog when, once upon a time in Indiana, I found myself working late at night with the TV turned on:
Steven Spielberg's MINORITY REPORT
This movie expands upon the dazzling realistic-future-world special effects of Spielberg’s A.I. but wastes astonishing technical and artistic virtuosity on a hackneyed, uninvolving murder mystery.
Halfway through I thought about stopping but I’ve decided to give this movie another chance after reading the Netflix reviews.
Fritz Lang's THE BIG HEAT
Forget the happy view of post-WWII America as fresh faced kids running around green lawns in mass produced split level suburbs fed by newly minted commuter highways and GI Bill educations. Metropolis director's Fitz Lang's 1953 film The Big Heat is a reminder of a darker time when brave film makers occasionally veered into crime, sex, and darkness, barely skittering around a Film Production Code that enforced moral views that did not include crime, sex, and darkness.
Frank Miller, Quentin Tarantino, and Robert Rodriguez's "SIN CITY"
It was the dame’s earrings … They kept jangling in my mind, like tolling Easter bells out of some giant, hollow, cavernous cathedral … dark, inky shadows … except for those damn earrings… like golden beacons in a monochrome Dark City …
Akira Kurosawa's “HIGH AND LOW”
There is a scene in Kurosawa’s High and Low where police emerge from the house of a man, played by Toshiro Mifune (Red Beard), whose lost kidnapping ransom, paid to recover the son of his chauffeur, has caused his total financial ruin. Yet there he is, calmly mowing his lawn with his power mower, while his life collapses around him. He seems to be enjoying himself. Life goes on.
The Coen Brothers THE MAN WHO WASN'T THERE
This film is a triumph of style AND substance. The photography is striking, the performance are universally excellent, and the story keeps our interest until the very last scene.
Ram Gopal Varma's COMPANY
That the life of crime can be portrayed as glamorous, dangerous, brutal, and ultimately as pointless is something we in the West have grown accustomed to. We have films like THE GODFATHER and GOODFELLAS that reinforce that as they simultaneously attract and repel us.