The Moon (2023, Kim Yong-hwa)

The Moon runs about two hours, but it’s got enough story for eight. About the only way to tell all the story it’s got overflowing would be a miniseries remake. And even then, you could probably toss on another couple of episodes to even it all out.

The film concerns South Korea’s second attempt at a moon landing. Their first attempt blew up five years before this one. Moon takes place in 2029, so the first attempt was 2024. It doesn’t so much take place in the near future as the immediate future and then the very near future. Except, for all the truthiness of Moon, there isn’t any. Korea’s doing a solo moon mission because they want to take all the water out of the moon (we’ve discovered there’s probably water under the surface, and whoever controls the water controls the spice). The United States and all the other English-speaking countries with white people have teamed up to share the moon–no word on anyone else.

The U.S.-led group also has a space station orbiting the moon at all times. It has landers on it so they can go down and do a Tom Hanks-inspired skip and sing whenever they want, but Moon almost immediately establishes no one has walked on the moon since the seventies. This new mission is going to be the first time since then. Actually, wait, it might be possible only Americans have walked on the moon, including since the seventies, which means they don’t let the other astronauts on the lunar space station go walking on the moon because Americans are dicks.

Americans are dicks is another of Moon’s subplots, it turns out. See–and buckle in–disgraced Korean Astronautics and Space Center (NASC) flight director Sol Kyung-gu, who oversaw the previous tragic mission, is back because he designed the control module, and they need him. His ex-wife (Kim Hee-ae) dumped him, moved to the United States, renounced her Korean heritage, married a white dude to raise her son with her, and became the head of NASA. Lots of Moon involves Kim telling Sol to shove it whenever they need help.

Now, there’s the subtext about South Korea wanting to strip-mine the moon and not share with anyone else, especially Kim. It’s bizarre. The geopolitical implications are all very, very strange.

But Moon doesn’t get into any of them. Not when it’s also got one of the astronauts–Do Kyung-soo–vastly unqualified for the mission. It turns out his dad (Lee Sung-min in a not-tiny but always silent cameo) was Sol’s partner on the previous mission, and when it went bad, Lee was the one who killed himself in disgrace. Another big thing about The Moon–basically all of the Korean guys in authority positions imply they frequently consider suicide instead of having to apologize or be uncomfortable. It’s so much.

But also Sol and Do don’t know they’re working together. And they have so many secrets from one another.

Presumably, Do has another secret, which somehow the film felt the need to cut–he’s supposed to be an elite ROK Navy SEAL, except he’s terrible under pressure and spends all his time not under pressure panicking about being under pressure. The other astronauts–who disobey orders and kick ass because they’re astronauts, bro–make fun of him for being such a worry wart.

There’s also Sol’s sidekick, Hong Seung-hee, taking up screen time because they wanted an ingenuine (at one point, she and Do seem like they’re going to have a long-distance connection, but it’s actually nothing, which is weird). Oh, and new KASC political appointee Jo Han-chul is freaking out about everything because he wanted an easy government job without any responsibility.

See, it could easily go eight episodes. I haven’t even gotten into the constant terror everyone finds themselves in once things start going wrong.

Not talking about what goes wrong isn’t necessarily a “no spoilers” decision, either. The Moon’s a science and technology thriller a la Apollo 13 but since it’s based in a poorly thought-out reality (courtesy director Kim’s script) and doesn’t pretend to know any of the engineering whatsoever… it’s just a bunch of words and visuals out of other movies. The special effects are great, no complaints in that department, but they’re just showing various, pre-existing visual tropes.

In all, Moon’s not original (though letting melodrama knock a science thriller off course so much isn’t common), but it’s usually compelling. Do’s not good, but he’s sympathetic. It’d have helped if they revealed he’d faked his way onto the mission, just so the KASC astronauts don’t seem incompetent. Sol’s fine, but there’s not a part there. The rest of the supporting cast is solid–Jo’s a lot of fun, always in the background.

The Moon’s a very tense, simultaneously bloated and thin special effects extravaganza. The only thing missing is the human drama, making it a phenomenal contrast between that genre and melodrama.

Dr. Cheon and the Lost Talisman (2023, Kim Seong-sik)

Until the third act, when it suddenly becomes clear the film never really had anywhere to go (at least not in this installment), Dr. Cheon is mostly delightful. Even the listless ending isn’t not entertaining, it’s just listless.

After a magic-heavy dream sequence opening, Cheon settles into the gag–Gang Dong-won is a “doctor” who solves hauntings for his YouTube channel. Lee Dong-hwi plays his faithful sidekick, who does all the editing, takes the pay, doesn’t ask too many questions. Not even about Gang’s actual scheme: he’s a trained psychiatrist who knows he can’t cure people’s cultural beliefs in ghosts but can address the symptoms.

Or something. Lee doesn’t care as long as the checks clear.

It will turn out Gang’s actually using the actual mental health help racket to track down the very real, very evil shaman who killed his little brother and grandfather. Huh Joon-ho plays the evil shaman, who can possess people with ease, which makes for numerous good chase sequences and fight scenes. Dr. Cheon’s least realistic element might be Gang’s adeptness as a combination street and sword fighter. While the film hints at his quest to identify Huh (whose existence is something of a theory between Gang and his mentor, Kim Jong-soo), there’s no indication Gang’s been training.

Maybe it just comes with the magic.

The setup involves Gang and Lee taking damsel-in-distress Esom’s case and heading to a remote village. Esom can see dead people all around her and so on, including the evil spirit inhabiting her little sister, Park So-yi. Esom’s ostensibly going to be Lee’s love interest (Gang’s got no time for love), but no one told Esom. And then the movie itself forgets about it towards the end. Dr. Cheon only runs ninety-eight minutes, and they’re clawing for that runtime; there’s lots of delay. Good thing the cast’s so fun.

Well, Gang, Lee, and Kim. And Park to some degree. Since Esom’s in the place of Gang’s love interest but isn’t, she’s missing traditional functions. For a while, it seems like she might have more significance than a plot delivery device.

She does not.

Huh’s a threatening villain, but still cartoonish.

For most of the film, director Kim keeps a fine pace going, balancing the comic and action sequences. The story’s small but big, with the second act dipping into the flashback well a little at a time until the whole story finally comes out. But the geography–Esom and Park’s haunted village and its immediate surroundings (well, drivable immediate surroundings)–is rather finite. And since the movie spends the first half pretending Gang shouldn’t have a plan for this eventuality (one of his “fake” exorcisms leading to the real magic bad guy), it starts feeling cramped.

So instead of focusing on Gang, Dr. Cheon leans heavily on everyone else. Esom’s got damsel stuff, Lee and Kim have sidekick stuff, Huh’s got evil stuff. Gang’s around a lot and gets to charm a lot, but he doesn’t have a character arc. Not even the foreboding revenge arc; Kim warns Gang not to act with vengeance in his heart and whatnot, but it doesn’t even matter. Especially not once the film goes all out with the CGI in the third act. There’s a lot of smart, action-oriented magic on display in the set pieces in the first and second acts, but the third act decides it’s time to unlock the secrets of the universe onscreen.

It’s way too much for such little emotional stakes, derailing the film. And there’s not time to get it back on track. Dr. Cheon goes out with a bang, which is not what it needs.

Hopefully, they’ll figure out something for Gang to do in the next one.

Even if they don’t, get enough of the cast back, and it won’t matter.

Dr. Cheon’s a fun ride, but it’s (too?) determined just to be the beginning.

The Childe (2023, Park Hoon-jung)

For the first half or so, The Childe ostensibly has three lead characters. The protagonist is Kang Tae-ju; he’s a half-Korean, half-Filipino illegitimate son of a Korean rich guy. Life has sucked, leading to Kang becoming an underground boxing champ (which has so shockingly little to do with the movie it’s like they forgot it was a thing), which keeps him and Mom going, but then she gets sick. She needs an operation, so he starts trying to track down Dad in Korea.

For a while, Dad doesn’t want to be found, but just as things get worse, Dad sends his lawyer (Heo Joon-seok, who—at forty-two—is the old square in Childe) to whisk Kang to Korea. See, Dad’s sick and wants Kang to be there. For sure, they’ll pay for Mom’s surgery, and everything will be fine.

Except Childe doesn’t start with Kang’s only boxing match; it starts with the runaway star of the film, Kim Seon-ho, taking out a room of bad guys in spectacularly bloody fashion. Kim’s been tracking Kang, adding another ominous layer, and then shows up on the plane to Korea, now directly interacting with Kang. At this point, the film starts giving Kang a lot less to do. Based on this less-is-more approach, I wonder if maybe Kang wasn’t able to keep up with Kim, so they quieted him down instead of having him outdone, charismatically speaking.

Anyway.

Then comes Kim Kang-woo, who’s also overtly charismatic. Kim has the most challenging part in the film because he’s playing a nepo-baby vicious gangster. He’s Kang’s half-brother, and he’s got his reasons for being happy (and not happy) they’re bringing Kang over. Kim’s simultaneously a dipshit, a monster, and comic relief (he berates his staff, basically, because they’re dumb thugs). It’s a rocky part, but Kim hangs on through all the plot twists and frankly bat shit plot developments (whenever Childe gets bored, it brings out the ultra-violence, like writer and director Park is just reminding everyone they might want to leave if they don’t like actual buckets of blood); he’s great.

The film somewhat balances between Kang, Kim Seon-ho, and Kim Kang-woo until Go Ara comes back in. Go’s a Korean tourist whom Kang meets in the Philippines, and they get off on the wrong foot (for a South Korean film, Childe’s subtext is South Koreans are racist, materialistic bastards and should be avoided at all costs). In the second half, the film’s going to sap Kang’s agency entirely. Kim Seon-ho gets most of it, but Go will get a bit too. Then it’ll turn out to be a red herring—Go’s return to the story—and we’ll go back to Kim Seon-ho and Kim Kang-woo pretending Kang matters when really it’s just about them spitting chunks of scenery at each other.

Solid direction from Park, some great photography from Shin Tae-ho, and a nice soundtrack (both Mowg’s score and the song selections).

The Childe needed to figure out something to give Kang to do throughout, especially considering how little his first act turns out to matter, but otherwise, it’s a reasonably nail-biting action picture. Lots of blood, some quickly cut (or heavily implied) gore, but also lots of humor, dark and light. Kim Seon-ho’s spellbinding.

It’s good stuff.

Gangnam Zombie (2023, Lee Soo-sung)

For a micro-budget horror movie, Gangnam Zombie isn’t unsuccessful, but it also isn’t much of a success. The setting is decent—locked in a trendy office building on Christmas Eve, except Zombie doesn’t have the money for Christmas decorations. It also doesn’t have money for zombie special effects, so it’s more like they’re rabid vampires (complete with the teeth). Except then, the opening titles imply a bad batch of COVID-19 vaccine causes zombie vampirism. Only for it to not. I had been thinking how Rona would give cheap horror movies plot points for a decade, but….

It seems like they had the Dawn of the Dead content and had to pad it out. Gangnam fully embraces the no-budget pad; there’s a flash-forward prologue (which gets entirely repeated later on), there are too long opening titles, frequent stock footage montages, lots and lots of slow motion (including annoyed actors walking slowly only for it to get further slowed down even more), then six minutes of end credits. Gangnam’s greatest struggle is making that eighty-one-minute runtime.

After the zombie (but, wait, are they vampires?) action introduction, where we learn despite buying a stock movie score package, Gangnam didn’t buy a fight sound effects pack. So there’s rarely any sound when the good guys hit the zombies. Gangnam can’t afford gore, can’t afford sound effects, so it’s a surprise when director Lee does an entirely adequate job. Other than all the slow-motion nonsense.

And also, it’s not like Lee takes advantage of the micro-budget status. There are approximately twelve different zombies for most of the movie, recognizable once you start paying attention. Instead of playing up that familiarity, Lee tries to pretend there are more. There are never a bunch more.

Oh, they also pad with a break dancing sequence. It comes back way too briefly for one of the fights. The breakdancing is more impressive than the fights, which hinge on hero Ji Il-joo being a taekwondo badass. There’s a lot of kicking. But Gangnam is lousy at fight choreography; the movie’s “hook” is Ji fist-fighting zombie vampires, and every time they do a sequence, it’s a disappointment. Even there’s the break dancing, they don’t do enough of it. Like they had the good idea but then didn’t shoot enough of it.

There is one slightly better fight scene when leading lady and not damsel in distress, Park Ji-yeon, helps Ji fight the main zombie (Jo Kyoung-Hoon).

I couldn’t bring myself to check the runtime breakdown, but most of the movie seems to be the first-act setup. Ji’s in love with coworker Park, who thinks he’s a taekwondo dork. They both work at a YouTube channel run by Choi Sung-min, who has a bad business model and worse ideas for YouTube videos. Tak Tu-in plays Ji’s doofus bro sidekick, which Tak grates against. Choi’s a dipshit who’s sexually harassing Park; before the zombies show up, the movie’s mainly about Ji trying to empower Park to stand up to Choi like she stands up for young women she encounters being threatened by men.

Gangnam doesn’t say much for humanity.

About a third of the shots look good, with the rest being either mediocre or vaguely warped, like cinematographer Kim Do-young didn’t convert the iPhone-shot footage correctly. But it’s micro-budget, and it looks all right for it.

Ji’s not good, but he’s also not bad. Park’s a bit better, but she gets even worse material than Ji. Choi’s a good zombie movie dipshit.

Speaking of zombie movie standards—Gangnam’s zombies run. Except when they don’t. The movie doesn’t try to explain the zombie rules at all.

Gangnam Zombie’s not good, and it’s not so much successfully inventive as competent. Director Lee’s really good at making things monotonous.

An actual score—instead of the melodrama music pack—would help a lot.

Chaw (2009, Shin Jeong-won)

Chaw tells the familiar tale of a man-eating wild boar and the brave villagers who confront it. The boar’s descended from the mutant boors the Japanese created when they invaded Korea. These abominations have been low-key terrorizing the countryside for decades and as the hipsters started doing weekend trips from Seoul into the countryside, things have gotten worse. The boars have gotten a taste for man-flesh, which post-grads Jung Yu-mi and Ha Sung-kwang have been investigating for years in hopes of breaking it big into tenured positions. They just happen to be in this one particular village when the giant man-eating boar attacks, and the timing coincides with Seoul cop Eom Tae-woong getting reassigned to this one particular village, which is important because Jung and Eom are going to be the third act action heroes.

Eom’s brought along mom Park Hye-jin and wife Heo Yeon-hwa; Park’s got dementia (you wouldn’t feel good about it, but you’ll laugh at her dementia antics too) and Heo’s pregnant. Heo and Eom might have chemistry together, but they’re never in the movie long enough together for anyone to find out. Heo’s got home stuff to do, not protagonist work like Eom.

Eom initially shares the spotlight with absurd Seoul detective Park Hyuk-kwon. Chaw actually has an incredibly complicated first act, lots of characters, lots of layers. But the movie starts with a horrific Jaws-inspired death scene, followed by exceptionally straight-faced slapstick. Director and co-writer Shin isn’t shy about setting Chaw’s tone, which is one of its greatest assets. Along with his confidence. Chaw’s finale, which attaches the second half of Predator to the first half of Jaws, with some Aliens thrown in, is exceptional action direction. Especially since the film’s shot in frequently iffy DV. Shin and cinematographer Kim Yung-chul compensate—and the silliness but thoroughness of the CG wild boar helps a lot (it’s intentionally cute)–and it all works out.

But the first act is a lot. There are multiple victims to remember—and to remember who, if anyone, knows about the victim (since it’s a vacation town, I’m pretty sure at least one victim gets forgotten). Eom’s subplot initially seems to involve Park and Heo, but it doesn’t. Instead he becomes best friends with adorably weird detective Park—who never breaks character, which is the point, and it’s superb work start to finish, especially since all the village cops are buffoons. It’s like a mix of Se7en and Keystone Cops.

Eventually–Chaw’s real confident in its runtime—Shin knows they can keep this going for a couple hours, they just need to make it to the second act, and so the first act throws a bunch of spaghetti at the wall. All of it pays off in the end, which is chef’s kiss; Shin and Kim Yong-cheol’s script is so narratively sound it rings. But the first act. So lots of comedy, lots of characters.

The second act brings in master hunter Jang Hang-seon. He quickly becomes everyone’s grandpa. What if Robert Shaw was cuddly? Jang’s great.

So then it seems like it’s Eom, Jang, and Park. Jaws. Including some great homage scenes. Though much grosser with mammals than fish.

Then the movie adds Yun Je-mun to the mix. He’s Jang’s former protege who’s become a TV celebrity hunter. Yun’s weird. He does this macho thing until he gets sweet on Jung, then he’s very… inappropriate at times. Harmlessly? But grossly? Don’t sniff girls’ hair when they’re asleep, fellas.

It’s a neat, very amusing subplot the movie introduces in the second half for Yun and Jung. There are a number of major subplot resolutions in the second act. Chaw’s clearing the deck for the finale but also compensating for it not having an infinite amount of space for the hunting party to cover. There are only so many places the boar can be.

Chaw’s great. The main cast members all get nice standouts, the script’s strong, production’s good. Shin even knew not to show off too much when shooting with DV because who’s going to notice? It’s a delight.

I’m a Cyborg, But That’s OK (2006, Park Chan-wook)

I’m a Cyborg, But That’s OK gets some points for not wrapping things up with a neat little bow, but they do little to offset the film’s more significant issues. Cyborg’s got a lead performance problem and a stakes problem, something the film tries to avoid acknowledging, which ends up creating an infinite loop.

Im Soo-jung is the titular Cyborg. She’s not really a cyborg; she’s just got schizophrenia, inherited from her grandmother. The film opens with Im at work—a radio factory—where she cuts herself open to put in wires, which mom Lee Yong-nyeo sees as a suicide attempt, not a wireless communications upgrade, and has Im committed. The opening titles cut between the factory scene (which, in hindsight, is probably just Im’s imagination) and Lee explaining the family history to doctor Choi Hee-jin.

For the first act, Cyborg pretends doctor Choi might be important. She is not. She spends a large portion of the film “dead,” which makes no difference to the plot whatsoever. The first act also pretends the other patients in the mental hospital are important. They’ve all got quirks, which the film first uses to introduce them to Im, but soon become leading man Rain’s introduction too. He’s the only unattached male for Im’s new girl in the ward—there’s a love triangle elsewhere, but it’s unimportant—so, of course, they’ve got to pair off. Let’s not get into whether or not Im’s capable of consenting to the physical relationship Rain wants. If he’s not a nice boy, Cyborg gets a whole other (and entirely valid per onscreen events) bent.

Anyway.

Rain’s guy thinks his mom ran off because of him, and no one can convince him otherwise. While Cyborg’s at its most accessible in the first act with the other patients, it’s at its best when Rain is learning how to care for Im. Im only did the radio installation in her arm to get hospitalized so she can track down the white suits who took her grandmother away. Because she’s a cyborg, and she’s going to kill them.

The film’s got a few imaginary sequences with Im going full T-800 on the hospital staff, which is where director Park really flexes. But, unfortunately, they have no bearing on the film because Im doesn’t have any character development, so they’re just ephemeral tangents. They don’t even set the mood for the third act, which is a full romantic drama, as Rain realizes he’s the only boy for Im and feels the weight of responsibility.

If Rain had an actual backstory, it might be a good character arc. Instead, it’s the best Cyborg can offer.

And then there’s Im.

She gives an accomplished quirky performance in the lead. Except there’s nothing else to it. She thinks she’s a cyborg and is trying to figure out how it’s okay. The film’s got a very epical arc involving Im needing to eat; only cyborgs don’t eat. The script’s also got some obvious timeline problems. But then it’s also got Im either fantasizing about her adventures with Rain or Rain fantasizing about his adventures with Im. I think the ultra-violence and body horror is supposed to distract from those details, but… again, they’re just red herrings.

Good special effects and good music (Jo Yeong-wook). Park’s direction is solid, if occasionally tedious. He and co-writer Chung Seo-kyung drag Cyborg out in all the wrong ways. Five minutes of backstory for Rain would’ve made a big difference.

Still, Rain’s a solid lead, Im’s sympathetic, and the film’s usually charming. Monotonous but charming. Cyborg’s got its ups and downs, but it’s OK.

Project Wolf Hunting (2022, Kim Hong-sun)

Watching Project Wolf Hunting (sadly not a Good Will Hunting reference), I kept wondering if the human body holds as much blood as the film suggests. It’s violent to the extremis, with every mutilated corpse creating a standing river of blood. It takes the film a while—well, at least ten minutes—to start gushing blood everywhere, but there’s the implication of it from the start.

Hunting beings as a police procedural, set in 2017. The Philippines has flown some Korean criminals home on extradition; one of the returning criminals’ victims blows himself up along with pedestrians at the airport (and presumably his target). We never find out what the criminal did exactly, but the implication is… financial fraud. The post-exposition shot features a river of blood (of course) and a blown-off leg. Hunting’s going to be gruesome.

Fast forward five years, and the Korean government’s making another run, except this time, they’ve learned their lesson. They’re going to take the criminals back to South Korea on a cargo ship, and there are going to be experienced cops on board to keep the prisoners in line.

Now, right away, there are some issues. Like why the cops—outside boss Park Ho-san and female detective Jung So-min—are questionably competent. There’s also the question of why you’re putting regular cops in charge of the transport instead of corrections officers or even the Special Service, led by Sung Dong-il, who take over the command room in Busan port to monitor the ship. But also, why isn’t the transport outfitted for these dangerous criminals, because they’re not financial criminals, they’re splatter-punks. Led by Seo In-guk, they like to eviscerate their victims, hacking or bashing them to literal pieces.

The whining cops seem like sitting ducks if anything were to happen, especially once doctor Lee Sung-wook sneaks below deck and gives some blood-encrusted guy in an ice bath an injection. The guy—Wolf Hunting (no, not really, but… sort of)—also has his eyes sewn shut, because Hunting isn’t for the faint-hearted. Though the eyes are never particularly gross or even disquieting, maybe because once the creature awakes, he’s covered in so much blood it’s hard to make out details.

Choi Gwi-hwa plays the creature. He’s supposed to stay asleep for the trip from the Philippines to South Korea, but once Seo stages his breakout and the ship’s corridors run with blood, it makes its way down to the Choi’s holding cell and drips on him, resurrecting him.

The voyage starts with a dozen cops, two dozen prisoners, and an indeterminate amount of crew members—who apparently voted to allow the Korean government to use them as a prisoner transport, much to their regret—but they’re down to a dozen by the hour mark. Hunting runs just around two hours; if you just cut out the graphic violence, it’d probably be eighty. Tops. The whole point is the blood and gore.

Except director Kim’s not really into it. I mean, his special effects team does fantastic work, but Kim doesn’t do anything with it. His action scenes are boring, all about characters you don’t care about dying horribly, but since there’s always ultra-violence, it doesn’t garner any immediate sympathy. Kim—who also wrote the film—even establishes the cops as assholes (before revealing the criminals are all splatter-killers).

The film’s also got some very obvious limits. For example, none of the violence against women is sexually motivated; the handful of ladies get butchered without any lewdness, though there’s some low-key homophobia (in some of the sequel setup).

Despite being a bad action director and a worse horror director, Kim’s fine with the rest, which is sort of a Jurassic Park movie. No one who’s too annoying lives long enough to impact the film, and the survivors working their way through are all solid enough, if not sympathetic. Female cop Jung and quiet family killer Jang Dong-yoon have an unspoken bond, mainly because they’re the only two competent people in their group.

Sung ends up having a much bigger part than implied initially, and he’s a tad tepid, like a metaphor for director Kim’s own disinterest. But the other main cast is all right. Like, Seo’s scary, and Park’s okay. The acting’s fine.

Good photography from Yun Ju-hwan and great special effects.

The third act’s got way too many reveals and way too many sequel setups, but the film’s entirely competent until then. It’s gruesome without being exploitative, unpleasant but not enthusiastic enough to be repugnant.

If you’re looking for something so bloody and gory you become numb to disemboweling, Project Wolf Hunting’s just the ticket.

Emergency Declaration (2021, Han Jae-rim)

Emergency Declaration is a disaster movie made like a horror movie. It’s not just any disaster movie, either; it’s Airport meets Airplane but with bioterrorism. The bioterrorism doesn’t have to do with the horror movie; it’s all the investigation procedural. The horror movie experience is entirely reserved for the victims (and the audience). Declaration doesn’t thrill, it doesn’t excite, it terrorizes. From the start.

As we’re meeting busy cop dad Song Kang-ho (whose wife Woo Mi-hwa went on vacation with girlfriends without telling him), co-pilot Kim Nam-Gil, single parent Lee Byung-hun, and seeing the flight attendants and class trips arrive, we’re also meeting Yim Si-wan. He’s asking the desk clerk weird questions about the flights because the first act of Declaration is all about how lax Incheon Airport security is going to cause lots of problems.

Pretty soon, Lee’s adorable daughter, Kim Bo-min, has to go to the bathroom and goes to the boys because the class trip is waiting in line for the women’s. In the can, she just happens to see Yim slicing himself open so he can put a vial inside to get through security. Again, it’s Airport, only with bioterrorism instead of a bomb. And then it’s Airplanebecause Lee’s actually a hotshot pilot who burned out and is now a bit of a drunk. Luckily adorable Kim keeps him in line.

Now, by the time Kim sees Yim mutilating himself, it becomes clear director Han isn’t stopping the terror any time soon. Especially not when cop dad Song goes on a call about some TikToker threatening to do something to an airplane. Song pretty quickly discovers evidence, and it’s time to start talking about turning the plane around. Except no one listens to Song for a while.

But it’s okay because we’ve established the pilots made sure to get extra fuel (bad weather in Japan, which comes up again).

So we’re just waiting for Yim to do something and to see how it affects the lovable or at least sympathetic cast of passengers. Especially Kim, because Yim decides to terrorize her.

Now, Yim’s just an incel. He’s some other things on top of it, but when the news eventually compares him to someone else, it’s a U.S. mass shooter incel. Declaration came out in 2021, so in the middle of Covid-19, but you’d never know it. It’s a recent movie where Rona doesn’t happen (wow, did South Korea do things better than the U.S.—everyone’s crowded together in this movie, on plane or not), but it’s about bioterrorism and how people react to communicative disease. So it’s this weird, in-direct commentary on Rona only not, starring a generic incel, only not.

Or it would be such a commentary if Han weren’t just making a terrorizing movie about a lot of people dying horrible deaths and no one really being able to do anything to help, especially not over-promoted men, the United States, or the Japanese. Though Song’s somewhat shoe-horned in so they don’t have to give Jeon Do-yeon too much to do as the government minister in charge of the response. The movie decides in the third act she’s really super-duper important, only they don’t give her enough in the first act. She makes sense; she’s navigating the bioterrorism thriller. Lee’s on the plane doing his Ted Striker thing. Song’s around like it’s Taking of Pelham One Two Three. They needed first and third act drama, so they gave it to Song, while at least some of it should’ve been Jeon’s.

When I say director Han’s trying to terrorize, he’s not being coy about it. Whether or not the unfortunately constant lens flare is supposed to be ominous as far as foreshadowing (spoiler, yes), the editing and music are just about scaring the audience. Lee Byung-woo’s score is excellent. It’s almost entirely just horror movie slasher stalker music. Relentless.

Then the editing—from director Han, Lee Kang-il, and Kim Woo-hyun—cuts to and from characters in moments of incredible stress and tragedy, and fear. Whether they’re in the ground or the air, it’s just about scared people in their worst moments. Han brings incredible severity to this fictional remake of Airport. It’d be an opportunistic melodrama if it were a true story. But it’s not, so it’s just terrorizing.

And it works out pretty well. Declaration starts cracking somewhere in the second half, and it’s falling apart by the third. The film forecasts a lot of the story (intentionally) and occasionally drags things out too much.

There’s some excellent acting. Song and Woo have some great phone call scenes, Lee’s an awesome imperfect hero, and Yim’s never not scary. Han directs the hell of the film with outstanding CGI plane special effects. It’s gorgeous.

It’s also manipulative, and a little insincere, but—as with everything else Declaration does—expertly so.

Hansan: Rising Dragon (2022, Kim Han-min)

About half of Hansan is a naval battle. The second half. The first half is a combination history lesson, period espionage and turgid war thriller, and naval warfare theory symposium. The film’s about Admiral Yi Sun-shin, who kicked the invading Japanese navy’s ass in the sixteenth century. Despite being in command, lots of folks questioned Yi, and then he also was trying new tactics and types of warships. Park Hae-il plays Yi. He’s almost indistinguishable from a wax sculpture; Yi was a pensive, reserved fellow, but Park plays him without any personality whatsoever. Not because Park’s bad, but because director and co-writer Kim Han-min doesn’t do character. Hansan’s utterly absent memorable characters, which is something else for a war movie.

It’s also fine because Hansan is a history lesson. There’s a compelling but narratively problematic prologue with Japanese admiral and general dick Byun Yo-Han inspecting a destroyed warship. The Korean navy has some kind of “turtle ship” with a Dragon head on it, which terrified the ship’s crew as it destroyed the vessel. Now, there have been numerous movies about mystery vessels; at least three James Bonds and maybe a Godzilla. Except there’s no mystery. It’s just Park’s latest idea, though he doesn’t like the dragon head.

Kim and co-writer Yun Hong-gi pull back on the narrative distance so incredibly far their characters lose all perspective. Despite Hansan’s first hour being about Byun wondering what Park’s going to do, while Byun’s allies give him shit and Park’s allies give him shit, and they both try to spy on one another, no one ever learns anything in the film. It’s a history movie with the cause and effect removed.

It also doesn’t matter because the second half is a thrilling naval war movie about the application of firepower on sea-going vessels. Hansan shows its hand in the first half; Park drills the Korean navy with the tactics he’s going to use in the second half. The movie shows off the shark first thing (relatively) but still gets plenty of mileage out of it in the battle. There are some surprises, of course, which unfold the same way as the rest of the film’s reveals. A character is alone, remembering a plot twist a few scenes before, completely changing the nature of their subplot. The film does it at least three times, possibly four, saving a major—but not—reveal for the finale.

But it all still works because Kim pulls off the sea battle. There are some land battles too, which he does okay with, but clearly, the thought went into the warships, and it shows.

The best performance is easily Byun, who gets to relish in unrestrained villainy while almost everyone else has to show some decorum. Kim Sung-kyu is good as an enemy prisoner who coincidentally encountered Park in the flashback. Park Ji-Jean has a fun part as the shipbuilder. Park’s okay; the movie doesn’t ask him to do anything, just stand there. Admittedly, there aren’t many options when you’re just supposed to be watching some quiet thinking guy quietly think.

The technicals are all solid. Han Hyun-gun and Lee Gang-here’s editing is a little impatient in parts—there’s a three or four-minute history lesson montage after the prologue, and it’s too hurried. After threatening dozens of characters, Hansan boils down to like six people before the sea battle. Kim and Yun get way too complicated. Once it settles into the espionage subplot, with actual players, it works much better.

But, again, doesn’t matter so long as the sea battle pays off. The movie starts promising a great sea battle, then delivers it. Along the way, there’s some good filmmaking, decent acting, and compelling history, if not character drama.

Hansan’s a qualified, impressive success.

The Witch: Part 2. The Other One (2022, Park Hoon-jung)

The Witch: Part 2. The Other One starts with a flashback to the very late nineties or very early aughts—someone’s still got a cassette walkman, but MP3 players do exist. Now, The Other One is a sequel, but it’s a “start from scratch” sequel, so for a while, it seems like this story will be important.

Not really. It brings Jo Min-su back in from the first movie, then establishes witches are always twins before jumping ahead to the present. So, just keeping track, we’ve met a new cast, introduced them to the old cast, then jumped ahead and abandoned them. Other One closely tracks four or five characters, with another ten in the background. Writer and director Park treats it as a gimmick, all these different people pursuing the title character, who we’ll meet incredibly slowly and intercut with other characters’ stories. It’s a busy film.

In the present, a strike team of other witch-powered people—lots of superpowers in Other One; lots—attacks a research laboratory and kills everyone, except then Shin Si-ah gets up and walks out. She’s covered in blood, and it’s snowy out; lots of good visuals. Park spends the first half of Other One putting a lot of time into the composition. Then, in the second half, which is an extended fight scene at night with a couple dozen people and lots of superspeed… it seems like composition’s all of a sudden less important. But, first half, lots of mood.

Shin gets to a road where a van of bad guys who have just kidnapped local landowner Park Eun-bin. She’s back in Korea from the United States; her father just died, and she’s there to care for little brother Sung Yoo-bin. And to ensure her evil uncle Jin Goo doesn’t sell the farm to resort developers. He’s not just vaguely evil; he’s a crime boss. The implication is Park and Sung’s dad was a crime boss too. Establishing the ground situation on the family dynamics takes Park almost the entire movie. Everyone’s got a history, lots of people know each other, but Park very gingerly reveals those details. The mood is more important than the exposition in scenes, like when Lee Jong-suk goes to talk to Jo about it. They’re suspicious of one another because they’re part of different factions in this super-secret organization, which basically created all the witches.

If they have superpowers, we don’t find out this movie. Probably next.

Jo’s going to get old friend Seo Eun-soo to hunt Shin for her, but Seo and Lee have history together, which the film spends too much time on. The Other One runs two hours and seventeen minutes, and there must be at least ten easily cuttable minutes. Unless it matters for the next movie, in which case, release an extended cut. For this movie, The Other One’s got considerable excess.

Seo’s some kind of government agent who hunts witches. She’s got a literal man-bun bro sidekick Justin John Harvey. They speak in English to one another, with Harvey complaining about Seo swearing at them in Korean. They have a lot of scenes together and no chemistry. Seo’s English language acting is presumably not-native language acting, so she gets some slack. Harvey’s just an amateur. Their scenes are sometimes amusing, but most times, they’re just trying way too hard and never finding a moment.

Until they start having action scenes, then it turns out they’ve both got superpowers. There are seven people with superpowers fighting in the final sequence. It’s basically an X-Men movie at that point.

Okay, so Shin saves Park from Jin Goo’s thugs, and Park takes her home to brother Sung. Jin Goo’s going to terrorize the household the rest of the movie, escalating in violence and intimidation, with Shin having to protect her new friends. Meanwhile, everyone else is looking for Shin, too, all headed out to the farm.

Where there’s a lengthy fight sequence, complete with rocket launchers and flying and knives and all sorts of things. It feels very much like director Park’s trying to make up for not having enough story, so at least there’s whiz-bang gore action. The Other One never feels much like a horror movie, just a gory action one with lots of standing blood. The long fight takes place at night, with Park rushing through it. When you’ve got a dozen people fighting at once, you can be fast while still being slow.

The acting’s all fine. Seo’s the biggest disappointment (you keep waiting for her to be better when not speaking English, but, first, she’s usually speaking English with Harvey, and, second, she’s not really any better with Korean dialogue). Jin Goo’s good as the villain you didn’t think would be important but ends up driving the plot.

Shin, Park, and Sung are all good, but they don’t really have much to do. After the first act, Park and Sung are entirely supporting Shin or one of her pursuers. They get no time for themselves. Sung eventually gets more because he’s around while Park’s out picking up red herring.

Most of the third act is set up for the next movie, which is unfortunate. Just when Shin finally gets some agency, she loses it to franchise building, which is too bad. It’s the worst thing about the movie, which has been teasing post-Other One plot lines throughout, but always additively. Sometimes too much additively, but never at the expense of Shin.

The end’s at her expense. And the finish—with the uninspired but elaborate nighttime action—doesn’t need any more disappointments. The Other One ends mid-stumble.

It’s fine and not the same old thing for a sequel, but it’s also long, dense, and sacrifices performances for world-building.

That said, I’m definitely onboard for another one. Can’t wait.