rat_little-red Reviews

I'm a Cyborg, But That's OK (2006)

sweet, funny, surreal and beautifully shot.

[10/10 · 15 January 2009]

Director Park Chan Wook creates a colourful world surrounding some unique characters and as always it is done with beauty and sensitivity only this time without the heavy and dark story lines of his earlier work, ie; the vengeance trilogy. This film is very sweet but funny enough to carry its lighthearted take on a obscure situation. There is a balance between the surreal happenings and the sad moments that bring you back to reality.

Young Goon(Lim Soo Jung)thinks she's a cyborg and is trying to find her purpose in life. Her childhood misfortunes - watching her grandmother being taken away by doctors and her mother being a bit secretly deranged - have lead to this desire to find her correct path, or in her terms; what she was built for.

When she gets shut a way in a hospital, under the instructions of her mother to keep her cyborg-nature a secret, she finds herself unintentionally befriending fellow patient Il Soon (Rain) and as he finds out about her secret worries he tries to help her come to terms with it all.

it is a love story but from the outset not a straight forward one. The actors are wonderful and it is shot with grace and warmth. Just what you would want from a film of this genre; pretty, moving, and a bit bizarre.

Night & Day (2001–2003)

on the hunt for night and day

[10/10 · 21 February 2008]

i loved night and day, i don't even think i made it to the end when it was on TV, moved around and axed from its daytime slot - itv wont even release a DVD because of royaties.

so anyone please tell me how i can watch it again. is it in an online archive? what is the point of having a show and then it not being accessible?

night and day is like the younger sibling drama series of twin peaks, and follows in the footsteps of difficult distribution. but when it was shown its cult following speaks for itself. a soap bordering on drama, crime and ghosty horror. there was nothing like this then, the performances were great, and there is no way to watch it... seems dumb to me.

The Golden Compass (2007)

doesn't live up to the billboard comments

[4/10 · 4 January 2008]

i saw, on my way out of the cinema, a bus shelter poster for the golden compass. it suggested that it was leagues ahead of narnia and harry potter... what? although the children in it were nowhere near as irritating as the narnia youths, the story was lost, the depth was gone and the visual fx were the only thing holding the film together... not what i look for in a film. readers of the books are up in arms. should have gone to see stardust instead. so whilst being lulled into a false sense of security with the beautiful scenery that surrounds the film there was nothing to draw me in. the animals didn't have me wondering about what it would be like to have familiars - which is such a cool dream, the baddies didn't have me worried for the outcome of the story, and i had no real attachment to the characters. the rather sudden flashes of violence seemed out of place because the movie was trundling along so slowly, when the brief violent bursts occurred i was shocked by them - even though they weren't really graphic. it just didn't fit. the film itself didn't fit. i was disappointed. and i really love this genre so i hoped for more.