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Reviews
Geuddae geusaramdeul (2005)
Korea's Answer To Scorsese
I'm-Sang Soo's "President's Last Bang" is an awesome piece of cinema, a throwback to the paranoid political thrillers of the 70s like "The Conversation," "The Parallax View" and "All the President's Men."
The film revolves around the true story about an assassination attempt made on President Park Chun-hee and its aftermath.
Saw this at Telluride and was blown away by the pitch black comedy, Kim Woo-hyeong's incredible super 35mm cinematography, and the fluid tracking shots.
The director described this film as in the vein of "Goodfellas" and the "Godfather" trilogy.
For those who are fiending for more quality Korean cinema after "Oldboy," this is definitely worth seeking out.
Grace and the Storm (2004)
Why You Can't Trust The Internet
A couple months ago, a number of talkbackers on AICN were making lists of the top 10 twists in films ever. And for some reason, "Grace and the Storm" was listed on several of them. My only guess as to why is because it was the filmmakers, cast, those involved, and their friends and family making those comments.
Here is an incredibly derivative, poorly paced, badly edited, low budget, DV feature with not one good piece of dialogue. Not one well composed shot. Not one even halfway decent performance.
Had Jay Mohr actually played the lead role, it might've been somewhat better, but as he did not, we're left with amateur hour all the way.
As for the twist, it's on level with something I expect on cable. No I didn't see it coming, but it was hardly what I'd call earth shattering or worthy of even the top 1000 twists of all time.
The film is mediocrity epitomized.
Air (2004)
Miserable
What a terribly unfunny, poorly paced, completely uninspired piece of coming of age trash that encourages negative stereotypes of African Americans and Hispanic Americans.
How the filmmakers could blow $25,000 shooting this on 35mm is beyond me.
The only saving grace of this film is the fluid camera work of Eric Gustavo Petersen. His photography, especially in the locker room and some of the exterior dolly and crane shots, raise this film's production value immeasurably.
If this got into any festivals, or this is getting the director further work, it's only more proof of our industry embracing mediocrity.
American Fame Pt. 1: Drowning River Phoenix (2004)
Pseudo Hip Indie Trash
This is the kind of art school garbage that people pretend to like because it's so bad. Everyone, and I mean everyone, in attendance at AFI had their minds boggled at how this even got into the festival. It's terribly pretentious and the director who spoke there came across as just as just what his film was, full of more sh*t than a whale with no ass.
On a side note, the only reason this film even got into festivals was because of the director's "relationship" with Gus van Sant.
Shame on the festivals without the integrity to see this film for what it really was: a shameless exploitation of a celebrity who passed away years ago.