LUCY

LUCY is a very odd film. It's not exactly bad. It's not exactly good. There's a lot going on and you can't fault its ambition. It's just that it's a movie by Luc Besson which means that whenever there might be elegant moderation, there's a willingness to go too far.  And while it's all shot in a stylish and slick manner, it almost feels too stylised, as if there's nothing underneath.  The weird thing is that the movie borrows some of the themes of 2001 and seems to take them in earnest. Why does it feel absurd when our protagonist goes back in time to meet our ape ancestors and yet not absurd when Kubrick has apes fighting over a bone?  I guess there's just something too slippery about this film - too trying to be Tarantino with Kill-Bill revenge action - for us to take it seriously.

Anyways, back to the story. Scarlett Johanssen plays Lucy - a naive and carefree girl working in Taiwan. She's conned by her dope-running boyfriend into delivering a package to Choi Min-Sik's Korean gangster and in a serious of improbable but stylish scenes ends up as a drug mule with a weird MacGuffin-y embryo-fuelling enzyme in her belly.  The upshot is that she is getting really really brainy really really fast - to the point where we get giant roman numerals throughout the film telling us how far she's reached her maximum brain usage.  And when she gets to 100% she's going to die. Or turn into a massively powerful organic supercomputer that then falls in love with Joaquin Phoenix, or something.  

The first third of the film plays like a kind of abduction-revenge horror with a kind of Tarantino attitude to highly stylised action.  We then get into thriller territory as Lucy leaves Taiwan to track down the other drug mules in Europe, with the help of a credulous French cop. The final third of the movie starts out amazing, transforming into a genuinely quite profound sci-fi flick but then descends into 2001 pastiche.  

Overall, this is a film that is less than the sum of its many parts but I really did enjoy the parts I liked. I wonder just what it might have been with the same cast but a less flashy director.

LUCY has a running time of 89 minutes and is rated R.  The movie is on global release.

Homage to OLDBOY - Tarantino wishes he were this good

With LADY VENGANCE on cinematic release, I thought I'd take the opportunity to review Park Chan-Wook's previous film, OLDBOY. OLDBOY is an intelligent but extreme South Korean revenge thriller. With a plot-line inspired by the Count of Monte Cristo and Kafka, we see a doofus middle-aged middle-class guy get arrested for drunken behaviour. The man is named Oh Dae-Su and in the first five minutes of this film we see the actor Choi Min-Sik giving one of the most convincing and hysterical portrayals of a harmless drunk. As his best friend comes to bail him out, Oh Dae-Su is abducted. When he comes to he is in a small bedroom with a TV set. This is to be his prison for crimes unspecified. 15 years later, again for no particular reason, he is released. We are still only twenty minutes into the film. Dae-Su has another hour and a half to find out who held him captive, and why, and to reap his revenge.

On a superficial reading, OLDBOY is the story of Oh Dae-Su's revenge on his captor and tormentor. But as his punishment has also been a "revenge" for a crime committed in his past, we find that we can identify with him as a victim of sorts. And even Dae-Su's tormentor is himself a deeply conflicted and sympathetic character. If we can find a "moral" to such an extreme and un-real set of circumstances, it is that human nature compels us to revenge, but we cannot find peace through it. We are condemned to a life of regret if we pass up the chance to avenge ourselves, and a life of torment if we follow through. This is the tragedy of man - essentially still a primitive creature, but condemned to live in a civilised world of his own making.

To the extent that this is true, OLDBOY covers much the same thematic ground as Spielberg's portentious and over-praised MUNICH. This comparison might seem a little facetious to people who have read about OLDBOY. How can I compare a movie that, while flawed, was at least serious and earnest, with a South Korean blood-and-gore horror movie?

But I think that the undeniably brutal violence in OLDBOY is in danger of detracting from the emotional veracity and subtlety of the movie. Choi Min-Sik's performance as Dae-Su is the key part of the movie's success. Due to styling, costume and choreography he can be incredibly menacing. But his soft features and expessive face mean that even when carrying out some vicious acts he looks vulnerable. (This is a facility he uses to great effect as the former boxing champion know fighting for cash on the side-walk in CRYING FIST.) Yes, in the iconic shot, the octopus is eaten live on screen. No, this is not considered a crime in Park's native South Korea. Yes I am very happy to needle my cuddly vegetarian friends with this fact. But the key point is that when Dae-Su eats the octopus it is because he is so desperate to eat a "living thing" - to feel life - even in its most brutal and visceral format. This is, after all, a man who has not felt rain for fifteen years.

So, I highly recommend OLDBOY. Ignore the superficial similarities to the all-style, no-substance movies of Tarantino. This really is an emotionally draining and thought-provoking movie.

OLDBOY went on release in South Korea in November 2004. It won the Grand Prix at Cannes in 2004, after extensive lobbying by Tarantino failed to get it the Palme d'Or. (The P'dO ended up going to Fahrenheit 9/11, proving that the Academy doesn't have exclusivity on pissing on true cinematic greatness from a great height.) OLDBOY went on release in Europe in winter 2004 and played Sundance in 2005. OLDBOY is now available on remastered DVD replete with a crazy-large amount of interviews with case ad crew. It has already been plagiarised by Bollywood in a piss-poor John Abraham/Lara Dutta flick called Zinda (Lock) and Hollywood isn't far behind.

SYMPATHY FOR MR VENGEANCE - violent yes, but beautiful also

After the massive success of JOINT SECURITY AREA, South Korean director Park Chan Wook could have pretty much done anything he wanted to. What happened was that he took a giant step into left-field with a bizarre movie called SYMPATHY FOR MISTER VENGEANCE. At the time, the movie tanked at the Box Office. Little did anyone know that it would become the first in a trilogy of highly acclaimed "vengeance" movies. Upon the release of the final movie in the trilogy, LADY VENGEANCE, I am taking the opportunity to have a look back at the first two films in the trilogy.

SYMPATHY FOR MR VENGEANCE is, despite the title, a "sweet" movie. Why so? Because it features a lot of characters who are emminently charming and empathetic. Chief among these is a young guy called Ryu. His sister is chronically ill and in need of an expensive kidney transplant. When Ryu is sacked by his boss, his girlfriend convinces him to kidnap the boss' daughter in order to win a ransom to pay for the transplant. Ryu's position is deeply sympathetic and remains so throughout the kidnapping. This the genius of Park Chan Wook. There is a lovely scene where the little girl is watching TV, balancing on Ryu's knees - so intimate and caring. Mad props have to go to the actor portraying Ryu - a character who is a deaf-mute - and so must be made sympathetic by means of facial expression and physical comedy. Unfortunately, at the handover, things go wrong, largely because of the appearance of a tragi-comic figure played by Seung-beom Ryu - the fantastic actor from CRYING FIST and ARAHAN. At this point, it is the little girl's father who becomes Mr Vengeance and the movie spirals into extreme violence that is photographed beautifully - a hallmark of Park Chan-Wook's work. The final scene at the lake is haunting, and more recent movies, such as HOSTEL, which rip off some of its most horrific content, fail to replicate the beauty of the original.

Overall, SYMPATHY FOR MR VENGEANCE is a violent and horrifying film. The real brilliance is to make the characters funny, original, credible and genuinely sympathetic. The movie is at turns bizarre and ridiculous, and yet beautiful and memorable. It is an amazing combination to have pulled off - and a recipe that was honed and perfected in each following film.

SYMPATHY FOR MR VENGEANCE is available on DVD.

LADY VENGEANCE - vicious and nasty, but in a good way!

Park Chan-Wook a.k.a Mr. Vengeance, is a man in whose pysche you would not want to get lost. He makes nasty, vicious, blood-drenched revenge thrillers that are an absolute joy to watch. He gets horror in a way that, say, the producers of Final Destination 3 do not. He knows that there is nothing more nauseatingly spine-chilling than seemingly normal, buttoned-up, vaguely attractive middle-class people taking to each other with axes. A lot of the time, due to deft editing, you don't even see the gruesome acts. You see the 'before' and 'after' and your brain does the rest of the work. Your imagination is going crazy with the most lurid, horrific visuals but at the same time your sympathy is with the perpetrator rather than the victim.

LADY VENGEANCE is the third in Park's revenge trilogy, following on from SYMPATHY FOR MR VENGEANCE and OLDBOY. Thematically all three movies tread the same ground: the impossibility of reconciling the lust for revenge with the desire for a peaceful life. However, that is not to say that if you see one Park Chan-Wook film you've seen them all. LADY has a more muted colour palette than OLDBOY, almost to the point of using grayscale highlighted by Lady Vengeance's red eye-shadow. The use of violence is also more muted - the acts are more often off-screen, and people who felt grossed out at OLDBOY should give LADY VENGEANCE a try. And while we do see some of the surreal caricatures that we got in OLDBOY - not least in the rogue's gallery of inmates in the prison - in general, the characters "look" far more normal. To my mind, that makes the horror far more affecting - the stylistic balance has definitely tilted from Tarantino to Lynch and all to the good.

Reasons to watch LADY VENGEANCE: 1. Looks bloody amazing - every scene is like watching a well designed and choreographed ballet. 2. Wickedly complicated plot that sticks a finger in the eye (and indeed a pair of scissors in the back of the neck) of those who would dumb down cinema. Broadly speaking, Lady Vengeance went down for a crime she didn't commit, A-Team style, and is now out of prison and out for revenge on the actual perp. 3. Features the darling of Korean ultra-violence, Choi Min-sik, known to canny viewers as the all-out badass in OLDBOY and as the boxer with a heart of gold in CRYING FIST. 4. Despite endemic sadism, the movie manages to create a genuine emotional connection between the audience and Lady Vengeance. 5. Despite hard-core nastiness, the movie creates scenes of fantastically dark and piercing humour. 6. Best use of transparent plastic raincoats since AMERICAN PSYCHO.

Reasons not to watch LADY VENGEANCE: 1. If you are vegetarian, tree-hugging hippie, who might get traumatised knowing that a small dog is being shot at point-blank range just off screen, you should avoid this film.

LADY VENGEANCE played the 2005 London Film Fest. It opened in France in November 2005, and in the UK yesterday. It goes on limited release in the US on the 5th May 2006.

CRYING FIST - Searing South Korean drama

CRYING FIST is the latest movie from Seung-wan Ryoo, the South Korean movie director who brought us ARAHAN. ARAHAN is a really great post-modern martial arts film - mixing hyper-real action sequences with MTV dialogue and a healthy dose of slapstick.

By contrast, CRYING FIST is a dead serious, straight-up drama telling the story of two men who are in hopeless situations. One is a 43 year old ex-amateur boxer. He is in debt and a loveless marriage, and when his wife kicks him out he is reduced to fighting people in the street for cash. The second man is a young punk who learns to box in prison. He has a lot of aggression, little technical skill, and something to prove to his family. Both lead actors play against type in this film. The ageing boxer is none other than conflicted killer, Mr. OLDBOY, a.ka. actor Choi Min-Sik, who also appears as the nasty Mr. Beak in LADY VENGEANCE. The young punk is played by Seung-Beom Ryoo, the gormless hero from Arahan and the director's kid brother.

The first 90 minutes of the movie show these two men being degraded and defeated. It is painful to watch but compelling all the same - like watching a car crash in slow motion. There is no sentimentality, no deeper message, no sweeping orchestral score as in Ron Howard's CINDERELLA MAN.

In the final half hour, the two men meet in a boxing tournament. The fights are well choreographed but are shot with none of the balletic artistry of RAGING BULL. The director is very clear in communicating his belief that boxing is a nasty, ugly, painful thing to submit yourself to. To my mind, this is not a film arguing that redemption comes through boxing. Rather, the tragedy of these men is that they have so little hope, that boxing seems to them a redemption. The lack of a rip-roaring ROCKY-style final match has been criticised. But I think that it is a strength of the film that there is no good-guy facing off against a bad-guy. We have seen both of these guys treated like shit and want to see them both win. That is what makes the final scenes so engaging.

Overall, this is a movie that I admired more than enjoyed. It was a brave move for the director to steer away from cartoon kung-fu to straight-up boxing drama. It was an unusual move to have us sympathise with both of the protagonists. I found the relentless misery of the first 90 minutes a bit hard to take - but without them I would not have felt the full impact of the final 30 minutes. So I would recommend this movie, but be warned. It is a hard slog.

CRYING FIST was shown at Cannes in May where it won the Critics Prize for Best Film. It is currently on release in Hong Kong and the UK. There is no scheduled release date for Continental Europe or the US.