Free screening of Korean gambling movie THE DIVINE MOVE tomorrow

Korean Cultural Service New York
presents
Korean Movie Night 2014
Series Five: Blown Away by Korean Blockbusters!

The Divine Move

Directed by CHO (a.k.a. JO) Beom-gu

South Korea, 2014, 118 minutes
When: Tuesday October 14, 2014 @ 7:00 pm
Doors open: 6:30 PM
Where: Tribeca Cinemas 54 Varick Street, on the corner of Canal, NYC
Near the A, C, E @ #1 Canal Street subway stops
Map
Admission: FREE!!!

The next film in Korean Cultural Service NY's free Korean Movie Night is The Divine Move, a really intelligent, sharp and well-paced action-thriller. It will be shown tomorrow night, Tuesday, October 14th at 7:00. As always, admission is free. These Korean Movie Night screenings are always very well-attended, so get there as early as you can to maximize your chance of being admitted and getting a seat.

SONG Tae-seok (JUNG Woo-sung) is a professional GO (a.k.a. baduk) player. SONG Woo-seok, his older brother, entices him into a "Guidance Game" whereby Tae-seok "guides" Woo-seok's play from a remote location by using a hidden camera and communications devices. Things go horribly wrong, Tae-seok is framed for a murder and sent to prison. Through a fellow convict, for whom he's done a "solid," Tae-seok learns how to fight like a highly trained martial artist.

Tae-seok (seated left) and "Drinking Christ" (seated right)

Once released, Tae-seok seeks revenge. He enlists the aid of "Drinking Christ" (veteran actor AHN Sung-ki), a blind GO master, "Carpenter" (AN Kil-kang), a one-handed electronics expert, and Cheater (KIM In-kwon), another professional GO player.

Killer (LEE Bum-soo), left foreground, with cell phone

Tae-seok's target is Killer (LEE Bum-soo), the professional gambler who'd framed him. Among his gang are Player (CHOI Jin-hyuk), the manager of Killer's GO gambling house, and Kwon (actress LEE Si-young, the only female lead in the cast), a former professional GO player who runs the Goddess Bar and who is indebted to Killer.

Kwon (LEE Si-young)

Certain terms pertaining to GO are explained on occasion throughout the film. I happen to know a bit about the game, but think that just about anyone can enjoy this movie even without any familiarity with it.

Tae-seok in action

The director does a good job of keeping things interesting and moving along. I found myself really engrossed in the storyline and plot development. And the action scenes, of which there are several, are very well done.

AsianCineFest Rating: 3.5 out of 4 stars; highly recommended.

INFLATABLE SEX DOLL OF THE WASTELANDS to kick off Japan Society NY's latest film series

Inflatable Sex Doll of the Wastelands (c) 1967 KOKUEI

 Inflatable Sex Doll of the Wastelands / Koya no Datch Waifu

Directed by Atsushi Yamatoya

Japan, 1967, 85 minutes

When: Saturday, October 18, 2014 at 7:00 PM

Where: Japan Society NY

333 East 47th Street, NYC

(Between 1st and 2nd Avenues)

Map

Tickets

The Dark Side of the Sun: John Zorn on Japanese Cinema, Japan Society NY's new monthly film series, will begin this coming Saturday evening with a screening of Atsushi Yamatoya’s Inflatable Sex Doll of the Wastelands.

Taking some hints from Ambrose Bierce’s celebrated short story “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” it's a deliciously delirious cult film about a hitman (Yuichi Minato) who is hired by a rich real estate agent to find an abducted woman (Noriko Tatsumi). This simple setup gives way to a hip and chaotic worldview full of hard-boiled characters, sexy action, and hallucinatory imagery.

A close collaborator with the likes of Koji Wakamatsu, Yamatoya was part of the group of anonymous writers who worked on Wakamatsu Productions and was also one of the anonymous writers on the script of Seijun Suzuki’s Branded to Kill. Though considered a “pink film,” Inflatable Sex Doll of the Wastelands has surprisingly few sex scenes. Nevertheless, the film remains incredibly sexy through creative montage and innuendo. In his book Behind the Pink Curtain, Jasper Sharp calls the film “probably the most idiosyncratic work the genre has ever produced.”

A feast for the eyes as well as the ears, the sparse and cool music was provided by jazz pianist and composer Yosuke Yamashita.

Commemorating the life of writer, producer, and director Koji Wakamatsu, who passed away on October 17, 2012, this screening of Inflatable Sex Doll of the Wastelands will be followed by a reception..

Sentai Filmworks announces acquisition of CROSS ANGE RONDO OF ANGEL AND DRAGON

A once powerful princess who had the world at her fingertips will join a group of warriors to defend it from destruction in Sentai Filmworks' latest acquisition, CROSS ANGE Rondo of Angel and Dragon. This fantasy adventure series is directed by Yoshiharu Ashino (Tweeny Witches, Thundercats [2011]), with series composition by Tatsuto Higuchi (Phi Brain Puzzle of God, Toradora!), mecha design by Junichi Akutsu (My-HiME, Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion), and animation production by SUNRISE (Gintama, Horizon in the Middle of Nowhere).

Synopsis: Mankind has acquired a highly advanced information technology known as "Mana." Thanks to this almost magical force war, hunger, pollution, and every other problem on the face of the earth have been conquered. Finally the world is a utopia of peace and luxury.

Angelise is the First Princess of the Empire of Misurugi. She also lives a life of luxury, is celebrated by the citizens, and is expected to wear the crown. However, the truth becomes known that she herself is a "Norma."

A "Norma" is someone who cannot use Mana. They are called "Irregulars" and are considered anti-social "things."

With everything taken away from her, she is sent into isolation on a secluded island. There she meets Norma girls who know of nothing but fighting. They spend their days piloting transforming humanoid weapons called "Para-mails" to hunt giant aggressive life forms called "Dragons" which have invaded from another dimension.

Having lost her name, "Ange" becomes a warrior. But what will she see at the end of her battles?

What is to be trusted?

What is to be gained?

The story of one girl and her determination begins here.

CROSS ANGE Rondo of Angel and Dragon will be available soon through select digital outlets with a home video release to follow.

Encore screening of HONG Sang-soo's HILL OF FREEDOM tomorrow

Kwon (Seo Young-hwa) and Mori (Ryo Kase)

Hill of Freedom /  Jayuui Eondeok

Directed by Hong Sang-soo

2014 South Korea, 2014, 66 minutes

Korean and English with English subtitles

When: Sunday, October 12 at 12:30 pm
Where: The Walter Reade Theater

Ticket Info

Hill of Freedom, the most recent film from Korean director Hong Sang-soo, had its U.S. premiere at the 52nd New York Film Festival on Tuesday, September 30th and was also shown on Wednesday, October 8th, which was when I saw it. A third screening has been added as part of the NYFF52 Encore Screenings series. That screening will take place at 12:30 tomorrow afternoon at the Film Society of Lincoln Center's Walter Reade Theater.

With a 66 minute running time, the film is too short to qualify as a feature film (85 minutes or more), but too long to be a short (30 minutes or less). I'd be inclined to call it a featurette, but in our age of DVDs and Blu-rays, that term has come to refer to a short documentary film about the making of a feature-length film. And I don't think mini-film sounds right.

Youngsun (Moon So-ri), her boyfriend, and Mori

So, while I'm unsure how to technically characterize it in terms of its length, I will say it's a smart, well-made movie that departs from the kind of film for which Hong is typically known. Hong is frequently described as a director who makes the same film over and over, but with slight variations. Thus he can be regarded as a "one-trick pony," although this may or may not have a pejorative connotation, depending on the commentator's viewpoint. Most of his films rely heavily on repetition, of scenes and/or dialogue. What keeps his films interesting are the variations he employs.

Hill of Freedom for me was very different from the other films by Hong that I have seen, and I've seen a fair number of them. Here there really isn't much of the repetition for which he's known. In fact, the film is really a linear story -- no going back to visit the same scene from different perspectives -- although the elements of which it is comprised are not told in chronological order. (More on that in a moment.)

The film also employs the surprise of having the characters speak the vast majority of the dialogue in English. This device seems to have been used because one of the main characters is Japanese and doesn't speak any Korean, the language of all the other characters. English gives them a common language by which they can communicate.

Mori and his landlady

The story begins with Kwon (Seo Young-hwa), a young woman who has just returned to Seoul, being given a packet of letters left for her by Mori (Ryo Kase), a Japanese who fell in love with her during a previous visit and has returned after two years to see her again. The letters were written while Mori was trying to find her after he returned to Seoul.

While walking down a flight of stairs, Kwon drops the letters, destroying the order in which they were packaged. Since they apparently bear no dates, she can only read them in the random order in which she's picked them up. The film thus presents the various experiences Mori has had since his return in whatever order Kwon has arranged the letters. His experiences include his encounters with Youngsun (actress Moon So-ri) who works at the café whose name gives the film its title, as well as with the landlady of the guest house where he is staying and with other guests.

The viewer is thus left with the same challenge as Kwon: trying to figure out what happened when. Fortunately, this is a non-critical task; knowing the precise order of every event depicted is not crucial. It's sufficient to have a general sense of the order in which things probably took place.

I found Hill of Freedom to be one of the most enjoyable of the films by Hong that I've seen. And I've liked several of them a lot. It's funny, light-hearted and intriguing.

AsianCineFest Rating: 3.5 out of 4 stars; highly recommended.

Happy Birthday wishes to Bae Doo-na

Bae Doo-na at the premiere of Cloud Atlas in October, 2012

Actress Bae Doo-na (sometimes spelled Doona or Doo Na) was born thirty-five years ago on October 11, 1979 in Seoul, South Korea. Originally a model, she went on to star in both Japanese and Korean films. With her role in Cloud Atlas (2012), she joined Japanese actress Rinko Kikuchi (Babel, 2006, and Pacific Rim, 2013) as a contemporary Asian actress appearing in primarily English language international productions. There has been very positive buzz about her performance as a recent police academy graduate who has been punished for misconduct with a transfer to a small seaside village in July Jung's feature debut A Girl at My Door (2014).

Here is a sampling of screenshots some of my favorite of BAE Doo-na performances:

Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (2002)

Saving My Hubby (2002)

Linda Linda Linda (2005)

The Host (2006)

 Air Doll (2009)

Cloud Atlas (2012)