I heard about this movie at a party of a friend of a friend. I've long since lost contact with them but I remember jotting down the movie that the friend recommended to me with frenzied vigor. That was about a year and half ago, I think, and I barely watched it a few months ago ( hey, I have about 300 movies on my netflix queue..). I now understand why he was so excited to share it with me.
"The Restless" is a korean fantasy movie. It is a beautiful, fantasy movie. The beginning of the movie almost turned me off with it's depressing fight scene and the village dialogue thanking him. It almost seemed like it was heading for the kind of movie where the hero travels all over the place and saves people. Whoopee. It wasn't until the hero died (yes he died in the beginning of the movie) and woke up in the beautiful scenery that is ghost land that I perked up. From that moment on, my eyes were riveted.
It's been awhile since I've seen it, so the IMDB explanation of the movie would be better. It was a love story amidst the vengeance and self discovery. The ethereal backgrounds were splendid. The fight scenes had all manners of weapons and moves that made my head ping pong all over the screen. I love fantasy fights. Who wouldn't love to fly and spin around in the air for minutes while fighting? I would be more willing to learn martial arts if I could fly around and bounce off of trees.
The last fight is THE fight to watch. When the hero hears the distressed call of his loved one deep within the temple, he sets out to make his way through the horde of demon fighters. By the way, a horde in this scene is not a few dozens or an alarming hundred. It's more like a whole country of demon soldiers stand between him and the temple. HE. FIGHTS. THROUGH.THEM.ALL. My words won't do it justice. Watch that scene and I swear you will be muttering disbelieving expletives left and right.
One, just one, complaint I had about the movie was the ending. I wasn't happy with how lofty and open the end was. I understand it but it just wasn't as satisfying as I hoped. Maybe I'm missing the point of some Korean reference but I don't know what it is. If there's one, then please tell me.
No, I lied. There is another point of complaint. The heroine of the story is a bit too wimpy for my tastes. She's supposed to be this bad ass high spiritual fighter. Other than one cool magical fight scene, most of the time she's being thrown to the side to cower or made to run away. There really isn't anything too special about her other than looking like his dead wife. If she wasn't a look alike I know the hero wouldn't give a hoot about her. Neither would I.
Alot of Asian fantasy films (Thailand included) often features these wimpy females. Something about the idea of females handling magic seem to make the writers edgy. There might be a general idea that women aren't strong enough to handle the magic, blah, blah, blah. If the females are able to handle, they're bad and they get whats coming to them. If that's true then I flip my finger to those writers. Geez, I'm sick of that.
1 comment:
Have you taken martial arts yet? Maybe you can fight mid-air if you try!
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