The trailer for Kim Jee-woon’s Western is out, and damn, it looks good.
At any rate, who wouldn’t want to see a Western set in 1930s Manchuria?
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The trailer for Kim Jee-woon’s Western is out, and damn, it looks good.
At any rate, who wouldn’t want to see a Western set in 1930s Manchuria?
26 Comments
Anybody who doubts that there is ANY basis in fact for the conceit of Korean cowboys robbing a train in Colonial Manchuoko to the accompaniment of the sound track from Kill Bill and believes that there are numerous other more worthwhile and historically significant stories to be told about the experiences of Korean settlers in Imperial Japan’s most important puppet state.
I’ll watch it.
Who cares about fact. Its a movie not a documentary! Sometimes they can just be about a little escapism. The trailer looks like a hell of a lot of fun. Thanks for the tip. I’ll definitely check it out.
When it comes to plotlines in action movies, fact is whacked - the story’s just a story, and with stories, good’s better.
With trailers, keep in mind that they’re made by completely different companies using the original film footage, with their own editing and soundtrack. As happens sometimes, the film might end up looking different in the theater. Still, that’s no complaint - it looks really good, I’ll definitely check it out.
just a little side note, this is one the movies earmarked to be shown on initial run with english subtitles at yongsan cgv. i’m all a’twitter.
That looks amazing. Too bad I’ll have to wait insurmountable amount of time before I get to see it… in brown screen no less…
The movie had me at Song Kang Ho’s casting.
The third guy (Jung Woo Sung’s character) looks exceptionally badass with that shotgun.
@#1
Oh come on, dude. Suspension of the disbelief? I know my dad will be excited, being an ill-fated action movie fan who hasn’t seen a good release of gun blazing movies lately. Btw… what you wrote is a sentence fragment… Anyone [blah, blah, blah] is what, exactly?
“Dragon Wars” had a nice trailer, too, but the movie turned out to be a piece of crap.
Also, I do not think it is a good sign that they “borrowed” music from “Kill Bill” and a title from a Clint Eastwood movie since it suggests that the makers of this movie are not very original.
Finally, I wonder how much of the movie will just be scenes of people busting through doors on a train?
I think I will spend my money on Harrison Ford, instead.
#7: Dragon Wars did not have good previews.
Your argument is thinly veiled…and I’ll
leave it at that.
yeah #7, go ahead and skip it. more than likely that will just mean that you’re missing out on one damn fine movie-going experience. mvoies with this sort of pedigree don’t come around in korea all that often. to go with a brilliant cast, the director, kim ji-oon, has, if nothing else, established himself as an extremely accomplished visual stylist. after movies like a bittersweet life and a tale of two sisters, which were not only beautifully shot, but also quite entertaining, i would not expect any less from this one. my guess is, you might find a better movie out there this summer, but it certainly won’t be in a walk.
I’m looking forward to it. It’s being shown out of competition at Cannes and it’s slated for release in Korea on July 10th.
The director, Kim Jee-woon, has an amazing track record of taking old ideas and breathing new life into them. His “Tale of Two Sisters” is slated for a big budget Hollywood remake (currently in post production) and his “Bittersweet Life” is a cult classic.
A high res, high bandwidth version of the trailer can be had here:
http://artservice.ktsystemhost.....railer.wmv
I’m also looking forward to this one:
The Crossing
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....deo/215339
If anyone watches it, be sure to post your reviews.
#7
Your loss. Song Kang Ho’s presence is good enough of insurance for me… the guy chooses his movie extremely carefully. From No.3 to Secret Sunshine, the guy never disappointed me in a given movie.
I’m hoping that a local independent/foreign movie-only theater will pick it up. I’d hate to wait to see it few months later on DVD…
Did I mention that the guy with the shotgun looks badass?
#7 - You thought Dragon Wars had a “pretty good” trailer? Well, you lost me there. Guess your judgment led you astray from jump on that one.
And as for the music? Well, since the music in most movie trailers often is canned or borrowed from other films because the scores are usually finished last, this isn’t unusual at all. Or how many American action/adventure films used Orff’s opening to Carmina Burana in the actual film, after everybody and their dog seemed to be using it in their trailers? I thought the use of the music from Kill Bill worked quite well, and it’s pretty industry standard to borrow like that.
And you’re worried about “originality” and Clint Eastwood, when the genre of the Western itself was “borrowed” in large parts from Japanese cinema as part of its construction as an “American” cultural product? Really?
Displaced ronin samurai wandering in the nooks and crannies of small Japanese villages, transplanted over to the lawless and dispossessed making trouble or defending good in the American West, which has now apparently been re-imagined as what look to be Korean badasses reluctantly making right and taking names in colonial Manchuria — who’s borrowing from whom again?
The title is an homage, not a ripoff or sign of unoriginality. Or is that not perfectly obvious?
Trailer looks well edited, with action that apparently has bite, and seems to be delivered with both a sense of humor and verve. In short, it kicks ass.
If you don’t think so, cool — but it sounds like you’re talking out the side of your neck if you think there’s anything “original” about the genre of the American Western to begin with.
#13: agree with your sentiments in general. although it is spaghetti western this new largely takes off from. spaghettis are of course bastard children of the long and rich history of american westerns. and john ford was creating his american west mythology long before kurosawa (from the silents in 1910s to Iron Horse 1920s, finally the John Wayne star-making Stagecoach ‘39.)
early settling communities in “uncivilized”, lawless lands is pretty universal experience. the development mythology and rhetoric, character stories are up for grabs. if someone has set up a whole belief system of contrasts with symbols and styles that’ll take your industry more generations to achieve, why not just tarantino it:P
Wow, deja vu.
I seem to recall having the same debate here in the Hole many moons ago about the Japanese origins of the new kind of Western which emerged in the 60s, the spaghetti Western (so-called because of the Italian director), which propelled Clint Eastwood to fame, and the debt owed to the works of Akira Kurosawa and Toshiro Mifune.
Decades later, the Japanese spoofed on the spaghetti Western and produced “sukiyaki western”.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S61ySyaJQSE
What food-adjective can apply to “The Good, Bad, and the Wierd?” I propose “jampoong western”.
The Western should really be called an Eastern.
On the issue of movies, the film could do very well as I have heard the government has finally shut down the movie sharing sites.
holy cow, Netizen Kim !
it seems Korea is getting inspired by Japanese works,
Yet again !
One can only wonder when the tide turns.
Yeah, I could see how this movie came about.
Director watched a lot of American and Japanese movies. Got some proven audience magnet stars, males with proven track records, and made his own movie, probably a seemingly entertaining one,
but the bare bones behind it is,
Japanese.
for a brief moment, I thought making-believe that American West-like conditions existing in East Asia was
truly original.
I have learned that,
when I think something is “truly original”
in Korea,
I must look for something or anything similar in Japan first, to solidify that claim.
and that’s
S. A. D.
who wouldn’t enjoy a train robbery, with guys firing round after round of revolver shots, re-loading quicker than Korean students swivel a mechanical pencil, and every once in a while boom someone with a rifle?
I think it’s due to make money.
Who wants to see a movie like that on a computer screen? Okay, they could always make a Divx, but even then a Divx doesn’t look all that good on a big flat screen either.
I don’t know. I make it a point to buy good movies. Since I have a PS3 w/Blu-Ray, the movies are all the more beautiful on screen.
I hope someone can keep us updated as to whether or not this will be showing in Yongsan with subtitles.
#7,
Well, I also intend to watch a now-geriatric Indiana Jones go at it one more time, but that’s hardly going to keep me from watching other movies as well.
Finally, I wonder how much of the movie will just be scenes of people busting through doors on a train?
Your criticism would have had more bite had you mentioned the heavily recycled footage of the exterior scenes of the train attack. Even so, as mentioned above, the companies that make trailers often get just a small amount of stock to work with (which is usually, but not always, what will end up in the final film), and that’s often without a finished soundtrack. So, yeah, what you’re watching is simply one scene of the fim, extended and reworked, to get the public’s attention.
Frankly, trailer editing is an art unto itself, much as is the medical work required to keep Harrison Ford alive all these years.
John Ford invented dry cleaning.
Song Kang Ho!
Song Kang Ho!!
Song Kang Ho!!!
BTW,is he the bad or the weird?
I think the investors will enjoy the return from this movie. Even it seems there’s no Hollywood blockbusters to compete with when it hit the theaters.
I wish pawi were here to point out how often “the expat” has a knee jerk reaction to Korean attempts to do something cool culturally (or do anything, for that matter).
You’re not even hating well. Gee, an Asian Western has some borrowed elements? Go figure.
#1,
Tell me, how many Star Wars movies have you seen?
I just saw this movie, and it’s great: highly entertaining, well filmed and well edited. And, despite the fact that there is an obvious plotline at work here, there are still small surprises to keep things fresh.
It’s really enjoyable - check it out.
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