I enjoyed this movie, partially because of its length, and partially because of just a lot being extremely right with this film. Firstly some perspective, the film seems to be made for teenagers and/or early twenty-somethings. It is extremely dumbed down and the bulk of it is quite superficial. It has almost the exact formula of a bad slasher movie but just with kicks to the face. I believe any negative reviews will likely fail to acknowledge that they are not in the right mindset or not the right audience.
The story is straightforward; foreigners decide to buy the bar the main characters work at and use force when they are refused. It's just at about 80min. so that really is just enough story frankly. Despite that being the main plot, there is a subplot, and this is the best part of the film, about the main character dealing with his father's death and ultimately meeting his killer(and of course fighting) again.
The significance of this is that the move has the theme of learning to deal with the consequences of one's actions, and always being in the state of mind where right choices can be made. This crops up several times in the story and had this been a straight two hour drama, this would've probably been the weightiest martial arts movie in recent film history.
On the technical side, there is practically no budget and very little script. The actors do a fine job at acting, but there just isn't much acting to do, so everyone wears as little clothing as possible. Everyone.
The movie could've been a little subtler with the music, as many of the accompanying shots were dramatic and impressive. This was an extremely well shot movie in places. Fight choreography was fantastic. The fights tended to be balanced with both parties getting equally injured and lots of tension in the fights.
The movie is an odd mix of two distinct approaches, and while I would have preferred a straight drama as I think it would've be great at it, I can't fault it for being what it is, and it is what is very well. This movie is well worth the eighty minutes.
