Righteous Ties

I've yet to see a South Korean movie I did not like.

This movie might be a bit slow, or a bit sentimental for some people but if you like a balance of understatement and simplicity, mixed with great characters, you're going to love Righeous Ties.

The ending, while not unique was not really predictable either. There are only so many ways you go go with an ending to a loyalty/brotherhood/ revenge movie. I guess it really boils down to how are the last 20 minutes of the movie played out.

Wow, 10 lines of text. How frustrating. This is/was a minimalist movie and therein lies the beauty. Oh, not a lot of outdoor scenes but South Korea really looks to be a beautiful country. I give it a 7/10 but that only means that 9/10 and 10/10 are reserved for the best work of people like Bergman, Kubrick or Malick.

I picked up Righteous Ties because I liked the writer-director Jang Jin's previous works as a genre-tweaking talent with a great sense of humor. However, in this gangster comedy/drama/farce/etc., I think the good director drops the ball.

All the things the director is good at: great sense of humor, ability to warp around genre conventions, transitioning between comedy and drama, they're all present. At times, you're watching a pretty ridiculous straight faced comedy, which turns into a sweet action sequence, and then a slapstick piece and then a dramatic exploration of friendship. And none of it feels too far out of place. The problem lies in the story and in the weak drama segments.

It's a story about a pair of gangsters, one who ends up having to go to jail and is betrayed by his mafia boss and his childhood buddy, who remains loyal to the gang, despite discovering this. Most of the film occurs without significant interaction between the two sides, as the jailbird adapts to life in prison (meeting up with another betrayed gangster/childhood friend in the process) and planning a jailbreak. The other gangster works with the gang to set up a new drug operation.

Here's the problem: the drama hinges on the relationship between these two characters, but we never see that relationship develop or even explore their relationship except for a couple very brief melodramatic flashbacks to their childhood times. This is somehow supposed to engender sympathy and show the strength of relationship, but none of this is followed through over the course of the film, so the conflict between the two feels manufactured and hollow. Not to say that there isn't anything entertaining about this, but the entertaining comedy and action feels strung together by an underbaked story and consequently, it doesn't feel like a coherent story. This is complicated by adding in a lot of sub-characters and plots that aren't necessary nor contribute to the main story, even thematically.

But the action with the near invincible gangsters is fun and kinetic. The comedy drew laughs. Production values are solid and the actors are convincing in their roles. The director has a good eye, it's just that his storytelling didn't hold up to his directing this time. As such, I will have to call this one a good try, but a pass. 5/10.

Excellent movie, loved every bit of it. Great fight scenes, love the usage of comic relief, and it still keeps it's seriousness. All around a superb movie that I can watch over and over and over. Some parts are a little confusing at times, however it picks back up and you get a good understanding of what's going on, it does have an interesting but sad ending, had a friend watch it with me and she spoke no Korean at all, and without subtitles she still understood it, though the DVD does have the option for English Subtitles. This movie is one of the better Korean films I've watched and that's saying a lot if you've seen Tae Guk Gi:Brotherhood of War. before.... Really glad my GF sent it back from Korea.