The Yellow Sea

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I can't remember the last time Hollywood offered me anything mind-blowing. An industry now controlled by bankers for shareholders, even filmmaking geniuses like Martin Scorsese have been reduced to making pointless kids movies. Not even the so-called independent cinema in the US has been spared Hollywood's fixation with the bottom line, where the few table scraps left are thrown to a dwindling numbers of original voices still relevant. If ever we needed another Easy Rider inspired industry revolt, then now is the time.

With American cinema (not unlike the country itself) irrelevant and hopelessly behind the times, the only option North American cinephiles have, is to go abroad. One of the countries that's long since surpassed American cinema for shock and originality is South Korea. And it's not like Hollywood is oblivious, they're actually cannibalizing SK cinema by remaking Korean gems into pointless American knockoffs. The latest SK gem ripe for reproduction is Hong-jin Na's The Yellow Sea (Hwanghae).

Like Ravel's Bolero, The Yellow Sea understands the patient reward of crescendo: starting slow and building to a fevered climax. By the end of this, we're left with what seems impossible for an epic 156 minute film: wanting more. With the exception of one car chase marred by phony green screen cutaways (see the video below), the breakneck action, extreme violence and hyper-realistic gore is virtuosic. Guns noticeably absent, whooshing knives, devastating hatchets and the blunt trauma of gnawed animal bones provide The Yellow Sea with brutal, bloody and refreshingly lo-tech weapons of choice, a grim example of how Hollywood and it's obsession with appeasing demographics can't compete.

But The Yellow Sea is much more than just a knife brandishing ballet that hearkens back to early 90s HK bullet ballets, it's exceptionally well written and acted with none of HK cinema's clichéd melodrama. The characters here are many shades of grey, avoiding archetypal absolutes, allowing us to identify with and like even the worst of the worst. All of the action is beautifully composed with kinetic, hand-held photography that compliments the bleak color palette, which results in a gritty and ultra-realistic film, not unlike so many American masterworks from the 1970s.

This film is quite a ride. If you like nonstop action, you might like it. If you like stories about desperate people stuck in desperate situations and struggling to get out of them, you might like it.

Unfortunately, you have to be willing to suspend quite a bit of disbelief to keep watching it, as each five minutes takes the main character further into unbelievable territory. By the end of the film, he's outsmarted several police organizations and several crime organizations, all of which have been chasing him through most of the movie, and it tells in several scenes where, rather than showing how he got out of an impossible situation, the film simply cuts to him driving or running away with nobody in close pursuit, suggesting he did it . . . Um, somehow?

Other reviewers talk about gritty realism, and while it is gritty, it isn't within miles of realistic. In the real world, the main character of this film would have been either killed or put in prison within thirty minutes of this 2.5 hour story.

featuring the same trio of director and leading men from the outstanding "The Chaser" Na Hong-Jin gives us a bleak slice of Korean life. All of the characters are unappealing and unsympathetic, but especially the violent loser Gu-Nam, who is sent on a murderous mission to Seoul by people trafficking gangster Myun-Ga. But despite Gu-Nams hopelessness you still root for him to survive and win despite the odds stacked against him. Na has crafted a flawed masterpiece from these broken elements, with plenty of his trademarks from The Chaser, like the outstanding cinematography (apart from some of the later chase scenes which seem to have been shot on a horrible video camera) and unrelenting violence. I would recommend it very highly.

another near perfect thriller out of south Korea. i don't know what and how most movie festivals giving out award, but all movies directed by this director and screenplays written by this specific several movies directed by this specific director, the screenplay writer(s), both should have received the highest honors of awards. based upon my forty years movie viewing experience, i've never seen anything like these kind of well written, well directed and well performed korean movies. these movies mentioned by other reviewers are just on different level, making hollwood's films in similar genre like worthless garbage. watching every one of these movies just became a psychiatric treatment, the perfect and ultimate catharsis to drain the stress caused by the financial burden and bore-to-death day in and day out urban living, because nobody could be more down and out like the main characters portrayed in these movies, and not any common person, you or me, could be less lucky like these characters faced in their lives. korean movie thrillers are just so uniquely different from other countries, in my opinion, they are definitely on a higher level, higher than where the Hollywood, bollywood, Japanese, Chinese stand. because every time when i finished a korean movie like 'the yellow sea', 'the man from nowhere', 'i saw the devil'....i felt the stress that constantly burdened on my mind and shoulders would go away temporarily, i actually felt better and more alive. no other country's movies could have such catharsis-like effect.

highly recommended to those who got the similar burden like me.

It's time to fete our Director Na Hong-jin for making a masterpiece like this. This is about his noir thriller "The Yellow Sea". His second film after a bang like The Chaser. The main success of this movie is for it's fast screenplay and some nail biting chasing scenes. Inspite of its long running time the movie tightly grips us during most of its running time.

Coming to story, The protagonist Goo-nam(Ha Jeong-woo) is a Joseon(Chinese of North Korean descent)is a taxi driver living in Yenji, China. Goo-nam's wife went to South Korea for work to lift their family. She promised that she would send money to him, but there has been no money sent by her, let alone any news from her. Goo-nam really loved her and meanwhile tortured by the possibility of her infidelity in his dream, but that is not his only problem. He has lot of debts including his wife's travel fare. He tries to solve his problem with gambling, but that makes his situation worse.The debt collector often visits and questions his pride.

After his fierce attitude in the gambling bar, Goo-nam is noticed by a local Korean mob boss/dog seller Mr. Myeon(Kim Yoon-seok). Myeon has a plan to solve his problem. If he goes to Seoul and kills somebody, his debt problem will be solved. Giving his daughter in the safe hands(his mother)he agrees to work. Under the instructions from Myeon, he illegally entered South Korea with other Korean Chinese.

He arrives at some coastal area without much problem. He goes into Seoul while not being noticed by the law enforcement. He stays in a lousy motel room. He checks out the place where his target lives. He is clever enough to devise a good plan while spying on the daily pattern of the target during the night. He also goes around Seoul for getting any clues about the whereabouts of his wife. There is not much time left, but he still cannot find her. The time is short, and he must do the job as demanded. It's a now or never situation,the night at the freezing cold Goo-nam anxiously waits for his target to arrive at the building. And then, something unexpected happens in front of his eyes. With an unexpected twist ,He is now chased by both the police and the mobs for what he does not commits. The chasing starts, even we feel sorry for the unfortunate things happening to this inglorious bastard in the merciless world.

The plot shines lightly and it turns out a mob boss in Seoul, Tae- won(Cho Seong-ha), is involved with the incident. After the involvement of police and the media far more than he has ever thought, he becomes panic. He attempts to solve his problem even before knowing what's exactly going on. This is a real critical situation, especially when Myeon comes to South Korea after the problem between him and Tae-won. Now both want Goo-nam in their hand. Reminding the chaser the good guy plays a very bad guy role here. Can't see the rage of fight with the bones. That's really a new route of violence. Thanks to the director the car chasing scene is really a nail biting high tension scene, he makes very impressive actions sequences. The camera is a little too running. And the plot changes in to unexpected twists. Overall it is really a worth watching experience. Can't wait for another movie from Na Hong Jin.