아유레디? (R U Ready?)

Graham Linehan set up a bad movie club on Twitter last week, managing to get 40,000 people to come together online and sit through “The Happening”. An admirable endeavour indeed. This morning I had a solitary bad movie club moment of my own when I sat down to watch the wonderfully appalling 아유레디? (R U Ready?).

It starts as a joyful overlong advert for Everland (A surprisingly good theme park just outside of Seoul), introducing us to some fascinatingly annoying characters. The little orphan boy who claims he still has a daddy, the two over-styled badly dressed bullies, the nerdy schoolboy, the stressed out doctor, the drunk grandpa, the heroic park ranger and the cool bus driver.

Even better, within the first fifteen minutes they go on the safari ride and we are treated to the most ridiculous looking fake bears to have ever graced the silver screen. Things get even better when the bears attack the safari bus and we’re treated to an absolutely insane three minutes of man-in-suit fun, concluding with a spectacular hit and run on one of the mischievous ursine fellows.

All of our two dimensional characters (save for the cool bus driver and the fatter of the two bullies) escape into an abandoned building, which conveniently blocks cell-phone signals and forces the motley crew of stereotypes to band together as a team to find their way to safety. All is not well though as the little orphan boy has lost his teddy bear, Baku, who eats and lives on nightmares. Oh the humanity! Fortunately a plaque kindly placed on the floor by the Korean version of Basil Exposition lets us know that this spooky building will help us find what we have lost, but it will be up to each individual to do it in their own way…

A plague of rats fall on our crew, the doors conveniently creak open and everybody runs off into the woods. The adventure starts here, as the grandfather starts to have flashbacks to Vietnam and the rats chase our heroes, all the while showing off the ridiculously poor CGI, until out of nowhere, for no particular reason, a fire starts and all the rats are burned to death. We then get a small serving of misogyny from the bully and the doctor towards the park ranger as they wander through the countryside.

They settle down for the night; Grandpa looks at old war photos and tells everyone the war isn’t over because he backed down at a crucial moment. Mysterious music tells us that something is about to happen and everybody else looks a bit puzzled. Flares start fizzing and bombs explode! We are at war folks! What follows is an incoherent mess of an action sequence: with too many cuts and a lot of shaky camera work it is hard to tell what is going on. Finally the camera stays still for more than two seconds and we see that past events are occurring before our very eyes. Our heroes watch as 1970’s Grandpa goes through hell and present day Grandpa helps change the course of history and sacrifices himself.

Leaving Grandpa for dead, the others get onto the nearest helicopter and whole-heartedly fail to notice that the cool bus driver is taking them to their next destination. They get dropped onto an island and the characters finally understand the meaning of the rather obvious plaque from the start of their adventure. Grandpa found what he had lost and they must do the same! Thanks to a surprise avalanche that chain of thought is quickly broken and the five get themselves into a nearby car and drive away from a collapsing cliff face that seems to follow them no matter how far they drive. The car stalls, it starts to rain and the camera zooms in for close ups on the park ranger’s lady bits. The rain turns into a typhoon, people hang off cliffs and the little boy gets dragged out of the car just moments before it tumbles into a ravine. What excitement!

Everyone is wet and angry and starting to think about what they have lost. The bully and the schoolboy fight and become friendlier, and the director clumsily shows us that the doctor, the park ranger and the little orphan boy deserve to end up as a family.

Schoolboy and bully end up almost drowning in a swamp and discover that what they have lost is friendship and as they sink under the muddy waters we know that they truly love each other. Three down, three to go…

Our proto-family unit arrive at a spooky looking house and we know that we’re on the home stretch. After a touch of mawkish fireside chat and a brief nap, we flashback to the doctor’s school days and his broken relationship with a pig-tailed rotter who stamps on his gift of a rose and breaks his heart. Turns out his mother works at the market and the poor boy stinks of fish! Meanwhile the park ranger has been visited by the ghosts of birthdays past and we are all supposed to be scared by small children wearing too much eye shadow. We discover that the doctor was into self-harm as a teen and the park ranger’s mother died when she was young giving birth to her younger brother.

These two stories intertwine with wobbly shots of long, dark staircases and tearful close-ups. The director tries to tug our heartstrings, but it is all a bit laughable. The terrible English subtitles don’t help the mood and as the park ranger has a final moment with her dying mother, the director reaches new levels of moribundity.

Out of nowhere a flying black puddle swallows up the businessman and the park ranger finally forgives her little brother for her mother’s death. Except, surprise, it turns out that the park ranger is actually hugging the doctor! Oh the twist of all twists!

The happy threesome go outside and find Baku (Eater of Souls) along with a working walkie-talkie. The poor little orphan throws Baku away into a stream for no good reason and they all decide to look in a nearby cave. Spooky music tells us that all is not well with the world and we get another glimpse of the fearsome flying black puddle who starts to strangle the park ranger. The doctor gets involved, but that only leads to him being thrown into a pool of water. The screaming orphan realizes how foolish he was to throw away Baku and goes to find him. Narrowly escaping a watery death, the doctor decides he will not run away anymore and he faces up to the poorly animated flying black puddle. The puddle transmogrifies into young businessman and tries to stab his older self. Luckily whiny orphan boy finds the floating Baku and the doctor manages to talk his younger self out of murder/suicide.

Suddenly the drowned boys appear in a little train, pick up the three musketeers and Baku and choo-choo their way out of the tunnel and back onto the safari bus…

Wait… You mean it was all a dream? It never happened? I’ve just wasted ninety-five minutes of my life watching a dream sequence? The bus is back to normal and they head safely back to their ordinary lives. However, things have changed: the bully is nice to the schoolboy, the doctor says goodbye to the orphan and the bus driver discovers that the grandpa has died in his sleep all the while clutching a photo of his war buddies. What a happy ending! Grandpa’s dead and the doctor, park ranger and whiny little orphan boy didn’t end up together after all!

But wait, cut to a night scene, same bus, same driver and a group of schoolgirls. Whoa, mama! What opportunities for a sequel! Shame there never was one…

R U Ready? would be perfect material for the bad movie club, the only problem being that few would be able to get their hands on a copy. If you do get the chance it’s worth a look if only for the ridiculous bears. A truly terrible film that could become a guilty pleasure.

열세살, 수아 (The Wonder Years)

열세살, 수아 (The Wonder Years) gives us a glimpse into the life of a thirteen year old girl struggling to cope with the world around her. With her father dead, her mother hooked up with a junkyard owner and a tenuous friendship with a woman who sells “toast” on the side of the street; Soo-ah is finding it difficult to make it through life. Her only solace comes from watching videos of her “real mother”, a famous pop star, but that stops when the video player breaks down.

This 2007 film tries to show us the trials and tribulations of adolescence. There is none of the melodrama or mawkish tragedy that affects many Korean dramas, instead we are treated to a very realistic portrayal of teenage life. 이세영 (Lee Sae-young) is very believable as the troubled Soo-ah and 추상미 (Choo Sang-mi) excels as her over-burdened mother. Soo-ah’s friendships with two different girls

The first-time director, 김희정 (Kim Hee-jung), doesn’t use fancy or flashy shots to bring the viewer in, instead she lets the story slowly envelop us as we become attached to each member of the dysfunctional family. Reality is ever so slightly washed out  and even Soo-ah’s fantasies are on a very modest scale. The plot is simple, but in the end the story is very satisfying and I found myself with tears in my eyes as the credits rolled.

On a slightly different note, the dvd manufacturers should be congratulated on misrepresenting the film. The box and inside cover might lead us to believe that we will be watching some exciting teeny-bopping extravaganza with over made-up adolescents dressed in the latest fashions, thank god we get something different.

삼공일 삼공이 (301 302)

“삼공일 삼공이” (301 302), the 1995 film by 박철수 (Park Chul-soo) is about compulsion. Song (played by 방은진), the woman in apartment 301, does nothing but cook, preparing dish after dish, bringing them to Yun (played by 황신혜), the woman in apartment 302, who wants nothing more than to vomit at the sight of all that food. One minute the screen is filled with loving shots of deep fried prawns being caressed with chili sauce; the next, we have to endure close-ups of dry retching and vomiting.

This is a hard watch and as Yun’s history of sexual abuse at the hands of her father unfolded, I found myself becoming more than a little queasy. Park Chul-soo’s extreme close-ups of chewing mouths start to taint the beautiful food with a sense of disgust and unease. Coupled with Song’s bullying and force-feeding of Yun, the film tries its best to assault the viewer’s senses.

After hearing Yun’s story, Song behaves more kindly towards her and the film begins to focus on Song’s difficult past with her husband and Chong-Chong the dog. Not wanting to give too much away, I will say that if you are fond of little puppies then this may not be the film for you. Dog lovers beware…

The food is incredibly well filmed, but it all leaves a bad taste in your mouth and by the time the final meal is served most people will have lost their appetite. It’s an interesting study of two women trying to cope with their broken relationships with parents or lovers, but the director is brutal in his attempts to show the pain they suffer from.

 Unfortunately the dvd looks like it has been transferred from vhs, so much of Park Chul-soo’s stylish cinematography looks a bit blurry and old. Give this a go if you are passionate about food and our relationships to it, but make sure your stomach has settled before you begin.

본투킬 (Born To Kill)

“본투킬” (Born to Kill) starts with a bang: man on a motorcycle, sleazy mob boss in a car feeling up a protesting girl – one minute later – smashed window, knife to the boss’ face and his eyeball neatly falling onto the screaming girl’s dress. Born to Kill means business from the very beginning.

The mysterious man on the bike, Gil, played by 정우성 (Jung Woo-sung) lives in his apartment with a sick little monkey named Chi-Chi, a fridge full of money, and an addiction to Marlboro Reds. He finds his neighbour Su-ha, played by 심은하 (Shim Eun-ha), collapsed on the ground outside their apartment building and takes her to his home to let her sober up. Su-ha is a wanna-be singer, stuck in a dead end bar job, she starts trying to build a relationship with Gil and once she discovers that his fridge is filled with money, then she does her best to take it off him. Gil, being a very socially inept assassin, follows her lead without complaint. Su-ha does her best to corrupt him and spend his money.

One day Su-ha disappears with Gil’s money and uses it to start her singing career, however when things go pear-shaped he is there to protect her. As all this is going on the gang bosses of Seoul are fighting between themselves and Gil is just a pawn in their ultra-violent chess game. He’s sent in to kill off a number of gangsters with his trusty knife, until he meets a victim who seems to recognize him….

Filled with a lot of slow motion  and middle aged gangsters shouting at each other, “Born To Kill” does become tedious at points, but the dysfunctional relationship between Gil and Su-ha is enough to keep the viewer interested. My heart also went out to poor little banana-loving Chi-Chi, the monkey gets mere seconds of screen time, but his demise is the saddest of all.

The action scenes of the film are designed to shock. The director loves knives and spends much of the film devoting long lingering close ups to the many stabbings that occur, unfortunately this love for his prop means that on one occasion when the knife is left in a body you can see it wobbling around, betraying its rubbery origins.

The subtitles for this dvd may well have been done by Gil’s little monkey, with hundreds of errors and odd grammatical quirks. The picture quality of the dvd is just as bad and looks as if it has been converted from a much watched video tape.

“Born to Kill” was released in 1996 and its two leads went on to many bigger and better projects. Jung Woo-sung has starred in “Sad Movie”, “Mutt-boy”, “Daisy”, “Musa the Warrior” and last year’s smash hit “The Good, The Bad and The Weird”. Shim Eun-ha went on to appear in “Interview”, “Tell Me Something”, “Art Museum By The Zoo” and the very moving “Christmas in August”. This may not be their best film, but we get glimpses of the actors that they were to become. They are the reason to watch this film, but patience is needed to get through the terrible subtitling and the slow paced 109 minutes of screen time. Fortunately a trip to Yongsan, could mean that you can find this cheeky little gangster flick at the low, low price of 2,500 won.

키스 할까요 (First Kiss)

“키스 할까요” (First Kiss) gives us a grim look at the lives of two immature, sexually frustrated, arrogant and self-centered Koreans in the late 1990s, unfortunately it is meant to be a romantic comedy. 최지우 (Choi Ji-woo) and 안재욱 (Ahn Jae-wook) star as Yun-hwa and Kyung-hyun, colleagues at an entertainment magazine. Yun-hwa lacks confidence, hates her job and has just been dumped by her boyfriend; Kyung-hyun talks the talk of a playboy, but spends his time secretly borrowing Yunhwa’s poetry books and scrounging off his best friend. Both are selfish, bratty, annoying characters, who have no consideration for others; neither of them have ever kissed before.

 

The next torturous hour and forty minutes take us along on their melodramatic journey towards some sort of belated adulthood. Yun-hwa’s character holds interest for the first third of the film and then just becomes more and more annoying turning the viewer against her. Kyung-hyun just grates on us from start to finish.

 

Director 김태균 (Kim Tae Gyoon) has got Richard Curtis on the brain, but can’t quite transfer the magic of Four Weddings and a Funeral onto the Korean screen. The finale with Yun-hwa and Kyung-hyun kissing in a phone box as it rains, harks back to Hugh Grant and Andie McDowell’s romantic moment and then as if to hammer the plagiarism home, one of the worst cover versions of “Love is All Around” (performed by 유리상자) starts blaring as the credits roll.

 

There are many cameos from all sorts of famous Koreans, but they add nothing to the enjoyment of the film and even seeing 장동근 (Jang Dong-gun) dancing in the rain did nothing for me. The only really funny moment is when Kyung-hyun trying to jolly up Yun-hwa’s birthday celebrations, slams her face into a birthday cake in some sort of bizarre attempt at camaraderie.

 

The sub plot dealing with the magazine editor and his affair with the office bicycle is slightly more interesting and helps ease the tedium of the main characters’ relationship.

 

Everyone involved in the production should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves and nobody else should ever have to watch this film again. If you see this in the shops, walk away, just walk away. I paid 2,500 won for it and even at that price I feel cheated.

Kim Tae Gyoon has gone on to direct the amusing “Volcano High” and the over-sentimental North Korean refugee drama “Crossing”.

Duets

“Duets” (2000) was one of the last things Bruce Paltrow worked on before his death in October 2002. An ensemble film dealing with people passionate about karaoke, it stars Gwyneth Paltrow, Paul Giamatti, Maria Bello, Andre Braugher, Huey Lewis and Scott Speedman as a motley crew of misfits who find happiness on the karaoke club circuit.

Huey Lewis, best known for his band “Huey Lewis and the News”, is surprisingly good as Ricky Dean, a karaoke hustler drifting from town to town until he meets his estranged daughter at an old girlfriend’s funeral. The daughter, Liv (played by Paltrow) tags along with him on his trip across the States heading towards Omaha and the $5,000 prize that awaits the best karaoke singer in town.

Meanwhile Paul Giamatti plays it up as Todd Woods, a frustrated salesman who runs out on his unloving family and finds himself hooked up with a singing ex-convict on the run named Reggie Kane played by Andre Braugher. They form a friendship over karaoke and their singing performances stand out as the most entertaining of the film.

Scott Speedman’s Billy Hannan finds out his girl is cheating on him and ends up in a bar with Maria Bello’s Suzi Loomis. Bello’s trick-turning huckster manages to persuade the innocent Billy to escape from his tedious life and take her to California.

All six are making their way to Omaha and trying to sort out their lives in the process. The story is simple and is performed well by all the leads, but Gimatti and Braugher’s friendship is the most interesting of the three threads. Giamatti steals the film with his stressed out neurotic salesman desperate to use his 800,000 frequent flyer miles on something and Braugher offers a very touching performance as a desperate man looking for some sort of escape.

The film drags a little at times, but the three intertwining journeys keep it interesting and it makes for an entertaining 110 minutes.

For more information on the dubious cover of the Korean dvd, click here.

Russell Brand’s “My Booky Wook”

Since moving to Korea I often find myself coming late to the American/British cultural party. I wait weeks, months or even years to see films or television programs that everyone else has already seen. It took me until Christmas to finally watch The Dark Knight and I’ve only just seen an episode of Skins. As for books, I pick things up here and there, but browsing a bookshop in Korea is not the same as going to my local one in Oxford. So carrying on in this tradition, I’ve just finished Russell Brand’s taudry memoir “My Booky Wook”, only two years after it was first published. I bought it on a trip home last September a whole month before the Sachs-Brand-Ross scandal blew up and it has sat on my bookshelf for the past five months, unloved and unread.

 

With Jonathan Ross’ return to the airwaves this month, I decided to pick up the “booky wook” and see what it was like. I’ve seen and heard very little of Russell Brand’s mainstream work, I tried his Radio 2 podcast and wanted to punch the wall after just a couple of minutes of  Brand’s annoying ramblings. I saw clips of his stand up material on Youtube and while there was something charismatic about him, his comedy never clicked with me. The only work of his I have really enjoyed are the RE:Brand episodes he did for UK Play in 2002. There was something very earnest in his relationships with the subjects of each episode and he seemed to really invest his whole being into the programs (little did I know he was drunk and/or on heroin for most of the time).

 

So I picked up the 405 page autobiography with a little trepidation and found myself really enjoying the eccentric ramblings of this very troubled comic superstar. Perhaps through the restriction of the written word, Brand’s humour becomes more intense or perhaps because I don’t have to watch his inane posturing and Dickensian high camp I am able to enjoy his work more; whatever the case “My Booky Wook” is a gripping, intensely funny and very honest read. Running from birth till his voluntary incarceration in a Philadelphia sexual addiction treatment centre in 2005, Brand takes us on the extreme highs and lows of his unusual and seemingly very self-destructive life.

 

Whether it is being abused by a babysitter, his mother’s long term battle with illness or his descent into heroin addiction, Brand keeps his descriptions full of life and humour, never trespassing into despair or morbidity. He is a wonderful raconteur of disturbingly funny anecdotes and shines a light into how far addiction can take you and how there can be a light at the end of the tunnel.

 

“My Booky Wook” is worth a look even if you don’t like Brand or the comedy he produces, it is far more entertaining than most celebrity memoirs and the tale of redemption hidden under the comedy is worth spending your time on. Now bring me some of your finest Chekov Vodka…. On second thoughts, maybe it’s time for a night off the booze….

Ola Mario in Itaewon

Itaewon has suffered the loss of two fine italian restaurants this year (La Volpia and La Tavola), so I was gladdened by the arrival of Ola Mario on the main strip this autumn. It is the latest restaurant from the Hotel Ola chain (other establisments in Youido park and by Baekun lake) and is, like more and more restaurants in Itaewon, aiming for an upscale clientele willing to pay hotel restaurant prices.

A simple and striking outside compliments the cool and relaxing atmosphere of the restaurant. The place settings are pristine, the seats comfortable and the staff are all smartly kitted out.

The chic interior, pricey menu and friendly english speaking waiters led me to believe I was in for a treat, albeit an expensive one.
However on closer inspection of the menu, the cracks in the fashionable facade of Ola Mario started to show through.

I don’t mind the odd spelling mistake on menus and I find the expression “pen-fried” quite charming, but the phrase “bamblanc sauce” really puzzled me. I asked the head-waiter what it meant and managed to establish that it was a white wine sauce and that whoever had written the menu had probably been trying to spell “vin blanc”. The head-waiter didn’t really care about the spelling mistakes and odd grammar and refused my offer to help make the menu a little more understandable. 

I decided to try one of the freshly made pastas that Ola Mario offers and settled on this:

The tortellini sounded interesting and I was very keen to try the “Camanber” whatever that might be….

Bread came…

And turned out to be quite delicious. Though the slice of garlic bread was as thick as my forearm. Still very tasty and an encouraging sign of things to come.

The tortellini was presented well, but like the menu, on closer inspection showed some of the restaurant’s flaws. The tortellini themselves were delicious, but had either been overcooked or brutishly manhandled, as several of them had not survived the journey from kitchen to customer and had already fallen apart. Those that survived were tasty, but drowned in a very thick, overly creamy sauce. The star of the show was hidden by that rascally “Camanber” and more annoyingly the dish was sprinkled with dried parsley (A real shame considering that fresh parsley is available at the supermarket five minutes walk from the restaurant for only 500 won per bunch).

After a disappointing main course, things perked up when I ordered a coffee and was presented with a choice of complimentary macaroons and chocolates. A nice surprise and a satisfying end to the meal.

All in all the presentation and atmosphere is very good, but Ola Mario lacks the finer touches for a restaurant in this price range. Plus with a laughable english menu, this restaurant chain is doing itself no favours.

If you have a rich friend who wants to take you for a passable lunch then why not head to Ola Mario, just walk from the Hamilton Hotel towards the Itaewon Hotel and Ola Mario is on the right hand side opposite Hana Bank.

The Fish at Sutton Courtenay

The Fish Restaurant and Bar at Sutton Courtenay in Oxfordshire.

Yesterday lunchtime we found ourselves winding our way down the country roads near Abingdon until we reached Sutton Courtenay and a wonderful pub/restaurant called The Fish. Both exterior and interior are very standard country pub in image, save for some wonderful pieces of stained glass by the kitchen.

The ambience though is slightly different, through the dimly lit restaurant the dulcet tones of various chanteurs and chanteuses waft their way over the diners and as a huge basket of french bread is placed on the table you can almost imagine that you are sitting in a small village restaurant somewhere in the north of France.

There are fantastic two and three course menus available, but we chose to go for a simpler, lighter lunch from the bar menu. Our party of four settled on three portions of moules mariniere a la creme, a superb grilled sardine and a steak sandwich (plus a few portions of the crunchiest, crispiest chips I have ever eaten). The food was delicious and the servings were large, but not too large to put us off ordering dessert. We settled on homemade meringues with whipped cream, pineapple, mango, coulis and sorbet. Starved of decent meringue in Korea, we devoured our desserts with great relish and fell back in our chairs sated….

Delicious sardines.

The remains of the mussels.

Meringues to die for.

Jean Philippe Lesecq and Sebastien Beaunier should be commended for creating such a beautiful restaurant and also for their belief that enjoying fine wine and food should be a “voyage of discovery.” The culinary adventure we had yesterday was most pleasant and deserves to be repeated.

For details on location.
The Fish bar and restaurant is closed Sunday evenings and all day Mondays. Booking is strongly advised

Back Home

Coming back home to the United Kingdom from South Korea is always a curious event. It’s easy to get swept up in the rhythms of Seoul city life, constant noise and movement, no chance to stop. So when you leave that polluted city of constant light, colour and sound, the absence of those things becomes plain.

Awoken by the first faltering steps of jet lag, I sit in my room at a quarter past five in the morning and the only sound to be heard is the clicking of fingers on keyboard and my own breath. Outside there is nothing but an inky blanket of silence. Peaceful, but unfamiliar. In Seoul, at this time there would still be the traffic, the occasional shout of the drunks and the hum of the heart of the city. A very different mood, a very different feeling.

But here at home, silence is comfort and my body starts to relax, safe in the knowledge of ten days rest. It’s good to be home, but I hope the rain god stays his hand for a while.