DVD and Blu-Ray Reviews

by Kyu Hyun Kim

  This page contains reviews of DVDs and Blu Rays from across the world, of Korean films and other works related to Korea. Here we plan to cover DVDs and Blu Rays, classic and brand-new films, independent and blockbuster productions, deluxe special editions and cheapo bargain-bin releases (except for the flagrantly illegal versions) and all varieties of genres and formats including feature films, documentaries, short films and animation. The reviews themselves will focus as much on the presentation of the films as the films themselves, including, we hope, the issues usually neglected in other DVD reviews, such as the quality of English subtitles. Bon appetite!

Unhealed scars of Gwangju from a local perspective: SOONJI a.k.a. MAY STORY [DVD]

A Cineworks Production, 2009. South Korea, 1 hour 29 minutes. Written and Directed by Park Gwang Mann. Cast: Jang Se-yoon (Soonji), Yang Im-ho (Officer Jeong), Kim Yoon-sung (Jjagu), Choi Dae-sung (Ddaksae), Lee Seol-gu (Paratrooper Leader).

I am genuinely surprised to find this local (Gwangju) indie production lurking in the North American DVD market. It is even available through Netflix! As far as I know Soonji never played theatrically in Seoul outside the festival circuit, nor has it been released on Region 3 DVD.

Soonji (Jang Se-yoon), a pretty woman in late twenties, runs a live chicken stew restaurant all by herself in an outskirt area of Gwangju. As the film opens, she seems to be unreasonably unresponsive to Officer Jeong (Yang Im-ho)'s courting gestures, while casually taking advantage of his kindness. As the May 18, the day her father allegedly went missing, encroaches on the calendar, she reveals traces of deep psychological disturbance: finding herself in a nightmare where she is imprisoned in a chicken coop, deliberately spilling food on her foul-mouthed former classmate, and so on. One evening, Soonji is threatened with potential rape and worse by a trio of ne'er-do-wells headed by the mustachioed thug Jjagu (Kim Yoon-sang). Inexplicably, she not only feeds them a freshly cooked chicken stew dinner, but also helps Jjagu steal some real guns and ammo from the police station where Jeong works. The fact that Jjagu is behaving as if his clock stopped in 1980, mumbling something about joining the "citizen's army" against the government, provides a clue to what is really going on, at least for the Korean viewers who cannot miss the meaning of May 18, 1980. Whether it works the same way for non-Korean viewers will depend on their level of tolerance for obscurantist art-house touches as well as the gimmick of blurring the distance between "reality" and "re-creation of reality," which director Park Gwang Mann heavily indulges in toward the latter half of the movie.

The Gwangju Massacre, in which hundreds (up to thousands in some accounts) of the citizens were brutalized and killed by the paratroopers sent down by the military dictator Chun Doo Hwan, finally became the subject of a mainstream commercial film last year (May 18, also to be released on Region 1 DVD in a few weeks), but has haunted the Korean cinema for close to 30 years in a variety of forms, constituting an essential background for understanding such diverse group of works as Jang Seon-woo's A Petal, Lee Chang-dong's Peppermint Candy and even Kim Hyun-seok's Scout.

Director Park, instead of depicting the events themselves or telling the stories of those who have experienced the massacre at first hand, decided to construct a love-triangle story around 2007's Gwangju-city-organized ceremony in commemoration of the Massacre, a re-enactment performance, a street demonstration and a shamanistic ritual rolled into one. In the film, however, the historical "reality" of 1980, which the viewers only access through highly symbolic performance art during the ceremony, the "fictional" reality of the movie's characters, and the documentary "reality" of the 2007 ceremony participated by the actors are allowed to overlap with one another, reaching for the violent climax in which key characters must literally re-live the gut-wrenching horror of the May 18th. As a Brechtian device to call attention to the essentially un-narratable nature of the Massacre, this layered approach is at least intriguing. Alas, the actual outcome is likely to induce boredom and confusion rather than shock and understanding on the part of the viewers.

The decision to keep the past histories of Jjagu, Officer Jeong and Soonji obscure might have been intended to keep the viewers in suspense regarding how the love triangle would turn out, but it completely backfires. The romance between Jjagu and Soonji seem wholly contrived, Officer Jeong appears to be blamed as a heavy simply because he is doing his job as a policeman, and by the final reel the whole thing begins to smack of a bad dress rehearsal for a play with a couple of actors going annoyingly, even somewhat comically, berserk-Method. Part of the problem is that Kim Yoon-sang's Jjagu is so underwhelming as a character that one cannot invest any emotion in him. Frankly it is just annoying when he begins to spew forth (stilted) dialogue about defending democracy and then scream and holler, waving a pistol in the air. Is he supposed to represent the ghost of the dead protester at Gwangju? I hope not, since he is nothing more than a cocky macho cipher. The victims of the Massacre deserve better. Jang Se-yoon gives Soonji a lot more dimension, convincingly portraying her gumption, obstinacy and sadness, but her character in the end is reduced to that Korean inkwell-sucker's old cliche, a woman whose body must bear "the unhealed scars of Korean history."

Director Park's intents appear to be honorable, but the movie itself simply does not communicate them in a legible way to the audience, generating a heartburn-like sense of frustration instead of emotional resonance. Still, even though the viewing experience is not altogether satisfactory, Soonji deserves a place in Korean cinematic history as a local production that delves into one of the worst political tragedies in postwar Korean history, along with its impressive documentary-like footage of the 2007 commemoration ceremony.

DVD Presentation: Vanguard. NTSC. Single Layer. Region 1. Release Date: February 23, 2010. Suggested Retail Price: $19.95. Video: 2.35:1, Audio: Korean Stereo 2.0. Subtitle: English (Not optional). Supplement: Theatrical Trailer.

Vanguard cinema releases Soonji under the title May Story on Region 1 DVD. The 2.35 widescreen video transfer is anamorphically enhanced but merely adequate in quality. The picture is a bit too bright and there are continuous presence of video noise and artifacts throughout the film. Video is also interlaced and becomes unusually aggravating in a few scenes with fast movement. Audio is equally lackluster: I can't even tell if it's in Dolby Digital.

English subtitles are burnt into the print and cannot be removed. They are serviceable with occasional confusions regarding place names, colloquial expressions and such.

To be honest I have no idea what Vanguard was thinking when they picked this up, but given the undeserving indifference to which the movie was subjected in Korea, I am glad that they added it to their roster of North American DVD releases.

War is evil, and Koreans knew that better than you ever did: THE MARINES WHO NEVER RETURNED [DVD]

A Daewon Film Production Company Film, 1963. South Korea, 1 hour 49 minutes. Directed by Lee Man-hee. Written by Chang Gook-jin, Yu Han-cheol. Cinematography by Seo Jeong-min. Production Design by Hong seong-chil. Music by Jeon Jeong-geun. Lighting by Chang Ki-ryong. Editor Kim Hee-su. Cast: Jang Dong-hwi (Kang Tae-sik, Squadron Leader), Choe Mu-ryong (Private Choe), Yi Tae-yup (Jeong-ik), Goo Bong-seo (Bong-gu)

The Marines Who Never Returned is a Korean War film made less than ten years after the conclusion of the war. A multiple prize-winner at the 2nd Grand Bell Awards, the movie is considered one of the masterpieces of Lee Man-hee, a major Korean director of '60s, who regrettably passed away in 1977 at the very young age of 44.

Marines is different from the countless Korean War films I have watched while growing up (Although I am pretty darn sure I saw it at least once on TV). Exquisitely shot in black and white by Seo Jeong-min and the crew, favoring medium- or long shots that frame the soldiers in the wide horizontal space, the movie's visuals do remind me of the rather leisurely-paced Second World War films such as The Longest Day, although it features some sequences that look like they might have seriously endangered the lives of the crew and cast. Apparently real explosives were used to illustrate the shelling of North Korean cannons, and there are several scenes where actors are showered with tons of real dirt and debris, not fake ones made of cork particles and Styrofoam. All military vehicles such as amphibian tanks are, as far as I can see, genuine articles. The battle scenes are classically set up and filmed. There are no disorienting jump cuts, close-ups, hand-held camera: cinematic techniques yet to reach the Korean soil in 1962.

Even though director Lee goes through the motions of making a standard anti-Communist propaganda movie, with such familiar tropes as a war orphan adopted as a mascot, a tracking shot of villagers massacred by North Korean troops, and two soldiers in conflict with one another over split family loyalties, Marines is remarkable in its cynical attitude toward the war. The heroes fight for survival, not for heroism or glory of the fatherland, and death scenes are powerful in their finality and severity. The movie also includes an extended sequence in which the squadron members are treated like bums by the "Yankee princess" prostitutes: the seething resentment South Korean soldiers feel against this discrimination is surprising, considering the extent to which critique of American military in any form was strictly no-no in 1960s and 1970s.

Later, the squadron leader played by Jang Dong-hwi and his members have a serious exchange in the middle of a battle, which comes very close to branding all forms of war, even a defensive war, as evil. This scene must have skirted acceptable boundaries of the censorship, and considering that even Apocalypse Now was banned from Korea in '80s due to its supposedly antiwar message, I find it remarkable that this sequence was allowed to remain intact. The final battle is set up as a drawn-out, grueling survival course in which patience and perseverance count far more than bravado or even skills with weapons. The squadron members are killed one by one, as they withstand again and again the massive onslaught of Chinese troops. The viewers are made to feel the sheer fatigue and despair of the survivors.

Choe Mu-ryong, the postwar film star Choe Min-su's father, and Lee Dae-yup are good in their respective roles. Choe has the ?lan of a '50s Hollywood star, smoking cigarettes and fixing a madam with a cocky stare. Jang Dong-hwi is gruff, solid and flashes surprisingly warm smiles when least expected. However, the best character in the whole show is without question Goo Bong-seo's Bong-gu (Note: this is the name listed in IMDB, but the film does not mention Goo's character's name at all). Even though his role is obviously intended as a comic relief, Goo's brilliant acting gives it a unique and interesting spin. His character is from an urban, well-to-do family and it is made clear that he joined the marines partly to taste a sense of freedom and adventure, not because he was drafted. He also reveals tough, calculating sides. Bong-gu is completely unfazed when a mate is upset by his jokes: when asked how he feels about first battle, he coolly quips, "As long as I am alive, it is not a bad exercise." (The interesting thing is that he is not saying it to brace himself up¡¦ this is what he really believes in. Is it just me or does Goo Bong-seo gets all the best lines in this movie?) Much of what he does in the movie is indeed funny (I especially liked the historically incorrect "twist" dance number in the base camp, as well as his "Konglish" explanation to the American troops about why they can't enter the brothel), but he also contributes a smashingly effective dramatic performance.

DVD Presentation: Bitwin. NTSC. Single Layer. Region Free. Video: 2.35:1. Audio: Dolby Digital Mono. Subtitles: Korean, English. Supplement: Theatrical Trailer. Release Date: February 26, 2002.

One of the first non-contemporary Korean films to be released on the DVD format way back in 2002 as a part of the now-sadly-defunct Bitwn Classic Korean Cinema Series, Marines is still in print as of June 2010. The transfer itself is good by the standard of early 2000s, although not anamorphically enhanced. There are inevitable white spots, scratches and blemishes: the dirt is especially noticeable during reel changes, although the intro battle sequence is surprisingly clean. There are also some curious pixelization problems in the deep blacks, thankfully not very often.

The soundtrack is Dolby Digital Mono, but definitely above the par. Dialogues tend to break apart in high pitch, but music score and sound effects are robust and clear, giving the epic dimensions of the film a workout. In this case, a powerful soundtrack is in fact more important than the correct aspect ratio in terms of its superiority to a VHS edition. The audio, though, has one big boo-boo: the very last five seconds or so of the film is without sound, apparently due to the deterioration in the original elements. I was very disappointed with this: as it stands, the surging male choir in the background is abruptly cut off and unable to bring the emotional final scene to an appropriate conclusion.

English subtitles avoid inappropriate colloquialisms and typos, and are nicely done. A little more sophistication could have helped, since the dialogue is surprisingly literary for a war movie.

The Marines Who Never Returned is dated in many aspects, and arguably it does not push the envelope much in terms of aesthetics as Lee's other smaller-scale films do. Nonetheless, it is a true epic and one of the best films I have seen from the "First Golden Age" of Korean cinema. Strongly recommended, despite its non-anamorphic transfer, while the supply lasts.

Seriously, it's getting really wet over here: TIDAL WAVE/HAEUNDAE [Blu Ray]

TIDAL WAVE/HAEUNDAE. A JK Film/CJ Entertainment Production, 2009. South Korea. 2 hour. Produced and Directed by JK Youn. Screenplay: JK Youn, Kim Hwi. Executive Producer: Katharine Kim. Production Designer: Hwang In-joon, Editor: Shin Min-kyung. Special Visual Effects Supervisors: Hans Uhlig, Jang Sung-ho. Music: Lee Byung-woo. Cinematography: Kim Young-ho. CAST: Park Joong-Hoon, Sul Kyung-gu, Ha Ji-won, Uhm Jung-hwa, Lee Min-ki, Song Jae-ho, Kang Ye-won, Kim In-kwon.

The Korean summer season in 2009 was, box-office-wise, dominated by two films, Take Off and Haeundae, one an underdog-coming-out-on-the-top sports drama and the other a pointedly Hollywood-like, nay, old Hollywood-like natural disaster extravaganza, selling more than 8.5 million and 10 million tickets, respectively. It is not immediately clear whether these two films indicate the evolution of the "copywood" trend that has in fact been going on since late '90s, despite all the superficial self-congratulatory rhetoric about protection of the domestic film industry against foreign encroachment, or instances of Korean filmmakers savvily adapting the Hollywood know-how for the domestic market. The makers of both films would surely want us to think the latter, but even if that was true, it does not unfortunately excuse the sorry quality of Haeundae, which is a stupefying collection of both hoary Hollywood-disaster movie clichés and the most obnoxiously exaggerated Korean melodramatic clichés.

Having said this, it certainly makes sense to me that Haeundae, as turbidly un-original as it is, managed to rake bucket-loads of money from among the Korean viewers, far more so than that Dragon Wars or even King and the Clown did. For most Koreans, for whom the Haeundae beach at the Southernmost of Busan had been the only "beachside resort" in the Euro-American mode available to them for the long stretch of modern Korean history, the idea of it being overrun by a gargantuan tsunami must have a built-in gotta-see-how-wild-it-looks curiosity quotient, combined with perhaps a barely suppressed sense of giddy delight and of anticipation raised, despite their better judgment, by the sheer carny-barker chutzpah of it all. It's the equivalent of a volcano exploding under Niagara Falls and turning all of their water into steam, then the said water raining down on and completely submerging the city of Buffalo underwater. Now North American readers might have some idea of just how far-fetched the premise of Haeundae is. It's precisely the kind of project that Irwin Allen (The Towering Inferno, The Swarm) would have embraced eagerly had he been working in South Korea.

JK Youn or Youn Je-kyun (the auteur behind Sex is Zero, My Boss My Hero and his true piece de resistance, Romantic Assassin) might be considered a surprising choice for a special-effects-ridden blockbuster like Haeundae, but in fact he is exactly the kind of producer-director who would unabashedly take stock of every cliché in Hollywood movies and then "domesticate" them by dressing them up with local flavor, all the while pontificating how patriotic his latest blockbuster is with a straight face. Subtlety in characterization? Artistic intent? Hey, bro, you be lookin' at a wrong flick. And let's be honest, these kinds of commercial strategies still work like gangbusters, especially in the local Korean markets.

I must say, even knowing what I should have expected, I do wish at least some of the characters had been given moderately interesting materials to work with. Sol Kyung-ku (Peppermint Candy, Oasis), despite his De Niro-like reputation overseas, has appeared in more than a few terrible films in his career and here, he is exactly only as good as the material he is given, which is to say, not at all. Ha Ji-won (Phone, Duelist) comes off slightly better but the subtle make-up job on her fails to suppress her incongruously movie-star good looks. Uhm Jung-hwa is more believable, but her histrionics caught up in the flooding elevator is sheer embarrassment. As her fan, I don't want her to suffer this kind of indignity ever again in a Korean motion picture. Park Joong-hoon is charismatic and fun but he is as believable in his role as a cracker-jack seismologist as Sean Connery would be playing a gay ballet choreographer. Kim In-kwon (Once Upon a Time in High School) and Kang Ye-won do their best in drearily predictable supporting roles, the former especially made to preen around like Cheetah to Sol's Tarzan. The veteran Song Jae-ho, not even listed in the English cast roster, essays a real estate developer, the only character with some tenuous connection to the reality outside the disaster-movie clich?s.

Perhaps I should be just thankful that the yang'achi thugs only make brief appearances and the movie was generally cleaned up of doltish "messages (anti-American or anti-Japanese, anti-McDonald, or whatever following the current fashion in Korea)" or bathroom humor. Oh, the special effects? It's OK. The gigantic wall of water endlessly suspended in the air before thrashing down at the hapless onlookers might trigger one's sense of awe for one second or two, depending on how pure-hearted or gullible you are.

Haeundae in the end is a well-calculated commercial project that partakes of undeniably improved filmmaking skills of contemporary Korean cinema industry to present the local viewers with an evening of brainless entertainment. It's plenty irritating, groan-inducing and aggressively boring in patches, but it's no less brainless than 2012, The Happening or any of its ilk. Baring one's critical fangs against it feels as futile as describing cuisinary pleasures of a wax model of spaghetti dish, with sculpted strands of noodle perfectly suspended in the air.

Blu Ray Presentation: Magnolia Home Entertainment. NTSC. Region Free. Release Date: May 11, 2010. Suggested Retail Price: $29.98 Video: Anamorphic Widescreen 2.35:1, 1080p High Definition. Audio: English & Korean, 5.1 DTS-HD Master. Subtitles: English, English SDH, Spanish. Supplements: Deleted Scenes, Gag Reel, Making-of featurettes on pre-production, production design, music, characters, sound mixing, cinematography, "tidal wave" visual effects and marketing in foreign countries.

I suspect that Magnolia, who had previously navigated Bong Joon-ho's The Host through the treacherous waters of the North American DVD and pre-Format War Resolution high-definition market, knows exactly what they got with Haeundae. One clue is that they re-titled it as Tidal Wave for the North American market, consciously evoking the example of the Japanese SF extravaganza Japan Sinks redressed and marketed by the ?ber-huckster-cum-great-director Roger Corman in the States. Magnolia, however, does the film's fans big service by releasing it on Blu Ray stateside, at the price substantially reduced compared to the CJ Entertainment/South Korean version.

The transfer looks identical to the Korean version as far as I can tell. The high resolution showcases the natural colors of beautiful beach-scape and greatly enhances the realism of production design. I am doubtful, though, whether Blu Ray's heightened detail benefits our appreciation of CGI effects. Without the scope of the theater screen, the crashing tsunami is just not as spectacular as it should look. There might be some contrast issues, especially during the too-bright daylight sequences, but overall the transfer is excellent and probably superior to the prints used at the good majority of theatrical screenings. The five-channel DTS-HD tracks are available for both dubbed English and Korean language track. Tidal Wave just is not the same movie without the flurries of thick Busan accents floating around in the soundtrack. Having said this, the dubbed track is not too bad, also given that you get to hear Park Joong-hoon's English dialogue. The subtitles are above par in quality, although the dialogue, other than pseudo-scientific seismological details, is as hackneyed as you can imagine. The Blu Ray disc also contains a wealth of EPK materials with fairly good English subtitles (decidedly superior to the Tartan DVDs in the similar sections). Frankly quite a bit of them are boring and unless you are a visual effects enthusiast or a big fan of some of the cast members you are unlikely to have rollicking good time.

Other than the domestic Korean viewers who can crack up at a Busan nurse shouting "Poisoned!" and pronouncing it "Secret Karma!" (if you don't know the South-Kyongsang Province dialect, what I just wrote won't make a lick of sense), the only appropriate audience for Tidal Wave are thoroughly undiscriminating viewers of the mock-Hollywood disaster flicks, although Magnolia wins points for a sassy Blu Ray presentation.

Who says you can't have sweet revenge again?: VENGEANCE TRILOGY BOX-SET [DVD]

Tartan USA has received its share of criticism from the Asian film enthusiasts, especially those who wanted to see more of the likes of Hong Sang-soo, Lee Chang-dong and Im Sun-rye in the North American market than the latest crummy horror flicks, but the abrupt discontinuation of its "Asia Extreme" line was still sad news to many fans. Not to worry, Tartan has now merged with Palisades Films and resurrected itself, even reviving its "Asian Extreme" line. And of course, what better way to announce their triumphant return than a deluxe box-set of Park Chan-wook's "Revenge (Now for some reason-in order to appeal to the Eurocentric art-film cognoscenti?--called "Vengeance") Trilogy?" Anyone who has even cursorily visited this website should know my, shall I say, foundational status as an international Park Chan-wook fan (Harry Knowles's got nothing on me, brother), so I don't think these pages are hardly suitable forums for me to unspool my thoughts, recent or otherwise, on these three masterworks again--Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (2002), Old Boy (2003) and Lady Vengeance (2005) (No longer referred to as Sympathy for Lady Vengeance, it seems). What y'all reading these pages want to know is whether this box-set warrants a double- or even triple-dip for those who own Region 3 DVDs or even Tartan's old releases. So that's exactly what you folks will get here: a review of the DVD presentations rather than of the movies themselves.

As soon as Palisades Tartan releases Blu Ray versions of these titles as they had promised, we will update the review accordingly. We know that the previously available Old Boy Blu Ray left a lot to be desired: hopefully they have addressed this issue.

DVD Presentation: Palisades Tartan. NTSC. Single Layer. Region 1. 8 discs. Release Date: March 16, 2010. Suggested Retail Price: $49.97. Disc 1: Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance. Video: Anamorphic Widescreen 2.35:1. Audio: Korean Dolby Digital 5.1, DTS Surround Sound 5.1. Subtitles: English, Spanish. Disc 2: Sympathy Supplementary Materials (Making-of film, Cast and Crew Interviews, etc). Disc 3: Old Boy. Video: Anamorphic Widescreen 2.35:1. Audio: Korean Dolby Digital 5.1, DTS Surround Sound 5.1. Subtitles: English, Spanish. Disc 4: Old Boy Supplementary Materials (Making-of film, Cast and Crew Interviews, Deleted Scenes, the Cannes Film Festival reportage, etc). Disc 5: Autobiography of Old Boy. Disc 6: Lady Vengeance. Video: Anamorphic Widescreen 2.35:1. Audio: Korean Dolby Digital 5.1, DTS Surround Sound 5.1. Subtitles: English, Spanish. Disc 7: "Fade to White" Version of Lady Vengeance. Disc 8: Lady Vengeance Supplementary Materials (Making-of film, Cast and Crew Interview, Deleted Scenes, etc.).

Palisades Tartan knows the significance of Park Chan-wook films in their film- and disco-graphic inventory very well. If they were to pull out all the stops in collectible DVDs, these three were undoubtedly the titles. Given this high expectation by the fandom, perhaps Tartan is facing a Sisyphus's struggle in satisfying their demands. Nonetheless, it is handy to keep all three films in one DVD set, packaged with all the available extra features faithfully imported from the old Region 3 releases, as well as some new supplements added, although their qualities vary. So let's take a plunge, first checking out feature films themselves and moving onto the supplements.

First off: Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance. The Sympathy transfer appears to be a close copy of the Korean Region 3 release, brighter, high-contrast, and leaning toward red and green, as opposed to the old Tartan Region 1 transfer, softer, darker, and noticeably stronger with blue and cyan. This shift in color timing is quite glaring, for instance, in a scene where Ryu (Shin Ha-gyun) sees the organ smugglers putting their advertisement tags on the bathroom stalls. In the old Tartan transfer, the cleaning lady's uniform appears rich, purple-like blue: in the box-set (and the Korean DVD) transfer, the bathroom stall doors are bright green, several shades more so than Ryu's dyed hair. Now this might be a welcome change for those who prefer this color scheme, but unfortunately, this does not mean an improvement in transfer quality. In fact, Sympathy's box-set version is more unstable than the old Tartan one, with aggressive aliases and other digital artifacts marring Ryu's checkered shirts and other images. Despite a color scheme more in line with the theatrical release (and possibly the director's intentions), this transfer cannot be called a significant improvement. This set's Sympathy also uses a different menu design from the old Tartan release, which annoyingly includes a major spoiler about the movie's ending. I recommend those who have not seen the film before to start the movie quickly without dwelling on the menu screen.

The box-set Old Boy, on the other hand, seems to be an exact or close replication of the old Tartan Region 1 transfer and retains its dark, softer, bluer look. Confusingly enough, this is not the color scheme used in Tartan's own Blu Ray release, which seems to be repossessing the greener, redder Region 3 hues. Old Boy DVDs have always been a major source of frustration for Korean film fans: it is true that the film sports much grungier, murkier look than the other two films in the trilogy but neither Region 1 and 3 (As this DVD Review page expands into the future, Region 2 discs will be added to the rosters, but I am afraid not at this point) releases have really done justice to the film.

To make things even more complicated, all three DVD versions of Lady Vengeance we inspected, the old Tartan release, the Region 3 CJ Entertainment issue and the current box-set version, feature different transfers. The Region 3 Korean disc, while high-caliber, is overcome by excessive contrast: some dark scenes have their details totally mashed, while any bright source of light-such as a naked-bulb overhead light-looks like a star has gone nova. The old Tartan release, while notably softer and warmer and expanding the palette considerably, is still infected by a goodly chunk of digital artifacts, including severe edge enhancement. The box-set transfer is by default the best of the three versions compared here, with the artifacts somewhat reduced and colors more sharpened than the old Tartan version. The menu screens are all different too, with the Region 3 version most beautiful and elaborate but again giving away portions of movie's content within its chapter compartments. DVD Beaver reports that the color version of Lady Vengeance has an encoding problem that prevents automatic default to the widescreen format: we have not encountered this problem at our Pioneer/Philips/Momitsu equipments, except during a playback in a laptop. (For the large-size screenshots comparing different versions, click here)

As for the sound, all three movies come with the Dolby Digital 5-channel and DTS Surround tracks. They are quite robust and I am assuming the same mixes have been used all around, possibly except for Sympathy, where the Korean DVD seems to give more oomph to the ambient noises than both Tartan versions. The Old Boy disc starts off with a super-annoying, very low-resolution trailer for "Asia Extreme" titles, impervious to fast-forwarding.

Thankfully, English subtitles for Sympathy seem to have been re-done in some places, including a very welcome addition of the translations of written texts, such as the "Death Sentence" text that Young-mi (Bae Doo-na) is seen to be typing down in an earlier scene, a crucial plot point. Typos and grammatical errors still surface, however. Old Boy and Lady Vengeance subtitles seem to be more or less identical in all three versions, except in Lady Vengeance, again, the written texts are translated.

So bottom line as far as the A/V presentation is concerned, the box-set's Lady Vengeance gets a thumbs-up, Sympathy receives a different transfer but still problematic, and Old Boy, I am afraid, is all-round inadequate.

Now onto the supplements: Sympathy, in addition to Director Park Chan-wook and action film master Ryu Seung-wan's audio commentary carried over from the old Tartan release, adds several new extra features. First off is a confusingly titled "My Boksu Story (Boksu meaning "revenge" in Korean)," a string of cast interviews seemingly recorded one year or so after the Sympathy's theatrical release. Song Kang-ho as usual does not mince words, casually mentioning the dismal box-office failure of the film. The old making-of featurettes are crammed into "Original Behind the Scenes" sub-category: this section mostly deals with production notes and crew interviews. "Soundtracks and Photos" is a 13-minute long discussion of the avant-garde rock group Eo-eobu Project's music for the film. Also included are the requisite trailers and storyboard-to-the-film comparisons.

The most interesting special feature to the North American viewers is probably British journalist Jonathan Ross's profile of Park Chan-wook, produced for BBC in 2006. It does give Park some room to counter his "Western" critics and address popular misconceptions of his films, including the charge that they are too violent. The documentary is in English (Park's interview is overdubbed with English narration) and supports no subtitles. Needless to say, none of the extra features should be seen prior to watching the film itself, as even Ross's documentary are chock full of spoilers.

The English subtitles for the Korean-language Sympathy supplements, by the way, are simply dreadful. To give you some ideas, in various points of the "My Boksu Story," director Park Chan-wook is identified as "Park Chan-ho," his previous film JSA as "JSC," and Sin Ha-gyun's starring vehicle Save the Green Planet as "Keep the Earth." It really is like reading an undergraduate term paper written in 30 minutes after an all-night drinking orgy.

The Old Boy supplements reproduce the extensive Region 3 Special Edition features that cover all aspects of production, from pre-production design, casting, cinematography and music score to the post-production and marketing. The biggest chunk is set aside for the film's unique cast, with Gang Hye-jung easily the most striking presence. Yoo Ji-tae, in contrast, comes off as weird, with those strange-looking, red-tinted goggle glasses and pencil moustache. The featurette "Le Grand Prix at Cannes" is, unfortunately, a Korea-produced docu that celebrates Old Boy's win at Cannes Film Festival. It would have been far more interesting if some independent filmmaker was commissioned to examine the raw and unadulterated reactions of the foreign press, critics and viewers to Old Boy, although Park himself seems determined not to let all these brouhaha go to his head (Considering that he subsequently made I'm Cyborg and Thirst, he obviously succeeded). The second supplementary disc for Old Boy is something called "The Autobiography of Old Boy," a 34-minute-long video diary of the production, detailing the spectacular fight sequence taking place at the villain's penthouse, resulting in some shockingly gory shots. Throughout the docu Park Chan-wook demonstrates his eye for detail, gently urging Yoo Ji-tae to look at the right side of his cuff at one point. With minimum of editorializing, this is far more fascinating than other EPK pieces. Even though overall the supplementary materials are better organized and more plentiful compared to the case with Sympathy, there is very little that's new here for those who already own the Region 3 Special Edition DVD set.

Next, the Lady Vengeance set probably contains the most desirable "supplement" for North American consumers in this set: Park Chan-wook's "fade-to-white" version of the film. Region 3 Special Edition did contain this feature but was only equipped with the DTS soundtrack. This version seems to be virtually identical to the Korean Region 3 transfer, a bit coarser and grainier than the main feature. It may well be that my eyes are playing tricks on me, but the editing seems to be tightened up in this version, too, almost on a subliminal level. The black-and-white visuals don't really kick in until the "jury as the executioners" sequence, and the transition is not as gradual as Park's introduction suggests. The monochromic visuals make this sequence appear more somber, tragic and somewhat surreal, than it is in the color version: more David Lynch than Martin Scorsese, if you will. It really depends on your taste which version you might prefer. Both "fade-to-white" and color versions are overlain with audio commentaries by Park, star Lee Yeong-ae, DP Chung Chung-hoon and Production Designer Cho Hwa-sung. The old Tartan commentary by Richard Pena of Columbia University is also carried over, a very good listen. The second supplementary disc contains exhaustive interviews with cast and crew members, making-of docus on, again, all aspects of production, deleted scenes and trailers. English subtitles, while not perfect, are substantially better than those provided for the Sympathy supplements.

Finally, the box-set includes a 32-page booklet, handsomely illustrated by photos on glossy black paper. Instead of inviting international critics to opine on the films, Palisades-Tartan recruited pro filmmakers, headlined by Eli Roth (Hostel), who basically takes credit for letting Harry Knowles find the mind-blowing cinematic gem that is Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance. Other contributors include the Tartan staff member Rick Stelow, producer Don Murphy (Apt Pupil, Natural Born Killers), stunt coordinator John Kreng and producer-director Susan Montford (producer of Shoot 'Em-Up). I loved most Kreng's take on Old Boy ("that movie did a mind job on me!") from the fight-choreographer's standpoint but each contributor gives an interesting personal take on why his or her choice among the Vengeance trilogy is the best. The booklet also includes a very brief interview with Park Chan-wook, originally published in Giant Robot magazine, attached at the end almost like an afterthought. The booklet, while not altogether too substantial, does add credence to the view that Park Chan-wook is really a filmmaker's filmmaker, a talent better appreciated by those in the same profession than by generic movie-goers.

The red-spattered box design for the entire set is rather cheap-looking, although the plastic fold-out cases (one case for each film and its supplementary materials) appear reasonably sturdy.

In sum, I recommend, with some reservations noted above, Palisades Tartan's Vengeance Trilogy box-set to those interested in Korean cinema either unfamiliar with the films or experienced one or two of them (Not sure about what they are all about? Check out the reviews in the main site). The value-for-price ratio is pretty good, given the internet discount reducing the price to as low as $30-plus. As for the serious fans of Park Chan-wook's oeuvre, if you already own all Region 3 Special Editions and Tartan releases of the trilogy, purchasing this box-set might not be a sound investment. On the other hand, if you have missed out Korean Special Editions and only own old Tartan titles, double-dip might be a tempting proposition.

* DVDs for review courtesy of Palisades Tartan

Good ol' boy in the bosom of the Great Leader: CROSSING THE LINE [DVD]

CROSSING THE LINE. A Very Much So/Passion Film Production. 2006, United Kingdom, 1 hour 32 minutes. With participation of BBC, E Pictures, Koryo Tours, Cine Qua Non, Dongsoong Art Center. Directed by Daniel Gordon. Cinematography: Nick Bennet. Edited by Peter Haddon. Music by Heather Fenoughty. Sound edited by Stevie Haywood. Sound mixed by Adam Mendez. Sound effects by Samantha Storer. Narrated by Christian Slater.

In 2002, the BBC documentarian Daniel Gordon made a heartfelt and crowd-pleasing chronicle, The Game of Their Lives, of North Korea's football team and its incredible advance into the World Cup quarterfinals in 1966. Greatly pleased by the final product, North Korean authorities granted Gordon an unprecedented level of access for a foreign filmmaker, allowing him to record daily lives of two young girls preparing for an eye-poppingly grandiose (and for many people, obscenely totalitarian) "Mass Game" in celebration of the Great Leader Kim Jong Il. The resulting documentary, A State of Mind, sharply divided the viewer responses: some consider it nothing more than a detestable apologia for a quasi-monarchical dictatorship, while others see it as a refreshing corrective to the usual anti-Communist palavers that reduce North Koreans into little more than brainless termites. Instead of playing it safe for his next project, however, Gordon went ahead and tackled an even more potentially controversial topic--the life-story of Private James Drasnok, an American soldier who walked over the DMZ, riddled with uncharted mines, and "defected" to North Korea in 1962, and has lived there since. The result is one of the most fascinating documentaries about North Korea ever made: but the film also unexpectedly uncovers some truly interesting, even poignant, episodes of intersection between American and Korean histories.

Despite his somewhat heavy-handed effort to (visually) draw the parallel between the aggressively nationalistic cultures of North Korea and the United States, Gordon manages to keep afloat in the air disparate, often mutually incompatible, perspectives on the bizarre life history of Private Drasnok, ably navigating through the treacherous ideological waters. Certainly most North Koreans will be hard pressed to see "Crossing" as a negative portrayal of their own country (Kim Jong Il himself acknowledged abduction of Japanese citizens as a part of its insane "spy training" scheme in 2002, so discussing that issue is no longer officially discouraged), but those who insist on seeing North Korea as an oppressive totalitarian state will also find plenty of evidence here to back up their view. Perhaps the surest indication that Gordon has pulled off this difficult balancing act is that we as viewers cannot easily come to a conclusion about the film's protagonist.

Drasnok's life is indeed the stuff that proves the adage "truth is stranger than fiction." A young Southern man, raised in poverty and a broken home (described by him as a "living hell"), he was a failure as a soldier as well. Cocky, ignorant and totally devoid of discipline, Drasnok crossed the DMZ seemingly out of sheer adolescent stupidity, like a teenager who has no loose change in his jeans pockets so decides to rob a liquor store, armed with a switchblade, and was as surprised as anyone when he was welcomed as a valuable tool for anti-American propaganda, eventually given a chance to lead a materially comfortable, middle-class life that surely would have been denied to him had he stayed in the U.S. (It might surprise some viewers to learn that North Korea was well ahead of South Korea in economic growth and overall quality of living conditions at least until mid-1960s, exceeding the average annual growth rate of 20 % in the years between 1954 and 1960)

Soon enough, he and his fellow U.S. army defectors (yes, there were more) fell into the pretty familiar routine of the annoying young American expats, cruising in a cluster, drinking, horsing around and chasing after women. The life in North Korea had begun to go sour by late 1960s: the Americans were unable to withstand the monotony of a "peaceful" Communist country and the lack of purpose in their lives. They finally attempted to jump ship to Europe via the Soviet embassy, which promptly sent them packing. Eventually, it was Comrade Kim Jong Il who came to their rescue, by casting Drasnok and his colleagues as seedy imperialist villains in his ambitious film productions. This portion of the documentary is simply amazing, as we are treated to rarely seen (certainly for me, never-before-seen) excerpts from such legendary North Korean megahits as Nameless Heroes, and footages of the American defectors hamming it up as hilariously grotesque caricatures of their own countrymen. Dresnok in these films suggests in appearance a no-talent cousin of Laird Cregar. Sargeant Charles Jenkins--Dresnok's arch-nemesis, resembling Ross Perot after a Jenny Craig diet regimen, more about him later--at one point shows up with a huge skullcap makeup, as if he is possessed by the Brain from Planet Arous: they must be seen to be believed.

Equally amazing is Dresnok's family history. One neat trick Gordon pulls off is casting Dresnok and other defector's children as "actors" playing their fathers in a '60s black and white re-enactment sequence. Dresnok's son, James, half-American and half-Romanian, is a handsome, white young man, studying English in the prestigious Pyongyang Foreign Language University: it's positively unreal to hear James speaking in fluent Northern-accented Korean and then in halting Konglish for the interview. Dresnok's cute-as-a-button youngest son from his second marriage to a half-Somali Korean woman is one-quarter white, one-quarter African and half-Korean. So Dresnok's own family in the perhaps world's most ethnically and culturally homogeneous nation--as Professor Bruce Cumings points out, that never wavers in the belief that "Koreans are the most superior people on the planet"--turns out to be many degrees more multiethnic than a typical American one.

The docu abounds with such ironies scaling the height of surrealism, not the least of which is the fact that Dresnok still resolutely remains such an unreconstructed "American," shoveling bonhomie in thick Southern drawl, teaching NK students English as a "native speaker" (this will sound very familiar to many South Korean students) enjoying illegal fishing expeditions, and hailed by old Koreans who recognize "Arthur the Evil American" from the movies. One cannot help think that it was his quintessential qualities as an American, which made him a misfit in the U.S. army, helped him survive and even flourish in North Korea.

In the latter half, considerable dramatic tension is generated when Sergeant Jenkins chose in 2004 to leave North Korea with his two daughters and join his wife already in Japan, and authored an autobiography condemning North Korean regime (translated into English and published from University of California Press). Dresnok angrily rebuts much of the claim made in Jenkins' account of how the defectors were treated, including the claim that NK officials scorched tattoos on their bodies as a part of re-education procedure (according to him, the burning of tattoos was a strictly voluntary act). It's clear that underlying the politically charged mutual denunciations is a longstanding feud between Jenkins and Dresnok that seems to hark back to the 1960s: Dresnok relates with pride a story of beating Jenkins up when the latter tried to pull his rank on the former.

In the end, we are left with Dresnok's sly, gold-capped smile. Like all good documentaries, by showing an organically linked whole of the elements that are at first glance totally incompatible with one another and deftly maneuvering out from ideological agendas of its principals, Crossing the Line re-focuses our attention to the human foibles and ingenuity usually swept beneath the grand narratives of ideological struggles and national conflicts. I most certainly wouldn't buy a used car from Dresnok, but at the same time he is way too uncomfortably "ordinary American" for many viewers to be dismissed as a devious traitor or a mouthpiece for socialist ideals. It is not difficult at all to imagine him voting for Mike Huckabee in the Republican primary, had he lived in the States. The Novel Prize winning writer Orhan Pamuk once stated to the effect that the real task of an artist is to show the people so utterly divided by language, culture, custom and beliefs are, in fact, exactly the same at their core. Whatever your opinion may be about this docu, and many viewers will come away from watching it with their negative views about North Korea confirmed, or even reinforced, I have no doubt that it achieved its artistic (and humanistic) aim in this sense.

DVD Presentation: Kino Video(US). NTSC. Single Layer. Region 1. Video: Anamorphic Widescreen 1.85:1. Audio: Korean and English Dolby Digital 2.0. Subtitles: English. Supplements: An interview with director Daniel Gordon, photo galleries.

Kino Video is not exactly 100% reliable in terms of quality presentation of foreign titles, but Crossing the Line's predominantly HD-lensed visuals are shown in a reasonably attractive fashion. Considering the large number of archival footage, the quality of video fluctuates wildly, especially in the first half, but I haven't noticed any significant transfer problem. The soundtrack is quite ordinary: the techno-minimalist music score sounds a little tinny, but it serves the purpose. The only substantial supplementary material is a 30-minute interview with the director. It is informative but the questions basically make him re-cap the film in a digest form, so it will be a total spoiler for those who haven't seen the main feature. I'd like to know why Christian Slater was chosen to narrate the film: maybe Gordon explains it and I missed it.

Koreanfilm.org, updated July 1, 2010.