Movie Title: 김종욱 찾기 (Finding Mr. Destiny)
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (5/10)
Year: 2010

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Movie Title: 여교사 (Misbehavior)
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (5/10)
Year: 2015

Misbehavior tells a tale of two complete opposite lives of  boy’s school teacher. Hyo-joo (Kim Ha-neul) constantly feels stressed and miserable as her life is going nowhere. She is a contract based teacher who is constantly worried that she will not get her contract renewed while she is also desperately trying to get a promoted to be a full-time teacher. Her long time boyfriend is a slacker who live off her and one day decides to dump her.

On the other side, the young and beautiful Hae-young (Yoo In-yeong) who is Hyo-joo’s university junior is the newest teacher in the school who instantly took her long waited full-time teacher spot. Hae-young have it all, good looks, good connection and well to do (she is the daughter of the school board’s chairman), trophy boyfriend.

Both their life cross path when Hyo-joo and Hae-young both are drawn to the good looking and charismatic student, Jae-ha ( Lee Won-geun).  The movie’s mood took a change when Hyo-joo caught Hae-young and Jae-ha making out in the school gym room. Hyo-joo uses this to emotionally blackmail Hae-young and slowly allowed her arrogance and jealousy blinded her when Hyo-joo herself later got involved with the same student.

While the movie’s manage to build and showcase the injustice of hierarchy in daily lives and workplace, the movie flawed with weak character build up where t he director tries too hard to give everyone screen time, including the dance teacher, Hae-young’s boyfriend and others, which in return sacrificed the build up of the main characters. The movie also lacks emotional connection between the trio which makes it believable that there are love and affection in the relationships – Jae-ha and Hae-young, or Hyo-joo and Jae-ha.

The movie stars of promising but the choppy editing starts to bring the movie to a slow and messy middle, and the abrupt ending leaves audience hoping there were more to it.

Movie Title: 바르게 살자 (Going By The Book)
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (8/10)
Year: 2007

Going By The Book is a comedy movie which center around the character Jung Do-man (Jung Jae-young). Do-man was demoted from his detective post when he tries to put a corrupted government officer behind bars but failed due to lack of evidence and was then sent to be a small town to be a traffic officer 👮‍♂️ in a small town.

With his upright and honest character, he always go by the book no matter how big or small a matter is. His life is about to change when he is selected to play the “robber” role in a training mission to combat the recent increase bank robber case in the town. The training mission aimed to improve public’s trust in the police force turns into a disaster when Do-man plays his “robber” role seriously and “killed” various hostages and SWAT team. This quickly gains the interest of public and even made it to national news which creates an embarrassing scene for the police.

While the movie don’t have any climax point, the humour and wittiness of the character and storyline is well-paced over the 102 minutes movie. The movie is a refreshing one, as it doesn’t involve any romance scene in it which I find it different. Jae-young proper and strict appearance perfectly fits the character bringing it to live and gives it a charming charisma.

Watch it! 🎬 It’s a great movie to watch to put a smile on face but minus the cheesy romantic scenes.

Movie Title: 탐정: 리턴즈 (Accidental Detective 2: In Action)
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (7/10)
Year: 2018

The Accidental Detective 2: In Action thriller-comedy movie is the sequel to the 2015’s movie of the same name. While I have not what the prequel, the movie was not hard to follow. The movie starts with Kang Dae-man (Kwong Sang-woo) a comic store owner who secretly sold his comic book store without discussing with his wife to setup his own private detective firm together with Noh Tae-soo (Sung Dong-il), hides about him taking an indefinite absent leave from police force just to test out how their private detective business will pan out.

Their first and only case came when a widow suspects her husband’s suicidal death is not what it seemed to be but was denied by the police due to lack of evidence. Their investigation on the case leads them back to the orphanage the victim was brought up in, which leads it to a broader conspiration between the orphanage and hospitals.

The addition of Hopper (Lee Kwang-soo) as a geek-ish hacker adds contributes his tech skills in the suspense investigation. Together, the trio is a perfect combo with each of them having different personalities that helps compliment each others lacking.

I find the movie pretty standard and decent detective-crime movie style. While the movie may not have drastic climax, the pacing and story unfolding is comfortably executed. While to some, this may seems lacking and less worthy of time, but I personally feel not every movie requires  high action, climax and major plot twist. At times, classics are sufficient and in fact gold, and this is one of them.

Movie Title: 나의 특별한 형제 (Inseparable Bros)
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (7/10)
Year: 2018

Inseparable bros ‍‍ is a sentimental-comedy about two disabled boy who were abandoned by their family members. Growing up together in the orphanage, they both soon become perfect and compatible partners. Se-Ha (Shin Ha-kyun) is a smart who are paralyzed from neck onwards hence he is not able to move due to the injury of his spinal cord while Dong-goo (Lee Kwang-soo) a cheerful character who is tall and strong yet have the mental age of a 5 year old.

While they both were not real brothers, their relationship blossom and they act as one and are inseparable when Se-ha works as the brain of Dong- goo, helping him with day to day decisions and thoughts, while Dong- goo helps Se-ha to perform physical tasks

However their brother like relationship are threaten with separation to different institutes due to their different disability when the orphanage are closed down. To make matters worst, Dong-goo’s mother appear all of a suddenly coming into their lives.

While the movie has a simple plot, a simple day to day life of two brothers from a humorous perspective it quickly gets audience bored due to it being predictable and draggy.  The acting for both the lead actors may be too exaggerated at some point, but it does help as it is used to compensate their acting limitations due to their character’s disability. One thing do turn me off, Lee Kwang-soo’s ear piercing, which was overlooked and made it less believable for his character.

While it may have a predictable ending, it is a good watch to squeeze out some humour and emotions in you.