Extras:
Trailer, Filmographies, Mark Wyatt Film Notes, Original Music Video
Asia Extreme Trailer Reel, Making of documentary
Director:
Je-gyu Kang
(Days of Roses, Ji sang man ga, Rules of the Game, Shiri, Well Let's Look at the Sky Sometimes, Who Saw the Dragon Claws?)
Producers:
Moo Rim-Byun and Kwan-hak Lee
Screenplay:
Je-gyu Kang
Original Score :
Dong-Jun Lee
Cast :
JongWon Ryu: Han Suk-kyu
Mu-young Park: Choi Min-sik
Bang-hee Lee: Kim Yun-Jin
Jang-gil Lee: Song Kang-ho
Dae-Ho Jung: Kim Derek
In Shiri, the governments of North and South Korea want to settle their differences,
but in this film made four years ago, there's resonances with world events that
have gone since then as terrorists decide to stick a big spanner in the works.
That said, the plot does feel like a combination of Nikita, Die Hard
with a Vengeance and has an overall tone of a Michael Bay and Jerry
Bruckheimer co-production at the start with soldiers running around in conditions
of rain, darkness and slo-mo.
That's because the prime 'weapon' the North Korean terrorists have is their
lone, female assassin, Hee (Kim Yun-Jin). She's put through a rigourous
training programme at the start in which we see her going up against - and
mutilating and decapitating - other human beings (where do they get the
volunteers?), blasting away with a gun at dummy heads placed at the back of
a group of like-minded soldiers, where she must fire almost constantly and
never get it wrong, and in the nastiest of the lot, a "Who can put their gun
together first?" competition, in which the winner gets to shoot the loser dead
with their result.
But once we've seen a few still shots of her handiwork over the years, it's
time to see the main event. The South Korean government have perfected a new
kind of liquid bomb, which, in its basic state, just happens to colourless,
odourless and everything else-less so it can remain undetectable. It's also
incredibly volatile and can go off at the slightest whim, even without the
detonator. As one government bod puts it,
"There's no way to predict when, where or how it wil go off."
Of course, this doesn't stop Hee and her cronies bumping off those scientists
who were bribed for information before stealing it for themselves so they
can plant it all over Seoul. They're clearly a bit more intelligent than the
average terrorist - no wussy suicide bombing for them, they make sure they're
out of the way when the good guys arrive.
And these are mainly Ryu and Lee who run around like a couple of Jack Bauers
trying to sort the baddies out before the film's end. Ryu's also about to get
married to a fish saleswoman who also drinks like a fish and looks not too
dissimilar to our favourite female assassin... Is there a connection?
Either way, they're both quite cute.
However, since the baddies are getting to the important places before these
agents can, and since it's meant to be a hush-hush operation, does that mean
there's a mole inside the government?
On the action front, there's a fair bit to enjoy here but nothing you haven't
seen before in a Hollywood epic and at times the dialogue can sound like it's
been lifted from a late 90s Jean-Claude Van Damme movie and it makes me wonder
that if it had been placed in his hands - and no doubt he'd want to double up
with himself again for the roles of both agents - whether I'd still be watching
till the end? We've also seen, way too often, the scenario of the
terrorist-cum-maintenance-man who just happens to be "looking for the men's
room" and expecting gullible workers to buy it.
Oh, and for those wondering, a Shiri is a Korean aboriginal fish, living
in crystal streams. Though they're separated with the country divided, some
day they'll reunite in the same streams.
The 1.85:1 widescreen frame is well-used, at times getting too close to its
subjects that you feel a 2.35:1 ratio would've been better for a broader
landscape. There's no problems with it though other than it can look a bit
soft at times.
For the sound, it's functional but not a great deal to write home about.
Even in Dolby Digital 5.1 there's precious little rear-only action, so the
opportunity has been missed to make things really stand out.
On the extras front, there's the following:
Trailers: a 90-second American theatrical trailer (1.85:1
letterbox) and a 2½-minute Korean theatrical trailer (1.85:1 anamorphic),
all with music-only accompanying the bullet ballets. However, this is far
from a John Woo epic.
Filmographies: brief ones appear for the director and main stars
Music Video (5 mins): This features a collection of scenes from the film -
for "When I Dream", the main theme from the film and the favourite
song of one of the characters.
Mark Wyatt Film Notes : 5 pages of info summarising the film.
Asia Extreme Trailer Reel : Further trailers for The Happiness
of the Katakuris, Sympathy for Mr Vengeance, A Snake of June, Nowhere to Hide
and Dark Water.
The Making of Shiri (60 mins):
Presented in 4:3, with letterboxed film clips, I get the point that it's
giving an insight into the movie and includes interview snippets but... and it's
a big but, it's only partially subtitled so you won't get everything that goes
on. It also includes two alternate edits for a confrontation scene and
a few minutes of bloopers.
There are subtitles in English only, plus the option to remove them which is
good as a video would have to have them burned into the print, just 16
chapters which isn't enough for a 2-hour movie, and a short piece of the
music on the main menu.
As of April 2009, Blu-rays and DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TH-37PX80B
37" Plasma TV with a Sony BDP-1500 Blu-ray player and played through a Yamaha DSP-AX820 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Jan 2011: Intel Quad Core Dell XPS 8100, i7 CPU 860 @ 2.80Ghz, 8Gb RAM, nVidia GeForce GTS 240, Windows 7
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
