Best movie of this year hands down!

Very best movie i ever watch

So much average

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

The film is divided into four parts. 1) Taxi Driver. This part sets up the protagonist's background. Gu-Nam is a Taxi driver, battling financially. He borrowed money to pay for a visa for his wife to go from China to Korea to look for work, but he hasn't heard from her again. Now fearing she is having an affair, he hates her. When an opportunity arise for him to go to Korea and earn money in the process (by killing a businessman), he grabs it.2) Murder. Gu-Nam's preparation for the murder is very interesting, as he plans everything in meticulous detail, and his thoughts are also very well portrayed on screen. However, things go terribly wrong for our hero.3) Josean Clan (North Korean Person). This part explains the Mafia set-up as well as the Korean mob, both of which are after Gu-Nam. It shows us how ruthless and determined the antagonist is, excellently portrayed by Kim Yoon-seok. The film's pace slowed down significantly during this part and I got a bit confused with way too many characters.4) Yellow Sea. Time is running out for Gu-Nam. The film gets extremely violent towards the end to the point where it becomes gory, and I found the killings just too many. The action sequences were incredible, though. I was not very happy with the ending, so this was a once-only viewing for me. (I do, however, appreciate the unpredictability of Korean movies).

Movie: The Yellow Sea (18)Rating: 4.5/5Director Na Hong-jin, known for his mindblowing action thriller THE CHASER, returns with THE YELLOW SEA, another action thriller but with a lot of difference as well as excellence. Starring Ha Jung-woo and Kim Yoon-seok, it's a film every cinema enthusiast should watch. It's a masterpiece by all means and a film which isn't just a film but something more than that.THE YELLOW SEA is a film which presents human emotions in a very realistic manner. Ha Jung-woo is so excellent as Gu-nam that you'll definitely root for him. Kim Yoon-seok is very impressive as usual, and leaves and impact like the former. Rest of the cast is impressive as well.The character development is what needs to be praised. It's so good that you feel like you know the characters fully, and eventually you manage to develop a psychological relation with them, especially Gu-nam played by Ha Jung-woo. The film's biggest strength is the screenplay itself, as it contains all other brilliant elements a film of this genre needs. The cinematography is excellent and captures the journey of the characters very well. The action sequences are: extremely mindblowing and spellbinding! And due to this, they deserve a repeated watch. The editing is excellent, and I recommend you to watch the director's cut as it has a lot of depth. Can't say about the other version because I haven't seen that, but the director's cut being an amazing one is, I feel, better to watch.The emotions are very well brought out on screen. The film is exactly what you can expect from a South Korean filmmaker. It's emotional, thrilling, violent, action packed and what not. It has everything to keep you hooked to the edge of the seat. There's not even a single dull moment and the film is very enjoyable despite of being quite dark as well.THE YELLOW SEA is a perfect action thriller which shows what South Korean filmmakers are capable of. Definitely, with films of this kind, they will earn more respect in the eyes of viewers. Highly recommended!

After making his mark with a sensational debut feature that easily ranks amongst the finest thrillers of the decade, director Na Hong-jin follows it up with another thriller that isn't as amazing as his previous film but is expertly crafted nonetheless. The Yellow Sea tells the story of a cab driver who hasn't heard from his wife for 6 months after she left for Korea to earn some money. With financial debt escalating, this man tries gambling to earn extra cash but ends up losing at it too & when faced with a dead end, decides to do a bidding for a local hit-man that goes horribly wrong, thus creating some terrible situation for him.Honestly, the first half felt pretty slow to reach where it needed to be & the characters aren't interesting either to keep many invested in the story but the second half makes up for a lot of things that went wrong & is relentlessly paced, throwing one violent punch after another. The plot isn't easy to follow either with too many characters & sub-plots creating much confusion about who's talking about whom & might require another viewing. Direction is good but those who've seen this director's previous work & were expecting a similar mind-blowing experience will be slightly disappointed.There are however nothing but positives as far as the technical aspect of the film goes. Cinematography uses the right colour tones to set its gritty, decaying atmosphere & even the hand-held shots are finely photographed. Editing would've been even better if the story had a more definite structure, music doesn't carry any complaints & the performances are brilliant as well. On an overall scale, The Yellow Sea isn't by any means a bad thriller but it sure could've been a much better product if the script was more polished. Worth a watch? Definitely. It didn't work for me because of my high expectations but it just might for you. Give it a try. And don't miss its after-credits scene.

Unable to break free of the visa debts that his wife left him with when she went to South Korea to earn money, a taxi driver takes an offer from local criminal Myun to be smuggled into South Korea in order to kill someone for him. The money is the main motivator but he also hopes he can find his wife somehow. Trying to accomplish these hurts both of his goals and, as he is soon to discover, the story is much larger than just a simple killing.I had heard good things about this film and, if I'm honest, it took me a while to get around to watching it mainly because the running time put me off. In a way I was right and wrong because when I finally did watch it the running time is excessive but yet it does mostly still deliver as a thriller. The plot sees a simple murder escalate as others involve in its planning or execution all start to represent a danger to our main character, who is trying to get home even though he'll be no safer there. It takes a little while to get moving but the film soon delivers some violent scenes as well as some exciting chases and escapes. The build of the plot helps these be engaging and exciting while in fairness they are also pretty well filmed as well. The more frantic action has the feel of the Bourne movies (although not as effective) and those that know the locations may get extra value from Busan harbor and some of Seoul showing up.The plot isn't perfect though and it does contribute towards most of the film's weaknesses. The first of these is the subplot involving the missing wife; it acts as an engagement tool with the main character that we didn't really need but otherwise it just seems to add distraction away from the main narrative. I was fine with it being mentioned but in the end I didn't understand why it was given so much time. Speaking of time, this is an issue because the film runs far longer than it really needs to and even though I enjoyed it, I still found myself thinking of all the really obvious places where the film could have been edited down to a still-generous two hours. As it is, the length means the pace cannot be kept up and that the simple story is spread out too much. This shows in how excessive but yet how very tidy everything gets. I liked the way that the various characters all fell into place around the lead's story, but I liked it best when it was chaotic, not when it is all pulled together to be all tidy and resolved at the end. That said I did enjoy the nihilistic tone it had and that, in the end, the route of the original murder was something so simple and personal that it wasn't even worth one man's death, far less all those shown here.The main actor is convincing and kept me interested in his escape; his performance keeps him as a human and tragic figure even though he is able to evade the odds a bit too easily and a bit too frequently. Myun is a great character full of menace and violence and the actor has fun in that role, but the excessive action does at time get too much to buy into since he has a stamina that a Terminator would baulk at. The rest of the cast fill in well enough, but mostly it is the action and plot that keeps the film moving, not the performances. Na's direction is good although I know some dislike cameras that move all the time.Overall Hwanghae is a solid and enjoyable thriller which would be better were it not for its own excesses. The running time is excessive, the spiralling plot and stamina of the main characters are excessive and the whole film really needed a tighter edit to make the most of its strengths. Still solidly good but could have been more.