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City of Violence
Directed by: Seung-wan Ryoo Starring: Jeong Du-hong, Seung-wan Ryoo Synopsis: Detective Jeong Tae-su (played by martial arts wizard Jeong Du-hong), returns from Seoul to Onsung, the hometown of his youth to attend the funeral of his long-time friend, a reformed small-time mobster, Wang-jae (Ahn Gil-gang). There, following a nostalgic reunion with his gang of former childhood buddies, he becomes obsessed with investigating the circumstances surrounding Wang-jae's death.
Review: In my recent review of Never Back Down , I complained just a little about how the plot was completely unoriginal and paint-by numbers. I enjoyed City of Violence immensely, but it does suffer from being a patchwork of familiar themes, particularly from Four Brothers (starring Mark Walhberg, and in itself a reworking of John Wayne's The Sons of Katie Elder). However, I think this familiarity would help the movie find a wider western audience. It certainly deserves one because it is one of the most action packed movies I've seen in a while. The early scenes establish Tae-Su's friends, both in the present and in the past. We learn who is the ambitious one, who is the troublemaker, who is the coward, and how they grew up to be who they are today. What shocks Tae-su is the fact that most want to let the incident go by - only the younger brother, Ryoo, is interested in getting closure (ie revenge). Whilst the plotting of City of Violence is straight-forward, the action is top-notch. At one point Tae-su finds himself surrounded by a whole load of schoolkids belonging to different gangs, all sporting different weapons and clothing. It reminded me of the gangs from The Warriors, with the Baseball Furies and those guys on rollerboots (nothing says scary like a '70s rainbow tanktop). Even with close to 100 participants, the action is crisp and clear, with long takes allowing you to keep up with who's hitting who.
City of Violence culminates in a massive fight as our two heroes storm the badguys' new restaurant. It is here that people will draw similarities to the tea-house massacre in Kill Bill 1, although they are pretty superficial: both scenes are standouts in my opinion. Verdict: straight-forward plotting but excellent action sequences. This is one to show your mates who don't usually watch asian action movies. 7 out of 10 (MikeOutWest)
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