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Sorum
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Country
: |
South
Korea |
| Year: |
2001 |
| Genre: |
Drama
/ Thriller |
| Format: |
DVD |
| Running
Time: |
1H40 |
| Distributor: |
Atlanta |
| Date
reviewed: |
03/17/2002 |
| |
|
| Producer: |
Jong-hyak
Baek, Pil-seok Hwang |
| Director: |
Youn
Jong Chan, Jong-chan Yun |
Cast: Jin-yeong Jeong, Myeong-min
Kim, Chang Jin Young, Jin-Young Jang |
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Story:
A 29 year old Taxi driver named Yong-hyun moves into
a new apartment. But his new home is very dilapidated
and even worst; the whole building is about to be torn
down because of its poor condition. Only four other
people remain on the same floor as Yong-hyun. Mr. Lee
an old writer who never got any real success in his
life, Eun-su a young piano teacher and Sun-young an
abused wife who can't escape her drunken husband. But
soon after that Yong-hyun moved into his apartment,
he learned that a man died in a fire in the same apartment
not too long ago. H Also 30 years ago, a husband, who
ran away with the woman living next door, killed his
wife and abandoned a newborn baby who almost died in
a fire.
With the time passing, these fives tenants will
begin to know each other a little more. Yong-hyun
is developing a very close relationship with Sun-young
the abused wife and he will also befriend the writer
Mr. Lee. But it seems that all these characters hide
a very dark past. Yong-hyun is suspect in the disappearance
of his ex-wife, Sun-young lost her child a couple
of year ago and Mr. Lee was apparently a very close
friend to the guy who died in the apartment no so
long ago. Were these fires really accidents and is
there any connection between all these mysterious
and strange events
Review: At first glance it looked like a
horror movie, well I was expecting to see some ghost
and dark chilling fantasy elements, but Sorum is not
exactly your typical horror ghost story movie. In
fact, there's no ghost at all and there's also almost
no fright factor either, so calling Sorum a horror
movie would not be exactly right. It is more of a
dark drama driven by a very claustrophobic and tense
atmosphere than anything else. Unlike the current
wave of Asian horror movies, Sorum doesn't have any
fantasy or ghost element but instead try to hook the
spectator by using a very impressive cinematography.
In addition the movie uses a lot of environmental
sound effects to make the spectator feel like they
are really in the movie.
Because of the very slow paced story, Sorum is probably
not the kind of movie that everyone will enjoy. The
slow story deals a lot about the past lives of the
characters, that all seem to be hiding some skeleton
in their closet. How all these small plots connected
together was interesting, even if some were a little
predictable. It also takes a while to really understand
every point of the movie, but don't worry everything
comes together at the end. About the ending, we really
thought that it was a little disappointing as it finished
a little too fast. In a way that you get the answer
you wanted but we were expecting a big major shocking
conclusion just before the closing credits, but did
not get one. If the ending would have been a little
better maybe the viewing would have been more gratifying
since it takes a while to really see were this strange
story is going.
The story also focuses a lot on the relationship
between the characters, so if you find them uninteresting,
you probably will have the impression of wasting your
time while watching this film. The acting was excellent
and really believable but the characters were sometimes
very hard to understand, as their attitude is never
clear and also change during the movie. At first they
all look very plain and typical, but they are far
from your ordinary Korean habitants. Yong-hyun, the
main character, was probably the most interesting
because of his enigmatic past and also especially
with his lame imitations of Bruce Lee. Sun-young,
the abused wife, is probably the hardest character
to get as she was very weird and her feelings are
never clear. Maybe those of you, who like mysterious
characters, will probably enjoy her more. But the
general impression for all these characters was not
a feeling of compassion as they were all generally
good on the side of acting but for me there was no
character that I could rely on. Even at the end, when
we finally really know what was going on in their
lives, I was not really impressed by the few surprises
that the director attempted to for us to swallow.
The movie is very slow and also doesn't have a lot
scary scenes in it. As I said, Sorum is not really
a horror movie but a dark drama. Don't expect to see
any ghost or intensely scary scenes because you will
be disappointed for sure. When I was watching the
movie I was really wondering what was exactly the
point of the movie, as it didn't look like the story
was going anywhere. Most of the film is about the
relationship between these characters and there's
no real entertainment value in it. But in the end,
I understood that the real value of this movie was
basically the look and atmosphere of it. It might
look strange saying this but what really makes this
movie stick out from the rest is really the dark chilling
atmosphere that the movie had. It is mostly shot at
night and it also rained very often. With the use
of the sound and scenery, the director really made
the visuals and sounds a very important part of the
movie, probably the most important and also the only
real interesting part of the movie. If you are looking
for a horror movie, look somewhere else.
If you like movie with a strong visual style, you
will probably find Sorum very interesting but take
note that it is the only real interesting thing of
the whole the movie. Maybe if the character would
have been more likable and interesting, the movie
would probably have a better effect on the spectator.
It is too bad because the atmosphere is an important
part in a horror/thriller movie and Sorum had a really
good one but there was nothing else to really back
up that atmosphere
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DVD
[ NTSC, Region 3
] :
The packaging is labeled Region 3 but the DVD is All
Region coded. The image quality is generally good.
Sharp and clear but also suffer form compression problem
during the night scenes. The transfer is also letterbox
non-anamorphic. You also have an excellent DTS original
audio track that really helps to enhance the great
atmosphere of the movie. As for the subtitles, they
were very clear and easy to follow, but with a couple
of small grammatical errors. The extras consist of
Cast and crew info, Trailers and TV spots, Highlights,
still gallery, production notes, Interviews and 3
extra trailers: Kiss me Much, Address Unknown, Bungee
jumping of their own The second extra DVD contain
3 short movie from the director. PlayBack (20 min),
Memento (13min) and Views (45min) all are shot in
English. Except the lack of an anamorphic transfer,
this is an excellent 2 DVD set.
Reviewed
by Janick Neveu
You
can buy this movie on DVD at: 
|
| Story |
Cast |
Entertainment |
Subtitles |
Overall |
| 2.5 |
2 |
2.5 |
4.5 |
2 |

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