Fati:
I'm a great fan of melancholic movies. I love the movies by Im Kwon Taek, he is not very famous in my country. He makes contemplative movies with a sophisticated staging :
https://mydramalist.com/1741-chunhyang (historical, drama, mature)
https://mydramalist.com/9560-beyond-the-years (historical, drama)
Can you tell me why you didn't like "tale of two sisters" and "I meet the devil", the director of these movies makes also sad movies and you can watch this (except if it's not your cup of tea) :
https://mydramalist.com/1903-a-bittersweet-life (action, drama)
I saw you watched sympathy for lady vengeance, you can watch (same compilation) :
https://mydramalist.com/992-old-boy (action, thriller)
For China, I think also you can watch the chinese movies by Zhang Yimou :
https://mydramalist.com/2836-happy-times (comedy, drama)
https://mydramalist.com/9528-return-2014 (life, drama)
Omg thank you so much for all the wonderful recommendations, Chunhyang sounds perfect to me I will definitely have to check it out asap because of your description of the director. I am not very familiar with his name gotta research more about him.
For the case of '', I saw the Devil'' The film was very exciting at the beginning it gave me suspense and an adequate amount of action/violence. But sadly the entire movie got incredibly stretched out and repetitive. There was a point during the film where I thought to myself '' oh it must be over, what will the conclusion of the movie be like, is the ending going to give the main character a proper release? '' and I was met with a very predictable outcome, the ending ruined the whole movie for me because it felt pointless. But in a sense, the whole theme is about the torture of the main character and the emotional distress he faces throughout the story, I think it succeeds in that aspect but removes the enjoyment from the viewer because of that exact same repetitiveness. The plot in itself makes you frustrated wishing it would end in a faster more dignified way.
Tale of two sisters sadly suffers from the same syndrome, the way it was directed made it incredibly frustrating and tiring to keep up with resulting in a messy outcome. Plot twists are my favorite thing about movies but this film managed to leave me 'confused' instead of 'satisfied' because the ending was executed horribly. Tho I am in love with the cinematography and certain horror elements it provided, this film certainly had its moments but it ultimately failed to make me invested enough to care about it.
But ofc that is my subjective opinion, I would love to know your thoughts on these two :)