Watched in 2022

Trying to figure out how these three stories fit together. The two adult stories seem to show how adults screw up relationships, and try to screw up the fresh relationship of the children The the teacher warns the children not to take notice of adults, as they're often wrong.
Nice to see Seohyun acting, she's one of the better voices and prettier faces in GG, but let's face it, acting hysterically crazy is what most beginner actors like to do; a really skillful actor can do subtlety. Sad that a film like this still has to be made, and that a mother and daughter have to go through so much angst before they can accept each other; maybe the day will come when everyone will have got over themselves, and same-sex couples will be a totally ordinary part of life.
The musician's arrogant boyfriend is played by the same actor who played the narcissistic boyfriend in Age Youth. What a bother to be typecast as a creep.

Totally different than Zhang Yi Mou's next film (Cliff Walkers), the style and symbolism of this movie makes it feel more like a stage play, even if several scenes consist of someone trudging through a landscape of unrelenting sand dunes. The repetitive and futile plot and the bleak landscape, even when the action is in town, give it the feel of Waiting for Godot, and perhaps that's the writer/director's comment on life in China during the Cultural Revolution, China anytime, or life anytime anywhere. I'd be fascinated to know who this was made for, and who it would appeal to in China. While it might appear an attack on the Cultural Revolution, including the theme of fractured families, there is also a vivid sequence on the power of collective action.

Two children each ask their mothers, who are preoccupied with their work, for an explanation of the mysterious relationships of adults, and in each case are met with hostile rejection, because the women are ashamed of their own behaviour, although it's necessary so they can survive in the male-dominated world. So the children can only turn to each other for companionship and to dreams their dreams. But of course that can't last as the adults' lives of struggle are imposed on the children.
I've mainly watched modern Japanese movies, so it was interesting to see Tokyo of the 1960s - the clothes, the cars. The acting and photography were a bit more stylised and less natural than we're used to in modern films.

I don't find it entertaining watching an immature, selfish and bitter man with no redeeming features consistently mistreat a young woman who is nothing but hardworking and undemanding. I understand his motivations, and a lot is explained by the way his just-as-bitter father treats him, but this certainly doesn't excuse him or make him endearing. Goodness knows what she sees in him, if it's anything more than just a safe place to stay after a lifetime of hardship. Even when her good example eventually wins him over, he keeps failing to provide what she needs, except for the climactic rescue scene, which unfortunately for budget reasons we are deprived from witnessing. This, along with the writer forgetting to address the matter of her guilt about her distant family, makes the ending feel rushed and unsatisfying.

A tragic tale in which cycles of mutual hatred and violence, engendered by a patriarchal and classed society, lead to inevitable karmic retribution, only occasionally given relief in a sensual and passionate romance, represented by the colourful rolls of dyeing cloth. While each episode is dramatic, the underlying repetition seems to be expressed in the frequent shots of the monotonous village rooftops. Gong Li is beautiful, erotic, and the strongest character, surrounded by emasculated men, either the paraplegic master, the subservient adoptee nephew, or the grim and taciturn son.

Is it just a coincidence that all the republican-era dramas I've watched (Sparrow, Lady And The Liar, and now this) seem so amateurish, in spite of the evident lavish budget? The actors all seem to just think they're being actors and not really living the role, they play the lines on face value without expressing any of the subtext, dramatic scenes suddenly cut to days later without any explanation of what happened, the moods seem contrived with excessive music to force the mood, characters don't behave with any consistency, etc etc. Do the Chinese feel too self-conscious about this period of their history?
Most of the actors are smooth-complexioned and look like they're 10-15 years younger than their characters.
It's unmistakably flirtation going on between these two (I don't think friends play around like that) but Xu You Yi's childish demands are in rather poor taste, would be understandable if she was just a rich girl, but we know she had a humble past and therefore should be less of a prima donna when with Wei Wei. But that's typical of the poor writing in this series.
Meanwhile, Yan Wei quietly smiles in pleasure as she panders to You Yi, even going so far as to inexplicably burst onto the scene and dramatically rescue You Yi whenever she's in danger and wherever she happens to be around the country.
But this is China, and so I can't see them living happily ever after with their baby in the final episode. [I was wrong - the story hasn't ended, but at the end of this series, they have been happily living together with their baby for several months]
Contrary to some comments below, strictly speaking this does not end on a cliffhanger i.e. not in the middle of an unresolved action scene. Much of the main story is resolved by the end. But there is significant backstory hinted at through the series, and the very end clearly shows that there is more to come, that the producers are expecting another season.

Neither the characters nor the plot grabbed my interest and I gave up after an hour.

Enjoyable slice-of-life story about a cheese farmer, his family and neighbours, set on the farms of Hokkaido during the sunny season (except for the midwinter freezing prologue). The most drama that occurs is the fight between loyal neighbours as our hero struggles with his dependence on his cheese-making mentor. A chef joins the community, leading to a celebration of local produce and its use in restaurant cooking.

In this paean to Taiwanese independence (the only one I've seen), the lead singer of a small-town death-metal band goes to the big city to try to talk their favorite big-time Taiwanese death-metal band to play in their town to support their protest against commercial takeover of Taiwan by mainland big-spenders. But he finds that just as so many Taiwanese are tempted by mainland money to sell-out their freedom, the band have sold-out their political stance for the sake of keeping sponsors. I got a bit confused what happened in the end, especially as the singer is prone to Walter Mitty-type fantasy scenes with animated overlays, but it looks like he got inspired to take his own stance and lead a dramatic martial-arts inspired protest, with death-metal soundtrack, against the turncoat visiting Taiwanese government.

"Rookie" is American slang and therefore sounds anachronistic to me, while our heroine and her colleagues are not historians (students and interpreters of history), but rather recorders/chroniclers.
Although this is set in early 19th C royal Jeoson, at its heart is a timeless issue relevant to our modern troubled times: one of the core principles of democracy is that governments must be accountable. In the drama, we see that when the king knows his actions are observed and recorded, then he behaves differently, even if those records remain secret except to the future.
And in an Asian kind of way, it's a vindication of the rights and powers of women.
This begins almost frivolously; when occasionally the mood is dramatic or romantic, it often switches back into comedy to conclude the scene. Much of the plot is predictable, and the pleasure is in how the story is told and acted, rather than truly surprising us. Several of the minor actors play exaggerated roles that are more like pantomime characters than realistic humans. Some of the palace scenes that particularly in the remote residence of the prince, are georgeous gardens. I haven't had the opportunity to visit the royal residence in the east of Seoul, but I'm wondering if it was filmed there?
Then it gets increasingly dramatic and suspenseful, and builds to a fairly satisfying conclusion.

Such an irony, that the police in this drama are so dedicated to obtaining sufficient evidence in search of the truth and upholding the law. In a democracy, nobody is above the law, but in China, the survival of the CCP trumps all other principles. Hopefully this is not lost on the Chinese audience.
The backstory of domination and abuse is so harrowing that there needed to be a fantasy sequence at the end, an impossible happy ending to provide some pain relief. However there are also a set of stories of steadfast love, amongst siblings, friends, and adopted family . In this complex interlocking story, the obfuscation and lies are gradually peeled back until the truth is eventually revealed. Each  of the large set of characters is flawed and complex , and each superbly acted. A deeply satisfying drama.

It seems Koreans never tire of the childhood-friends-become-lovers trope, or maybe in fact they do, because their scriptwriters can't think of any other way of adding depth to a romance.
It's the steadfast support of the five friends for each other through all their quirks and hardships, and their lively and unique personalities that make this worth watching, and it's the plot progression which relies on them not communicating with each other about vitally important matters, or even realising things themselves, which makes this drama frustrating and at times unbelievable. Does it actually happen in real life that someone is in love with someone else while totally denying it to themselves, and repeatedly badly treating the object of their love?
The remake has a second season which takes things further, and since I had already watched that, watching this original left me feeling dissatisfied. Best to watch this series first.

Yet another Japanese sentimental drama made to a familiar pattern, in which each episode culminates in an emotional finale in which people are shouting and crying and mouthing platitudes (remember,  a mark of good screenwriting is show, not tell), while the background music swells, just in case we haven't yet got swept up in what we're supposed to feel.

Set in steamy Chengdu, three wayward youths (two guys and a girl) board with a woman Beijing opera singer, mourning her son who died in a road accident. There is no support from their parents (alcoholic, remarrying, etc) nor the state (symbolised by a rural town ruined by earthquakes), but after initial friction they start to care for each other.  In a strangely traditional resolution, they find freedom in the scenery of  the remote mountain valleys of Sichuan seen by riding goods trains, and helping repair a wrecked Buddha temple. The woman finds release, and the young couple find real love.

I know this drama is a classic favorite, but for me it has all the key features of the worst of Japanese series: over-acted and cliched characters, loud music at climactic scences that even drowns out the speech of the characters, predictable and repetitive plots, frequent sexism and objectification of women's bodies, etc. Onizuka may tell his female colleague to stop being the tea lady for the principal, but he still takes any chance to look up the skirts of the teenage female students. A scene where the vice principal, who thought a female student was propositioning him, was played as a satire of his delusions, rather than totally unethical behaviour by a teacher. I tried to tell myself that when this series was made, behaviour standards were different, but it didn't stop the revulsion I felt.
The core of this drama is the series of transformations brought about by the titular character, yet this doesn't occur through him deliberately using whatever are his powers, but rather as unexpected outcomes of his impulsive, aggressive, and often self-centred actions. What is that supposed to tell us? Or if it's just being played as comedy, it didn't make me laugh.
Japanese teachers must feel so discouraged seeing yet another school staffroom depicted as a den of misogynist males and self-righteous fawning females led by a stupid cowardly principal sucking up to arrogant indulgent parents, and accompanied by his sycophantic parastic vice-principal.

Amidst soothing mountain and forest scenery, each episode in this minimalist drama (maybe there's a better word) mainly consists of conversations between the owner and each one of various friends, about other times and places. There's no real action, and strangely no other actual guests staying there. For this mood but with more substance, the Japanese pair of Little Forest movies.

Because I'm hungry for more of tiny Zhou Dong Yu, and she has plenty of space here for her cute and feisty ways, but the gee-whizzery of the story and special effects failed to grab me, and so I must move on. These Chinese fairy stories, while exotic, even alien, lack substance.

Why you shouldn't work as a firefighter in Taipei:
Your spouse hates you. The parents and relatives of the people you save, hate you. Your parents hate you. The politicians hate you. The media hate you. The community hate you.
What a demanding, unappreciative, and litigious community these poor professionals have to serve.
The ONLY people who like you are - you guessed it - your work buddies.
I don't know if our characters are going to make it to the final episode, what with equipment breakdowns, communication breakdowns, marital breakdowns, nervous breakdowns...

For me this could have been a chance to study formal Japanese, and learn about ryoukan life, but each plot development is so obvious and repeatedly telegraphed, contrived rather than believable, signaled by overloud music that doesn't quite fit the apparent mood, the acting is one-dimensional and exaggerated, like in a children's pantomime, that I couldn't stand it for more than a few episodes.

You'll need to take crack to keep up with the frenetic pace of this movie, and although the plot is the same as every other high school dance competition movie, you can't beat this one for sheer exuberance. You'll have to suspend disbelief that Natalie Hsu's character is bullied at her dance high school, even though she shows her very fine dance chops. There are many excellent dancers here, but the rapid-cut MTV-style editing obscures much of their performances. There are several imaginative scenes and set pieces, many of them relying on summer downpour. Natalie Hsu has personality and cuteness and I look forward to seeing her further work.

Eight episodes and I think I'll give up. I just don't like any of the characters. I can't follow the convoluted plot and it's not giving me a reason to persist.

A G-rated heist movie with all the requisite ingredients: laughs, thrills, and tears; in which a little homeless girl, her younger brother, and her loyal school friend, are more cynical than teens and smarter than the adults.

Entertaining if sentimental story of a young man and woman, each carrying guilt from childhood traumas, who help each other to find healing.
Somehow the story felt contrived, carefully constructed of the usual cliches, no matter how implausible, which doesn't help Nagasawa Masami who looks like she's acting, rather than becoming a convincing character.
Lots of fine scenery of the Seto Inland Sea (why is the FL also called Seto?) and the traditional coastal towns.

The acting was exaggerated; the story was a contrived tear-jerker. It felt like it was produced for children. I couldn't finish it.

When there's gore and off-screen violence from the first scene, we know it can't be a happy ending, even though the movie plays in an almost comedic way with the juxtaposition of a child playing while witnessing more violence and its cleanup. But there is a redemption of sorts brought about by the spunky child heroine and the circumstances that bring her into the supervision of the evidently deeply traumatized mute played expertly by Yoo Ah In, who like any good actor has succeeded in a range of roles, rather than being typecast.

With nothing likeable nor interesting in the main characters, a story composed of insincerity, deceit,  greed, and the soulless thrill of gambling, this movie couldn't hold me all the way through.

Yet another drama about single women working in Shanghai/ Beijing. With only 12 episodes this one is focussed and not sprawling. The four women - three survivors, who somehow are best friends despite varying in age and status, and who each grows and matures in the course of this series, and their dear friend who takes her life at the beginning of the first episode, and who features in many flashbacks as they try to make sense of her suicide, are each individual and vivid characters, engagingly acted, and with fantastic chemistry that jerks tears and belly laughs. They suffer the expected hardships - work pressures, romance, provincial relatives, and urging to get married. The three survivors stand up for the right of a single woman to make her own decisions, to live independently and singly, or if in a relationship to on equal terms and not lose her individuality. There are no villains; everyone who does wrong later takes the offered chance to redeem themselves. The finale manages to be a paean to life in Beijing and at the same time a celebration of the alternative choice of returning to the hometown and creating a rewarding future there.

Based on a manga which is evidently written for yowamushi (weakling) geeks with fantasies of sporting prowess, mateship, and being admired by girls. The singular girl character is there to serve the boys, which could be seen as representing Japanese culture, or just as the female-phobia inexperienced boys. It's presented as a sports manga/movie, but Onoda's implausible feats on his mamachari are deserving of a superhero origin story.

The typical formula for sports dramas with all the expected cliches. The specific flavour for this one is Korea/baseball/female. It's an improbable story, and just to make sure I checked after watching it: no, Korean pro baseball does not have women playing alongside men.

More of the same silliness, lots of shouting and hitting each other with squid, stunt sword fights glossed over with slow-mo and wobbly handheld close-ups, unsatisfying romance titbits, and no connection whatsoever with the first Pirates movie other than similar theme and tone.
한효주 and 채수빈 are two of the cutest women in Korean drama, but the former is too feminine to convincingly pull-off the tough pirate queen, and the latter didn't have enough space to show off her spunkiness.

Superbly and informatively fansubbed,  but that wasn't enough to keep me after four episodes. Turn off your brain if you want to watch this. The oiran doesn't behave at all with the dignity or the fear I imagine such a person would show in a modern setting. Despite wearing a variety of flashy modern clothes (how can she afford them?) she never once lets down her hair from the traditional style, which seems like the director thinks we're all so stupid that we'd forget she's from Edo if we weren't reminded every time we see her. Schadenfreude is the only way anyone could enjoy watching the ML for episode after episode being a stupid negativistic coward .

A low-key slice-of-life movie about an assortment of young adults who take a summer job harvesting sugar cane in Okinawa.  As you might expect, the work toughens them and bonds them, the backgrounds they have fled from gradually emerge but are often understated or just implied. The sweet elderly couple who own the farm know they can count on this alchemy to ensure the harvest will be completed on time, without any slave-driving.

The movie begins with a typical set of overacted caricature misfits who we're apparently expected to deride, and therefore feel no sympathy for. Aragaki Yui, whose acting chops are limited at the best of times, fails to convince as the nerdy high-school girl suffering unrequited love for the school's prize baseball pitcher, and looks about five years too old for the role and her classmates. So I fast-forwarded to see the end, and as expected, they've all become impossibly adept and cool, but somehow still the movie failed to engage.
At least it was interesting to see the Japanese version of cheerleading, male-dominated and martial-arts-influenced.

It has a slice-of-life tone, but there's in incident in which the children meet an old woman (the cat-eating hag) who may actually be a traditional spirit, and on the night of O-Bon the main character meets the spirit of her aunt who died of starvation after WWII. The child who is at the centre of this enjoyable film spends most of the movie shouting, or else singing rude childish songs with her playmates (somehow they're mostly about dicks, but girls have always been adaptable), or greeting each other with ritual chants involving farts. Her "international family" is a rarity in Japan, except maybe around the American base in Okinawa: her old sister was evidently fathered by a white American, her older brother by a black American, while her father is Japanese and apparently quite accepting of his wife's past pecadillos. There are many scenes of Okinawan town and country, along with traditional music and dance.

Problematic subtitles which gave a peculiar tone. The main character and the first half scenes were played as comedy which shifted into high melodrama and tragedy in the second half. Propaganda for the common man (and of course it's a man's world, for both the rich and the poor) and against the corrupt ones in power. We're expected to admire the obsession of the main character and his mapmaking on behalf of all the people, which is  supposed to compensate for the terrible price he pays in his fanaticism. Plenty of cruelty like so many Korean movies, including a side story about the persecution of the early Christians. When we see the assembled map finally near the end, it's with a pang, for the land that is no longer whole, and was divided in the Korean war.

I couldn't warm to the lame comedy in this story of two country bumpkins trying to survive homeless on the streets of Shenzhen with someone's abandoned baby, and I gave up after half an hour.

Has the feel of being written and acted by high school students, making the best of a low budget (e.g. when the hero is supposedly riding a horse, the camera never goes below his waist i.e. we hear but never see the horse). The humour relies on setting up a mythic and epic context, then repeatedly demolishing the mood by chucking in modern references. If you like that sort of thing.

Fully of the usual high school cliches (I've already listed them elsewhere), the usual eccentric teacher cliches, the plot climaxes relying on long-winded motivational speeches full of the usual platitudes and backed by swelling music in case the words fail to move us.

We're shown from the outset that the ML is a lazy and low-status worker at a television news studio, who gets a tip and pursues it in the most irresponsible way, by posting his half-baked ideas on social media, by recording interviews without consent and then ineffectively anonymising them, by not checking the consistency of his theories and information. This leaves the rest of the movie for us to find out if he gets away with it.  When the murderer is finally apprehended, the motive is banal (if I understood correctly), hardly deserving of the drama that preceded it(and the suffering it caused the victim and others).

The story assembles several character's different viewpoints of the same series of events (harking back to the famous Rashomon movie), playing off the capricious and opinionated range of views espoused by various social media posters. The screen often features the scrolling social media posts with their writers' voice overs, but I suspect even native Japanese readers would be struggling to keep up. I think the writing was just there to create the setting, rather than to be actually read.

This movie plays with levels of reality, setting them up them subverting them. We are watching a troupe of young actors rehearsing a play. Normally when we watch a movie, we see actors acting characters. In this movie, we see actors acting characters who are actors, who are acting as  characters. Or is this a reality movie in which real actors are just playing themselves? In the movie, the director tells the actors to use their own names. The screen goes letterbox to show we are in the play within the play. Then the main character, kokoro, breaks the fourth wall and talks to us. Later, the producer tells the actors there are not enough ticket sales to go ahead with performances. In the background, a rapper with a guitarist, like a Greek chorus, comment on this action.
Unfortunately with all these games, there wasn't enough story or characterization to keep my interest.

I seem to have lost any sympathy and tolerance for the typical style of Japanese acting, in which everyone overacts like amateurs and yet never succeed in moving me. Somehow this story of a post-apocalyptic frozen world, in which a crowd of people are trying to survive while taking refuge in a school, couldn't keep my involvement beyond two episodes.

Kim Ki-duk's movies are allegories rather than real stories about real people. This one starts plausibly with a young man who stays in vacated houses, in return doing a bit of cleaning and repair work, but later on, the film spins off into pure fantasy. Part of the allegory is that the two main characters don't speak a word of dialogue to each other.

The world has more than enough videos that glamourize serial killers, and try to seduce us into voyeurism of terrified and suffering females, typically young and scantily clad. This series' claim to fame is its setting in the world of manga publishing, which we learn quite a lot about along the way. And so it could take its place with less violent series such as Juhan Shuttai and Shirobako. The usual crime plot techniques occur: there is someone behind the apparent perpetrator, a good character turns out to be bad. This one has an ending that is twee and unbelievable.

Asian funerals are such bafflingly convoluted and protracted rituals as to inspire several movies and dramas e.g. the Taiwanese "Little Big Women". This slice-of-life movie, mostly in Taiwanese, reminded me of "A Boy Named Flora A", except that the drama of the central character, was simply about the deceased's adult daughter fondly missing her father, nothing extraordinary. While the living mourners obediently perform their ritual functions under the preremptory instructions of the priest, and secretly expressing their doubts and scepticism to each other, there are several hilarious comic moments, but none of the raunchiness and drama of say, Itami Juzo's "The Funeral".

This sprawling movie begins like a documentary, with voice-over and text-over narration, backgrounding a Japan in economic turmoil after the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923, and political turmoil with the rise of socialism and anarchism, and the fascist authoritarian backlash. Many characters are introduced, including a group of young male anarchists who spend their time shouting at each other and botching assassination attempts, and a travelling troupe of female sumo wrestlers, who are at each others' throats as much off the ring as on. The sumo bouts are done well, in a long sequence that was as exciting as the male sumo tournaments I've seen on Japanese television. The women have taken up this life to escape dominating fathers and husbands, seeking the freedom they imagine in developing their strength, but it's illusory and only found in fleeting moments during bouts, as the forces of male authority outside the ring continue to impose on their lives. Apparently female sumo was popular among the proletariat for about a hundred years until about 1960. Eventually the movie focusses on a couple of the anarchists who connect with a couple of the women and hang around with the sumo troupe, and then the plot centres on the authorities' attempts to  cover up a recent massacre of Koreans. I hadn't connected with any of the characters or their story, wasn't enjoying the emotional and physical violence, and dropped this movie about 2/3 through.

This movie charts the history of Josee's encounter with Tsuneo, and near the end she reviews this journey from a childhood of darkness, to the now in which she has just enjoyed unspecified erotic delights with Tsuneo in an out-of-town love hotel. The darkness at the beginning results from the ignorance, fear and disgust of the populace towards disabled people, and the shaming and shameful care of her grandmother. We're never really given any understanding of Tsuneo's decision to start a relationship with Josee, nor at the end to leave her. While he is the catalyst that changes her life to one of independence and dignity, she has the internal resources from the outset, and the welfare system has always been available. Her childlike delight in discovering the outside world at last enchants him for a while, but he doesn't have the courage to face his family and fully commit himself to a life with her. It appears that she outgrows him, and he does not grow in himself to keep up, instead returning the petty past girlfriend who we know is a lesser person in every way than Josee.

Now I'm going to watch the anime for comparison. I suspect the sexiness will be downplayed.

More of the same.

You might think a movie about the creation of an alphabet, with quite a lot of discussion about linguistic matters, would appeal only to nerds, but this film was a delight. There are many moments of dry humour, some great drama, and even an constrained but sweet romance. It's a fine demonstration of how great ideas are formed: by throwing away the strictures of tradition, starting from scratch and basic principles, with sharp minds creating and debating to bring up the best ideas. Most of the time it's men butting heads, either the power-jealous traditionalists versus the innovators (not just intellectual but social), or the would-be rivals who bond over their quest for the most efficient idea. Of course the new alphabet is seen as empowering women, because men have always sought to prevent women from obtaining education, and this parallels the traditional phonetic script used by women in China. There's a thread of Korean national pride, against the Chinese and Japanese who each have persecuted Korea, but they are deservedly proud in the case of their alphabet which is, as far as I can see, the best in the world, in stark contrast to the Chinese and Japanese writing systems which are the most cumbersome.

Superb drama, a tale of family trauma and redemption over decades, ably presented by the actors and the make-up artists, in the setting of rakugo, traditional story-telling. The live-action and the anime version are both great versions of the original manga. The subtitles from drama addicts are highly informative.

The FL despite getting up to various kinky things on a regular basis with five separate sex partners, is sad and lonely, like all the characters in this drama, who remain unfulfilled sexually and romantically. Incongruously, or perhaps it congruous in Japanese culture, her manner is virginal and girlish, especially when it comes to any chance of romance with her work colleague. Despite the blurb suggesting she enjoys this active sexual life, in fact it's clear that for her it's only really in pursuit of a loving husband.

A strange performance, full of non-verbal and verbal non-sequiturs. Despite both ladies having previous same-sex relationship experience, they're oddly awkward with each other. The writer chose to put one of them in a wheelchair, and yet doesn't seem interested in exploring the consequences of this other than in a general disabled-person cliche sense. How does she get onto the bed etc? How does it affect their lovemaking? (They do make love on screen).

Hard to imagine what sort of person this movie would appeal to. It's stuffed with names and places, stereotyped ultra-masculine soldier types, and long boring discussions about military strategy that would only make sense if you have a detailed knowledge of Korean history and geography. The goodies are distinguished by being inscrutable; the baddies by being vicious and cruel. The good guys are briliiant; the bad guys are cunning.
At least I finished Roaring Currents. This one I gave up half way through.

This movie fails due to a scene of appalling poor taste in which jolly comedy music plays over a scene of full-on sexual assault. Said scene also has an attempted-comedy ending. At least the woman victim gets a chance to bash the perp who gets away with it otherwise scot-free, and the woman still achieves her success in the story.
Apart from that, it's a predictable romantic comedy plot. I only watched it through so I could practice swapping between Korean and Japanese, but a lot of the time the pronunciation by non-native speakers was poor, whether in Japanese, Korean, or English.

Typically sentimental Japanese movie, driven by dementia and the returning prodigal, featuring a struggling actress out-of-work who takes refuge in the rural setting, chestnut-harvesting. I think we're supposed to understand that this experience makes her a better actress, although the movie doesn't make it clear.

I have minimal experience of reality tv. I couldn't imagine how the cameras were able to film what appeared to be unscripted and intimate conversations between each of the three couples, not only in their homes but on location.
Is a program like this preaching to the choir? At first I thought the MCs were just padding, but I see that they model curiosity and acceptance, which may be helpful for undecided viewers. The ideas expressed here were commonplace a few decades ago in the west, so it's wonderful to see that Koreans are taking on board this acceptance and freedom.
All members of the three pairs of couples were able to speak thoughtfully and insightfully about their life and their relationship. Their emotional intelligence surprised me, which indicates that the conversations in Korean dramas between lovers and with parents have still failed to capture the way real Koreans talk.
As a lover of Korean dramas, the Korean language, and the country (I've travelled around there twice), this program informed me a lot about families, relationships, and how Korean perceive and think about emotions.

Comedy poking fun by exagerating the already-exagerated cliche of young would-be lovers being terrified to express their feelings for each other, leading to unnecessary misunderstandings which of course further impede any chance of a connexion. I couldn't make it to the end.

Short episodes and a short run, tells the story of two women neighbours who meet and find mutual pleasure in cooking/consuming. Along the way, one realises she has always been lesbian, and thanks to an accepting and encouraging co-worker and some affirmative websites, comes to terms with this without fuss and looks to the future with optimism and confidence regardless of what the neighbour will think. The series concludes without a confession, which demands a sequel. There's a background of childhood unhappiness for both (one regarding no interest in boys, one regarding her brother being favored over her to the point of not getting enough food), which gives some substance to an otherwise light program.

A bloodthirsty and horrific pair of interwoven tales of betrayal, revenge, macabre love, and violent justice. The stories that are told in rakugo performances, here enacted before our eyes, complete with ghastly transformations and spraying blood.

Not to my taste, but done expertly.

Often feels like it is scripted, directed, and acted by teenagers, but what it lacks in logic and consistency, it makes up with teenage enthusiasm. It depicts a teenage character pretending to run a company, but rather than being the dutiful granddaughter she  affects in some background scenes, to the dominating grandmother who cast out her older sisters (one because she is lesbian), and in the face of her own absolute rule of no in-house dating (and basic good sense and business ethics), she's preoccupied with pursuing the newbie on the team, although with a confusingly tsundere approach.

Said newbie, despite her hero-worship and presumed inexperience in love, is quite capable of seeing through her boss's curt manner,  and confidently joins in the flirtation games as things ramp up. By episode 5 there are intensely erotic kisses, which are well ahead of anything we've seen on Korean and Japanese TV, and of course leave China in limbo. It's going to be a challenge to wrap up this level of energy in five more episodes in any kind of satisfactory way, and it will probably take the combined energy of these two lovers to overcome the tyrannical grandmother, although not necessarily by force or defiance, but maybe the power of their love?

Screenwriter 문지원 in Innocent Witness, had her character the teenage autistic girl, sadly admit that she realised she could never become a lawyer. In this drama, the writer fulfills that wish, based on the necessity that the lawyer has to be very intelligent with a brilliant memory for law.  The character is very convincing, due to 박은빈, who has already proven she is an expert actress with range, clearly having done real-life research. The legal stories are complex and morally ambiguous. 

The biggest flaw IMHO was the love story, as charming as it was.  If Lee Jun Ho was just a nice guy, he would have befriended Young Woo, but not fallen for her. It would have been more believable if we knew of something in his own background that made him attune to her emotional struggles, and want to make the effort to become closer with her.

Several plot threads were left hanging, suggesting the writer is hoping for a 2nd season.

Beautiful subtitles by nuve, a generally lively travel tale of frustrated women seeking independence and empowerment. A sort of light-hearted version of one of my favorite Japanese movies, Kakekomi. Almost ruined by the obtrusive modern music soundtrack (just like the historical Spanish drama Cable Girls). Surely something traditional, pseudo-traditional, or even just less-obtrusive modern music would have been a better choice?

Three no-hoper small-town blokes fritter away time, and then an over-eager city family move in from Tokyo. But by half-way through and nothing of note had occured, I wasn't enjoying the characters nor the story, and gave up.