Crazy, Beautiful You (Philippines: 2015): Princess Selfish meets a Cinderfella

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A romantic comedy that probably was designed to cash in on the popularity of the “KathNiel” pairing, Crazy, Beautiful You doesn’t stray much from the Poor Boy/Rich Girl love story formula. However, the leads do produce a certain amount of warmth together that may make it worthwhile for fans of the RomCom genre and not just the couple.

Rating:
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Kundo: Age of the Rampant (Korea: 2014)

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Jung-woo Ha: the clear-eyed, incorruptible, horse-hung butcher for justice.

Jung-woo Ha and Dong-won Kang shine in this period-action film about a clash of two men cast aside by Joeseon society. Director Jong-bin Yoon pulls Kundo together from a mix of styles, heavy on the Spaghetti western, but true to contempory Korean martial arts action. Overall, the film stays light and fun, but the slow exposition over the 137 minute run time keeps this good film from greatness.

Rating

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Secretly, Greatly (Korea: 2013): Identity-crisis and action genres step on each other in otherwise entertaining film

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Brief Review

The comic book origins of the story are never more apparent than in the clashing final confrontation scenes of Secretly, Greatly, Chul-soo Jang’s action-comedy-drama about North Korean super spies. The different cinematic requirements of  drama and action are kept in check until the final 20 minutes, when they stumble over each other, making for a relatively disappointing finish to an otherwise entertaining film.

Rating

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