People in the Slum: Once a Crook

If you're rich and you get caught doing a crime, what of it? Money can clean up your reputation over time. But if you're poor, no such luck. Shoplift and you're branded for life. So when pickpocket Kim Ju-seok (Ahn Sung-ki) gets busted for petty theft, his life is more or less ruined in perpetuity. He'll do his time in prison. He'll have a temporarily faithful wife Myeong-suk (Kim Bo-yeon) and a spitfire of a son (Cheon Dong-seok). He'll even get a job as a taxi driver. But ultimately, his life is doomed because from hereon, should anything bad happens in his vicinity, he's going to get fingered for it.

Such is the world of Bae Chang-ho's People in the Slum, a film parable in which one young man's "bad luck" seems to taint the lives of everyone around him. Even his mother-in-law dies early. Maybe the preacher who's now a local junk-seller (Song Jae-ho) escapes his shadow but the former holy man keeps his distance. As the crook's former wife puts it "I love you but I'm tired" and "I'm scared something bad's going to happen when you're around." That's why she stays with a drunk (Kim Hee-ra) instead. Misfortune has a shelf-life. When it passes the expiration date, it's a curse. And a curse is catching.

Pursuit of Death: The Opposite of Bromance

Imagine spending your whole life hating someone. And not just hating them but chasing them. And not just chasing them for your entire adult life but in this prolonged, decades-spanning process, sacrificing everything that really matters: Your wife, your child, your career, your reputation, your eyesight, your health... Is it worth it? It certainly doesn't appear to be in Im Kwon-taek's Pursuit of Death (a.k.a. Jagko). As the former cop (Choi Yun-seok) hounds a Communist rebel (Kim Hee-ra) across decades, only to end up widowed with stomach cancer and a limp, this film's protagonist is neither particularly sympathetic nor heroic. He's suffering from an obsession that suggests some unresolved childhood trauma but what that might be I haven't a clue.

His adversary (Kim Hee-ra) isn't much better. A roaming womanizer who contracts VD and poisons his nemesis with mercury scraped from a mirror, this guy is downright mean despite his luck with the ladies — who frankly are the only other characters that are developed at all. Pursuit of Death's focus is narrow: We meet a taxicab driver, a former fellow officer, a check-in doctor at the rehab center where the leads meet and match wits but they're all largely expendable. The musical interlude in which most of the rehab center patients sing favorite songs from their past isn't informative so much as bizarre.

Director Im has made over a hundred films in a career that spans over half a century. Some of these movies — such as Hanji and Revivre — are quite good. Others — like this one — not so much.

Bloody Tie: When the B in B-Movie Means Best

Dirty cops. Dirty crooks. Dirty government officials. Dirty whores. Dirty family members. Dirty, dirty, dirty. Everyone is dirty in Choi Ho's splendidly sordid, little thriller Bloody Tie. Shee-yit, even the settings are dirty — the tawdry karaoke bars, the barren underground parking lots, the ramshackle, low-rent housing, the waterfront's rotting docks... And amid this miasma, a nastily sycophantic relationship emerges between a not-as-bright-as-he-thinks-he-is police lieutenant (Hwang Jeong-min) and a sometimes-clueless, sometimes-crafty drug dealer (Ryu Seung-beom) on the make. They're both trying to screw each other while promising to help each other so you know they're bound to hurt each other but who knew their pain could be so intoxicating?

With its blaxploitation soundtrack, random hyper-violence, and chopped-up, socked-up camerawork, Bloody Tie feels like a B-movie defiantly harkening back to its low-budget roots; it's a movie that raises its fist for the disillusioned fuck-ups, the lost causes and the stay-true ethic. You'll root for the corrupt cop and the messed up meth dealer as well as the frenemy uncle (Kim Hee-ra) and the broken-hearted addict (Chu Ja-hyeon). Each of them is fighting unbeatable odds. Each of them is a loser you'd like to see win. Just once. But they can't all win. So the question is will any of them?

The material is pulpy. The acting, hammy. Both Hwan and Ryu give stares that could burn through steel and erupt in laughs that could get them committed to the psych ward. If you're craving subtler work by either actor, you can find it elsewhere. I recommend that you take a moment and appreciate that they put the realism aside and just acted the HELL out of this script. I named this blog Korean Grindhouse for a reason. I adore movies and performances like this! And you can sense that the performers are enjoying it, too.