Reviews

Slight spoilers.

What's certain is that Gassman, like Cary Grant in Hitchcock's timeless classic «North by Northwest» (1959), is the innocent man on the run after getting caught up in some spy racket. Gassman, along with former Bond villain Adolfo Celi and their respective wives, come to Sestriere to spend Christmas at the skiing resort. He's attracted to a Romanian blonde, in the Eva Marie Saint role, and before you know it, a mysterious man dies in his arms and he's whisked off to Cairo seated next to former Bond babe Daniela Bianchi on the plane.

Not the most common plot development in a skiing movie, surely, but at least Sestriere to Cairo is south by southeast on the map.

Gassman tries in vain to talk himself out of his predicament, playing his stock character who grumbles about the state of the world, polite to your face, but derogatory in a very Italian way as soon as you turn your back. He finds himself escaping from agents and double agents all over Egypt all because of some sinister world domination scheme. There's even a couple of car chases at the market and in the desert. Definitely not what I expected from a skiing movie.

And speaking of. I'm about to clock in at 6 500 movies, but this is the first time I've seen an action sequence in a ski lift. And a near-death experience by rolling logs of timber in the skiing slopes. And a kidnapping where two beautiful blondes in Santa Claus costumes drag poor Gassman into the back of their reindeer sled, drugging him and shuffling him off while he waves frantically. If I was ever to get kidnapped myself, it rather sounds like a good way to go.

Anyway. This is your typical 60s spy spoof. No more. No less. David Niven in "Where the Spies Are" (1965). Rod Taylor in "The Liquidator" (1965). There really were a lot of these.

This is a nice little thriller with an intricate plot that's almost impossible to outline without spoiling something. I suppose that in itself is a spoiler. But anyway.

Kang Ha-neul plays a 20-something student, Jin-seok, who, along with his big brother and their parents, move into a new house. He's a hypersensitive guy, having nightmares and hearing strange sounds. One rainy night, his brother is shuffled into a van by unknown assailants, only to return 19 days later, having no memory of his disappearance. Jin-seok, however, begins to notice changes in his brother's behaviour. You know. Alarming ones. Enough for him to follow his brother out into the streets at night, and so on.

The plot unravels from there, with time-tried things like scenes where Jin-seok approaches a door, while we see his feet, his fingers reaching for the doorknob, etc. This dates all the way back to thrillers like Hitchcock's "Suspicion" (1941), when Joan Fontaine wondered if Cary Grant was a murderer. Or a little like David Fincher's "Gone Girl" (2014) for that matter.

The movie is well-made as a genre exercise with touches of horror. Korean productions usually have a very Korean flavour, steeped in Korean sentiments (for lack of a better word), but this movie should be more «accessible» to an international audience. I'm not surprised it was picked up by Netflix, with little and easy dialogue, and a focus on a strong plot. And even if you know that there will be twists and turns, there should be something unexpected along the way.

PS: The Korean title translates as something like "The Night to Remember" or "Remember the Night". It is definitely more fitting than the generic English title ("Forgotten").

PPS: A note on the touches of horror. One scene involves TV footage featuring US President Donald Trump (with Korean president Moon Jae-in). Sure looks like horror.

The kings of Joseon are almost exclusively portrayed either as genuine twits or tyrant rulers who abuse their powers. The king, as played by Lee Sun-gyun in "The King's Case Note", comes off as a rather happy-go-lucky leader who acts like Sherlock Holmes and even knows a few magic tricks. Any resemblance to factual persons, living or dead, is definitely accidental.

This king, therefore, personally neutralises the threat of the usual plot to overthrow him. He does this alongside his own dr. Watson, the pie-faced eunuch Yoon (Ahn Jae-hong), who comes to the palace as a "royal historian" to keep a record of the king's movements. Yoon has a photographic memory to boot. The king calls him Obo, meaning Five Steps, because that's as far from the king as he is permitted to be. Yoon actually gets "promoted" to Sambo (Three Steps) later.

The plot, as the say, is slight. There is the obligatory old men's club of bearded conspirators who sit in darkly lit rooms, simply because, I guess, they have traditions to uphold. The main villain, played by veteran bad guy Kim Hee-won, is so evil that he even slices a maid in half simply for overhearing them. They want to replace the king to gain control of the country's trade. Or something to that affect. Yes, they're from the north. And yes, the movie does have a scene where assassins jump over the palace walls in the darkness with tom-tom- toms on the soundtrack. This is in every Korean period piece. Every single one.

The king and his eunuch remains in focus, though, and together they make this a Korean comedy that does not contain tragic melodrama. Or a love story. Or women in general. The king performs an autopsy. He even explains scientifically how a witch or shaman makes her bottles rattle (they supposedly contain human souls). The king also wants to catch a Nessie-like "ghost fish" wreaking havoc in northern rivers, which means that we get to see the king laid back on the boat with a fishing rod in his hand, to the pluck-pluck notes of a gayageum on the soundtrack. Sure sounds like a first in a period piece.

The two main characters only have to change names and professions to make this movie another instalment in the Detective K-series with Kim Myung-min and Oh Dal-soo. I liked it. It has a lighter and different approach to the material, with little violence, and no sex or nudity. And it would be kind of cool to have this guy as my king.

"Plan Man" stars Jung Jae-young as a 40ish Librarian who suffers from a severe obsessive-compulsive disorder. His daily routines follow a rigorous time-table in every aspect, and besides he's obsessed with keeping things clean and avoiding germs. In fact, his lifestyle makes Hercule Poirot look positively untidy.

He has, however, a soft spot for an apparently equally tidy girl who works at the local 7-Eleven, which he visits during lunch hour at the same time every day. Then fate steps in, as he crosses paths with the girl's sister, a carefree club singer who dreams of attending an Idol type singing contest.

The movie is a fusion of genres as always in Korean cinema, with some romance, some melodrama and a few laughs, some of which involve the psychiatrist and the patients in a therapy group which the plan man attends twice a week.

There's also a huge emotional payoff, triggered by the appearance of an ex-game show host who recognises the plan man as the wonder child with an IQ of 200 who once visited his show.

Jung Jae-young fares well in the title role by making the character sympathetic despite his nervous stuttering and slight panic every time someone messes up his plans. Like John Cleese in "Clockwise" (1986), he gets plenty of opportunity to "lose it".

The movie is as slick as an artificial studio production from the 50s or 60s, and it's not particularly profound, but I thought it was good fun.

The Koreans have gotten good at producing solid thrillers from B-Movie material hammered to death in other titles over the years. "Montage" is no exception.

The movie opens as the statute of limitations is about to expire on a 15 year old kidnapping case. Single mom Ha-kyeong (UHM Jeong-hwa) lost her daughter. The perpetrator appears to still be around, however, leaving flowers at the site, and police detective Cheong-ho (KIM Sang-kyeong) makes one last attempt at catching him. He comes real close, sitting across from the guy in a cafe, but time expires. Then another child is abducted, following the exact same pattern as 15 years earlier, sending the movie off on a fascinating turn of events.

I left the movie with a sly grin on my face, marveling at how the whole thing in fact was put together. This plot is worth following.

The movie also has a lot in common both in style and themes with the equally impressive "Confession of Murder" (2012), which also concerns the statute of limitations.

I'll admit I have a soft spot for thrillers like this one. The movie is fast, it's smart, and there's no shocking violence, no nudity, no super hero doing mindless action, and the Asian melodramatics are kept to a minimum.

In fact, this is a good, honest thriller with the story at its core.