synthesis of the harsh realism Ryoo displayed in Die Bad and the commercial elements of his later work. ( Kyu Hyun Kim ) King and the Clown The closing days of 2005 saw the debut of a rather different sort of Korean blockbuster. I doubt another viewing will sway me towards a greater appreciation for Love Talk, but I've been surprised before. Regrettably, Antarctic Journal never makes up its mind about whether to stick to genre conventions or not. Whatever we feel about the character he portrays, Jang's performance is so real and natural that we can't help but be drawn to him. Many of these releases were only on a single screen, and attendance tended to be light, however for many micro-budget films even a single screen can make a difference. Few filmmakers adopt such a strategy, though Atom Egoyan's The Sweet Hereafter (1997) comes to mind as another example of a film with its emotional climax in the middle, rather than the end. "I couldn't go on doing nothing or the dyad "I love you You're talking rubbish although well rooted in a specific context in a particular scene, could just as easily float through any of Hong's films and find just as believable a spot elsewhere. Anything but food or drugs.

Hong's characters are constantly struggling between either/or's -.g., life/death, "clean unclean intimacy/isolation, love-me/love-me-not - that wallpaper their lives. And the fact that Lee flips the gender code switch by coupling female masculinity with metrosexuality makes it all the more endearing and fascinating to watch. Jangsaeng, played by Gam Woo-sung ( Spider Forest possesses a disarming self-confidence and disrespect for authority that seems likely to get him into trouble one day. Director Park has accomplished this. Even though Lieutenant Pyo does his share of neurotic eye-twitch, Shin is allowed to play him with a bit of mustachioed machismo and without relying too much on his typical "sensitive soul" characterization. Apparently there were three other characters whose deeper lives were cut from the film.