I’ve been a follower of Asian cinema now for a long time, and I realised that I haven’t seen a guide or recommendation list for Asian cinema for newcomers to the scene.
So, here is my stripped-down list of Asian movies (Japanese, Chinese and Korean) you really should watch. They are in no set order, but I’m not including Anime for the timebeing – afterall, thats an entirely new blog. :)
(Apologies for the rather insanely-long blog!)
Title: Oldboy
Director: Chan-Wook Park
Synopsis: Based on Japanese manga of the same name by Minegishi Nobuaki and Tsuchiya Garon, this is part of Chan-Wook Park’s “Vengence Trilogy”.
A man is inexplicably abducted, and held prisoner for 15 years. Once released (again, without reason), he has 5 days to find out why he was abducted, and by who.
Verdict: An awesome shocker of a movie – this kept me firmly in my seat right the way though, and in doing so, has secured a place in my top 10 movies of all time.
Title: Ring aka Ringu
Director: Hideo Nakata
Synopsis: Within a week of watching a mysterious videotape, a group of teenagers are dead. The bodies are found gruesomely contorted, their eyes frozen as if they had seen something more terrifying than any physical threat. The video then becomes an urban myth.
Verdict: You have most likely heard of The Ring, in one form or another. The Cult classic has seen two successful (although inferior) remakes for the US market. However Hideo Nakata’s original is still much more chilling, as well as the two sequels.
There are several versions of Ring, including Korean movie “The Ring Virus”… however Nakata’s stands above them all.
Title: Hard Boiled
Director: John Woo
Synopsis: Inspector Yuen, nicknamed ‘Tequila’, is a courageous cop who shoots from both hips, never reloads and never misses. A tough guy with a soft spot and infinite charm, Tequila is the only man for the job of cleaning up the city, and when his partner is killed in a spectacular shoot-out, he decides to take the investigation into his own lethal hands.
Verdict: Without “Hard Boiled”, we would have no Die Hard – Woo’s Hong Kong gunfight extravaganza is without a doubt an awesome movie, and helped to cement Chow Yun Fat’s career as an action star. With a bodycount this big, you can’t pass up this movie.
Title: Casshern
Director: Kazuaki Kiriya
Synopsis: After the planet has been ravaged by chemical, biological and even nuclear weapons and the entire human race is dispirited and exhausted by half a century of war between Europa and the Eastern Federation.
The only hope for long term survival lies with geneticist Dr. Azuma and his breakthrough ‘neo-cell’ treatment that is accidentally used to resurrect Dr. Azuma’s dead son, who is brought back to life as legendary hero Casshern.
Verdict: I threw this in for the Anime fans, as its prettymuch as close to the ridiculous anime action you can get in a live action movie. The visuals are amazing, and the fight sequences will make your jaw drop. However I’d recommend watching this on a biiiig tv!
Title: In The Mood For Love
Director: Wong Kar-Wai
Synopsis: Hong Kong, 1962. Chow (Tony Leung) is a junior newspaper editor with an elusive wife. His new neighbour Li-zhen (Maggie Cheung) is a secretary whose husband seems to spend all his time on business trips. They become friends, making the lonely evenings more bearable. As their relationship develops they make a discovery that changes their lives forever…
Verdict: In this sumptuous exploration of desire, internationally acclaimed director Wong Kar-Wai creates a world of sensuality and longing that will leave you breathless.
‘In the Mood for Love’ has seduced audiences and critics alike, winning awards at Cannes 2000 for best actor, cinematography and editing.
Title: Ju-On
Director: Takashi Shimizu
Synopsis: An eerie tale of a family who is brutally killed in their own home, leaving behind an evil spirit lurking in the shadows. When an unknowing homecare worker enters, the spirit is awakened and a terrifying chain of events begins, passing through all who step foot in this dark house.
Verdict: Known in the west as “The Grudge”, Ju-On is another Asian movie that has spawned American remakes. Ju-On differs from the Ring in this aspect as the same Director helmed both the Japanese and American versions of the movie. As a result, the American remakes stand up surprisingly well to the originals. I would recommend both versions, but for purists, you need to see the Japanese version first.
Title: Sympathy for Mr Vengence
Director: Chan-Wook Park
Synopsis: A deaf mute worker saves all his money for his sister who requires a kidney transplant. He has the wrong blood type to be able to donate one of his kidneys, so he arranges a trade with a group of organ dealers: one of his kidneys, and 10 million won, in return for their finding a kidney for his sister. However, a legitimate kidney becomes available for transplant. Unfortunately, he no longer has the 10 million won required for the hospital to perform the operation. He and his girlfriend, a terrorist seeking to change how the poor are treated in Korea, kidnap his former boss’s daughter. But events spiral quickly out of control…
Verdict: Another part of the “Vengence Trilogy”, this movie spawned a sequel in the form of “Lady Vengence”… and as all movies in the trilogy, this is a must see. Sad, dark, depressive and fascinating at he same time, along with cold violence, I can’t recommend this movie enough.
Title: Lady Vengence
Director: Chan-Wook Park
Synopsis: Intense and inventive, the film follows the progress of beautiful, impassive Lee Geum-ja (Lee Young-Ae) after she’s released from prison having served 13 years for the kidnap and murder of a young boy.
Once on the outside, she hooks up with some former cellmates, a preacher who thinks she’s an angel, the detective who originally arrested her and the daughter she gave up for adoption, gathering around her all the people needed to carry out an elaborate plan of revenge.
Verdict: The third, and final part of the “Vengence Trilogy”, Korean director Chan-Wook Park makes the series indispensable with Lady Vengence. This is striking and ghoulishly entertaining stuff, a highwire act poised between horror, tragedy, comedy and exploitation. Often brutal, sick, and shocking…. Lady Vengence does the rest of the trilogy proud.
Title: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
Director: Ang Lee
Synopsis: Martial arts masters Li Mu Bai (Chow Yun-Fat) and Shu Lien (Michelle Yeoh) battle against evil forces to recover their stolen sword, the legendary Green Destiny.
Verdict: If you haven’t seen this movie, you must have been hibernating for the past few years. Ang Lee’s masterpiece pays homage to the martial arts movies of old in this majestic, and action-packed epic. Beautiful scenery, a touching story along with kick-ass martial arts make this a must see for any action or martial arts fan.
Title: Hero
Director: Zhang Yimou
Synopsis: In pre-Imperial China, feared warrior Nameless (Jet Li) is granted an audience with the ruler of the most powerful of the seven warring kingdoms (Chen Daoming). Posing as a minor official, Nameless sets about his mission of revenge by relating the tale of how he defeated the three most fearsome of the ruler’s adversaries. However, nothing is as it seems and Nameless is placed in great personal peril as the king suggests a very different version of events which brought him to the palace…
Verdict: If you liked Crouching Tiger, Hero is right up your street… Although I see Hero as a more action-packed version. Again, the movie is jaw-droppingly beautiful, and the choreography of the fight sequences is just amazing.
My highlight has to be the Jet Lee vs Donnie Yen fight though.
Title: Ong Bak
Director: Prachya Pinkaew
Synopsis: When the head of a statue sacred to a village is stolen, a dutiful but endearingly naive young martial artist is charged to go to the big city and finds himself taking on the underworld to retrieve it…
Verdict: Tony Jaa is on fire in this movie – and best of all… all the stunts in Ong Bak are real. No stunt doubles, no wires. No CGI. Its all Jaa’s ability. That being said… the story of Ong Bak is a little on the weak side, and it does take a little while to get going properly. However Jaa’s acrobatics and fight sequences are definitely worth waiting for.
Title: Audition
Director: Takashi Miike
Synopsis: ‘Audition’ is an eerie tale of a man (Ryo Ishibashi) who, in his search for a new wife at the insistence of his son, holds an audition for potential mates. He disguises his actual intentions by saying that the audition is for an actress to star in a new movie that he is making. When at last he finds the perfect woman (the model Eihi Shiina), she disappears, leaving a bizarre trail of gruesome murders in her path…
Verdict: One of the first grusome Asian movies I saw, and one of the movies that got me hooked. Audition is definitely one of the more disturbing that I’ve seen, and yet so simplistic in plot. Executed on screen brilliantly by Ishibashi & Shiina… you’re missing out if you don’t see this.
Title: Battle Royale
Director: Kinji Fukasaku
Synopsis: At the dawn of the new millennium, Japan is in a state of near-collapse. Unemployment is at an all-time high, and violence amongst the nation’s youth is spiralling out of control. With school children boycotting their lessons and physically abusing their teachers, a beleagured and near-defeated government decides to introduce a radical new measure: the Battle Royale Act.
Overseen by a former teacher, (Takeshi Kitano), and requiring that a randomly chosen school class be taken to a deserted island and forced to fight each other to the death, the Act dictates that only one pupil be allowed to survive the punishment.
Verdict: Another one of the first Asian movies that really got me into the genre. Battle Royale is original, funny and disturbing all at the same time. You’ll also recognise a young Chiaki Kuriyama (GoGo in Kill Bill Vol. 1) among the cast of schoolhchildren.
The sequel “Battle Royale 2: Requiem” is fairly lacklustre however, but still worth a watch to see how the “winners” from the first movie get on.
Title: Drunken Master
Director: Yuen Wo Ping
Synopsis: Wong Fei Hung (Jackie Chan) is sent to train under his uncle, a wine-guzzling master famous for crippling his students. Desperate to escape this brutal teacher’s cruel regime, he flees, but is confronted, humiliated and beaten senseless by a hired assassin (Hwang Jang Lee). Angry, ashamed, hungry for revenge, the wayward Fei Hung returns to his drunken master…
Verdict: Jackie Chan at his best, and directed by master choreographer Yuen Wo Ping (The Matrix, Iron Monkey), Drunken Master is just pure awesomeness in a can. Playing the legendary Wong Fei Hung (Jet Lee also played Fei Hung in the “Once Upon A Time In China” movies), Jackie Chan is just amazing on screen, and has all the humour and vitality he does today.
Title: Seven Samurai
Director: Akira Kurosawa
Synopsis: A desperate village hires seven samurai to protect it from marauders in this crown jewel of Japanese cinema.
Verdict: Kurosawa’s masterpiece still stands up against scrutiny today. An awesome spectacle of a movie, and the basis for many movies including Sergio Leone’s “Magnificent Seven”. No other film so seamlessly weaves philosophy and entertainment, delicate human emotions and relentless action. The Epic lasts 3 hours, but its not the kind of movie where you realise you’re ass is numb. ;)
Title: Police Story (1985)
Director: Jackie Chan
Synopsis: An honest cop on the run from a false murder charge with dynamic visuals and full-blooded fight action which is electrified with emotional underscoring.
Verdict: A simple storyline, yet unrelenting retina-scorching action make Police Story a must see. It has since spawned several sequels, including a remake directed by Benny Chan (still starring Jackie Chan thankfully).
Winner of the ‘Best Picture’ and ‘Best Action Choreography’ Awards at the 1985 Hong Kong Film Festival, ‘Police Story’ is regarded by fans and critics alike as the apex of Jackie Chan’s celebrated career. Breaking new ground with its breathtaking fights and stunt sequences, it very quickly became a standard-bearer for Hong Kong Cinema all over the World.
Title: Infernal Affairs
Director: Andrew Lau ; Alan Mak
Synopsis: A mole in the police force. An undercover cop inside the criminal organisation. The objective is the same: each must discover the other before their own position is exposed. Who will succeed and who will pay the ultimate price for their failure?
Verdict: This is one of my all-time favorites. Infernal Affairs again spawned American remakes in the form of Martin Scorcese’s “The Departed” released in 2006. A gripping police Hong Kong police thriller, starring Andy Lau and Tony Leung, the super-stylish ‘Infernal Affairs’ was the biggest grossing Hong Kong film of 2002. Watch it now… and you’ll see why.
Title: A Tale Of Two Sisters
Director: Kim Ji-woon
Synopsis: When sisters Su-mi (Lim Soo-jeong) and Su-yeon (Mun Geun-yeong) return home from a sanitarium having supposedly recovered their health, their stepmother Eun-joo (Yum Jung-ah) welcomes them back. However, elder sister Su-mi intentionally avoids her and younger sibling Su-yeon shows a smack of fear for her.
Soon, strange things begin to happen in the house. Footsteps are heard and Eun-joo’s birds are mysteriously poisoned. Assuming Su-yeon is behind the inauspicious incidents, the stepmother locks her in the closet, and when Su-mi learns about the cruel punishment, conflict between the stepmother and two sisters becomes more bitter than ever…
Verdict: This is a quirky, and yet unsettling movie, and seen by some as an aquired taste. Its slow to start, but things quickly get more and more eerie, and as you near the end of the movie, you’re quickly asking yourself whats going on. However, the acting and cinematography is excellent. So if you can get past the slightly confusing plot, then you should find yourself enjoying this movie immensely.
Title: The Eye
Director: Danny Pang ; Oxide Pang
Synopsis: At the age of two, Mun went blind. After eighteen years in darkness, she is given the chance of a risky corneal transplant operation. When the bandages are taken off, Mun’s eyes respond to the light around her and it appears that the surgery has been successful. However, when Mun experiences a series of inexplicable and chilling encounters with mysterious strangers, she fears that her newly restored eyesight has brought a different kind of darkness into her life.
Verdict: The Eye is a damn decent horror movie – one I can see having an American remake at some point. This movie reminds me of a Shaun Hutson book (I forget the title) where after a man is blinded he gets a cornea transplant from a serial killer, and is able to see auras around people that are going to die soon.
The Eye has some nice touches, and is subtle in its horror. The storyline is simple, yet effective… and the acting is decent. I’d definitely recommend this. However I haven’t yet seen either of the two sequels “The Eye 2″ or “The Eye: Infinity”.
Title: Tetsuo: Iron Man
Director: Shinya Tsukamoto
Synopsis: Concerning itself with a young man’s gradual mutation into a metal-being, the film takes a surreal journey into a dark and disturbing world where D.I.Y. body transformations and post-human women with deadly robot arms form the fabric of a strange new reality.
Verdict: One of the earliest Asian cinema movies to be released in the West, Tetsuo is striking and often twisted – the fact the movie is in black & white only helps to accentuate that.
Likened to the work of Lynch and Cronenberg, Tetsuo moulds explosive violence, bizarre sexual imagery and jet-black humour into a cinematic experience like you’ve never seen before.
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Thank you for taking the time to read my list of the 20 Asian cinema movies I recommend you watch.Obviously this is an opinion, and I would very much like you to voice yours… so please comment!
Post your recommendations for additions to the list and let me know why (after all, there may be some I haven’t seen, and you’ll influence me to go and buy them!)
I hope you’ve enjoyed your read, and found it informative, useful, enjoyable etc.
Jay
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