8. Arranged Love
In this good version of Crazy Rich Asians, runaway bride and orphaned Meera reluctantly flies back to her native India -- with fake husband in tow -- in order to trick her aunt and uncle into believing that she's satisfied the terms for receiving her inheritance. Will she get the funds needed to save her startup? Will a real wedding be in her near-future? Where does her actual boyfriend fit into all of this? Homecoming shenanigans ensue in Crazy Rich South Asians (if you will).
7. Bachna Ae Haseeno
Raj Sharma's love life begins innocently enough when he meets naive and equally inexperienced Mahi on a train to Switzerland. When Mahi misses her train after a stop, Raj offers to get her to the airport, which gives the two teens an opportunity to get to know one another and consequently allows them to discover first love and share a first kiss. Unfortunately, this fling leads to heartbreak for sheltered Mahi.
Raj then recounts that he'd achieved the perfect life years later: a job as a videogame designer for Microsoft and a live-in model girlfriend (Radhika). Life soon gets even better. He's offered a job working on "Halo". However, accepting the job, in Sydney, Australia, means leaving India -- and Radhika -- behind. And though Radhika volunteers to give up her career in order to follow her man, Raj isn't as committed to the relationship. After the two quickly become engaged, Raj catches a flight to the land down under while Radhika waits for him in her wedding dress at City Hall.
Five years later, Raj meets part-time cab driver and full-time business school student Gayatri. Though Gayatri's aversion to marriage mirrors his own, Raj falls hard and proposes. And the ladies' man catches the love boomerang squarely in the chest when his lady-love says no. He then puts himself through his own 12-step program in order to recover from the heartbreak and decides to seek forgiveness from both Mahi and Radhika -- no matter the cost.
Bachna really is a relatable look at relationships in different stages of life, complete with an examination of the emotional toll that comes with being careless with other people's feelings. It's a treat for those unfamiliar with Indian cinema and Bollywood connoisseurs alike.
6. Slumdog Millionaire
How far would you go to reconnect with the one that got away? Eighteen-year-old Jamal Malik decided that his best bet to get that old thang back was to compete on (the Indian version of) "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?, the most popular game show in the world, because if he could manage to stay on long enough she'd eventually see him. Right? Plus, if he won he'd also be rich. So, you know, win-win.
5. The Warrior's Way
Asian immigrants have a long and storied history in the American West and as a consequence, they have played a role in many a Western -- not all of them respectful. Warrior's plays around with the Western stereotype of Asians and turns it on its head.
The story centers on a legendary swordsman who makes his way across the Pacific Ocean out of necessity when he disobeys an order given by the head of his clan. He eventually settles in a town and into precisely the job anyone familiar with the genre would expect him to have -- the operator of the town laundromat. But this particular laundry operator only took the job in order to blend in and begin a new life. He doesn't even know what he's doing. His expertise lies not in cleaning clothes but in splattering blood on them. So when the local gunslingers come around looking for victims things gets messy.
4. #Alive
A zombie apocalypse would naturally consist of hotspots throughout the globe. We've already gotten great movies about walking corpses (or in some cases, humans suffering from weaponized rabies) in locations as diverse as Manhattan (I Am Legend), Los Angeles (Quarantine), London, Manchester (28 Days Later), Philadelphia, Jerusalem and Wales (World War Z). Now we have an idea of what an undead outbreak would look like in South Korea.
Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, movie lovers have compared it to zombie apocalypse fiction, what with the global spread of a lethal virus and mass quarantining. Well, #Alive makes that argument better than any film that's come before. Many zombie films feature worldwide infections and some even focus on the isolation of the survivors but #Alive is the first to so acutely examine the struggles of protagonists voluntarily confined to their respective homes.
During a live stream, other players alert student and avid gamer Oh Joon-woo to troubling news reports of people behaving strangely in Seoul, South Korea. After hearing an explosion, he takes a look outside of his apartment window only to witness what initially appears to be rioting on the street down below. When Joon-woo notices a young girl savagely attack and subsequently eat her own mother, he locks his front door. However, a neighbor tricks him into taking a peek outside, at which time the stranger forces his way in and begs for sanctuary. Realizing that the guy's been bitten by one of the infected and informed of the danger this poses by news reports, Joon-woo wants him out immediately. But before he can carry out the eviction, he witnesses the stranger transform from a rational person to a mindless killing machine right before his eyes.
SPOILER ALERT
After forcing his former neighbor into the hallway, Joon-woo is faced with another challenge: worrying about his family, who'd all left for the day prior to the outbreak. Realizing that he has little-to-no cellphone reception, he inventories what little food is in the apartment (Joon-woo failed to heed his mother's advice to go grocery shopping earlier in the day) and resigns himself to life inside his bubble.
Eventually, and through much effort, Joon-woo learns that his family has been attacked -- and likely killed -- at his father's office. Out of food and mourning his family, a despondent Joon-woo attempts to hang himself. But with his head in the noose he learns that another neighbor has survived. Joon-woo and a young woman directly across from his building, Kim Yoo-bin, instantly bond and share resources. And while Kim calls Joon-woo an idiot for attempting suicide, she fails to disclose that she'd tried to hang herself as well, only surviving because the rope snapped.
Don't worry. It's not all sharing food and walkie-talkie conversations. The action kicks in before you know it when Kim is forced to abandon her apartment and Joon-woo has to charge into the middle of Zombievania in order to save her from certain death.
Though you might expect Joon-woo's considerable experience playing first-person-shooters to be adequate preparation for peeling actual caps when necessary, he balks, then outright refuses to squeeze the trigger when he gets his hands on a revolver. But he's highly resourceful, employing his drone as a delivery system and turning his cell into a radio.
As in most great zombie thrillers, the marauding "creatures", as they're called by Kim Yoo-bin, are never actually referred to as "zombies" during the movie. These particularly dangerous biters are capable of quick movement and also retain minimal rational thought, which allows them to accomplish impressive feats like turning door knobs.
Though 2020 has seen murder hornets, global unrest, the return of the bubonic plague and a viral pandemic, nothing resembling a zombie has been spotted -- yet. And it still may be a good idea to follow Joon-woo's lead: keep an eye on the news and stay home as much as possible.
Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, movie lovers have compared it to zombie apocalypse fiction, what with the global spread of a lethal virus and mass quarantining. Well, #Alive makes that argument better than any film that's come before. Many zombie films feature worldwide infections and some even focus on the isolation of the survivors but #Alive is the first to so acutely examine the struggles of protagonists voluntarily confined to their respective homes.
During a live stream, other players alert student and avid gamer Oh Joon-woo to troubling news reports of people behaving strangely in Seoul, South Korea. After hearing an explosion, he takes a look outside of his apartment window only to witness what initially appears to be rioting on the street down below. When Joon-woo notices a young girl savagely attack and subsequently eat her own mother, he locks his front door. However, a neighbor tricks him into taking a peek outside, at which time the stranger forces his way in and begs for sanctuary. Realizing that the guy's been bitten by one of the infected and informed of the danger this poses by news reports, Joon-woo wants him out immediately. But before he can carry out the eviction, he witnesses the stranger transform from a rational person to a mindless killing machine right before his eyes.
SPOILER ALERT
After forcing his former neighbor into the hallway, Joon-woo is faced with another challenge: worrying about his family, who'd all left for the day prior to the outbreak. Realizing that he has little-to-no cellphone reception, he inventories what little food is in the apartment (Joon-woo failed to heed his mother's advice to go grocery shopping earlier in the day) and resigns himself to life inside his bubble.
Eventually, and through much effort, Joon-woo learns that his family has been attacked -- and likely killed -- at his father's office. Out of food and mourning his family, a despondent Joon-woo attempts to hang himself. But with his head in the noose he learns that another neighbor has survived. Joon-woo and a young woman directly across from his building, Kim Yoo-bin, instantly bond and share resources. And while Kim calls Joon-woo an idiot for attempting suicide, she fails to disclose that she'd tried to hang herself as well, only surviving because the rope snapped.
Don't worry. It's not all sharing food and walkie-talkie conversations. The action kicks in before you know it when Kim is forced to abandon her apartment and Joon-woo has to charge into the middle of Zombievania in order to save her from certain death.
Though you might expect Joon-woo's considerable experience playing first-person-shooters to be adequate preparation for peeling actual caps when necessary, he balks, then outright refuses to squeeze the trigger when he gets his hands on a revolver. But he's highly resourceful, employing his drone as a delivery system and turning his cell into a radio.
As in most great zombie thrillers, the marauding "creatures", as they're called by Kim Yoo-bin, are never actually referred to as "zombies" during the movie. These particularly dangerous biters are capable of quick movement and also retain minimal rational thought, which allows them to accomplish impressive feats like turning door knobs.
Though 2020 has seen murder hornets, global unrest, the return of the bubonic plague and a viral pandemic, nothing resembling a zombie has been spotted -- yet. And it still may be a good idea to follow Joon-woo's lead: keep an eye on the news and stay home as much as possible.
If you wanna see a South Korean thriller that's even better than last year's Best Picture Oscar-winner Parasite then #Alive is for you. And no fan of zombie flicks should miss it.
3. 13 Assassins
2. The Legend of Baron To'a
1. Ninja Assassin
Begins - of the 21st century. The title isn't merely perfunctory nor is it
misleading. The film is packed so full of ninja lore that it makes you
wonder if impressing the RZA and the other members of Wu-Tang was one of
the filmmakers' goals.
Ninja Assassin takes the time to show how Raizo, the most promising student
of the Ozunu Clan, is forged into a killing machine through a grueling training
regimen including unforgiving sparring sessions with real weapons.
The best line:
"The breath I take after I kill you will be the first breath of my life."
Updated 5/6/21
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