After the debacle that is 7광구, which I discussed here, I figured I might write up a few suggestions for Korean film companies considering undertaking an SF project. After all, I’m someone who has studied Korean SF films carefully, picked out their pitfalls and how and why they failed — either domestically, or internationally — and I have a few thoughts based on my own frustration with the way Korean SF film has gone, and is going. I think there are a few very simple things that production companies in Korea need to realize, if they want to start putting …
Month: August 2011
7광구 (Sector 7) — Setting Korean SF Back Decades
If you want the short version of my reaction: skip this movie, pretend it was never made, save yourself some money and some disappointment — that is, if you have a half a brain and actually like SF. Sector 7 is shot amateurishly, it is badly acted by almost the whole cast — and since at least some of the cast can act, I suspect it’s badly edited and badly directed; the budget was mostly used creating CG for a rather unimaginative monster; it was derivative of The Host (괴물), the Alien series (especially Aliens; it was badly written; it had …
The Big Time by Fritz Leiber
I’ve read things by Fritz Leiber that I adore — both Conjure Wife and, more vehemently for me, Our Lady of Darkness are important ones — but The Big Time simply did not work for me. I like the idea of the Change War — familiar though it is — and the notion of cutting people out of their “lifeline” so that they become pseudo-immortal soldiers in the war — and idea that I think still has legs, and indeed is used these days in time travel narratives; I like the idea of the Place as a pocket universe outside of …