The Good, The Bad, The Weird – An eOne Films’ Release

DVD Release Date: August 17th, 2010

Rated 14A for violence and language may offend.

Running time: 130 minutes

Ji-woon Kim (dir.)

Ji-woon Kim (writer)

Min-suk Kim (writer)

Dalparan (music)

Yeong-gyu Jang (music)

Kang-ho Song as Yoon Tae-goo / The Weird

Byung-hun Lee as Park Chang-yi / The Bad

Woo-sung Jung as Park Do-won / The Good

Our reviews below:

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The Good,The Bad,The Weird DVD Review By John C.

**1/2 (out of 4)

The overall story of this Korean western is simple.  Three guys – one good, one bad, one weird – are all on a quest to protect and follow a map that they assume will lead to buried treasure. There are plenty of tense set pieces, including an exciting showdown, but there isn’t quite enough here to sustain itself for over 2 hours.  The shaky cam action, coupled with reading subtitles was headache-inducing for this viewer, but there is still just enough here to make for a fairly entertaining, but very violent rental.

The DVD includes behind the scenes and making of featurettes, a highlight reel from Cannes, and interviews with the lead actors, and director Kim Jee-woon.

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The Good, The Bad, The Weird DVD Review By Erin V.

**1/2 (Out of 4)

The Good, The Bad, The Weird is about the title three guys, who are all chasing after a map that leads to an unknown treasure.  It does feel a little bit long, but the last half hour is entertaining, with everyone chasing after one of the title guys, including the Japanese army, a local gang, and the remaining two of the title trio.

This is a quirky, weird, and very violent film.  I personally found the amount of violence a bit over the top at times, causing the hard challenge of figuring out how to look away, while still trying to catch the subtitles in those scenes.  Still, if you don’t mind the violence, it is worth a rental.  It has a good twist, and manages a stylized action, western, classic tone throughout.

Of the two ‘westerns’ – this one Korean, the other Canadian – I’m reviewing on DVD today, The Good, The Bad, The Weird comes out on top.

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The Good, The Bad, The Weird DVD Review By Tony

**1/2 (out of 4)

The Good, the Bad, the Weird (좋은 놈, 나쁜 놈, 이상한 놈) is a “kimchi* western” from South Korean director Kim Ji-Woon (surname first), inspired by Sergio Leone’s “spaghetti western” The Good, the Bad & the Ugly.  It is set in 1930s Manchuria, which along with Korea had for decades been under brutal occupation by the imperial Japanese who suppressed Korean language and culture.  “The Good” Park Do-won (Jung Woo-sung) is a bounty hunter. “The Bad” Park Chang-yi (Lee Byung-hun) is a bandit hired to steal a Japanese treasure map from a train, but “The Weird” Yoon Tae-goo (Song Kang-ho) beats him to it.  In the great violent western tradition this leads to endless chases in pursuit of the map involving not only The Bad’s posse but a band of Manchurian bandits and the Japanese army, with hundreds of nonlethal shots fired at all three main characters leading to a final Mexican standoff between them. The classic western image is evoked by the arid terrain, horses and antique train, despite a few motorcycles, army jeeps and a house of “comfort women.”  Among all the bloodshed the tone is lightened by quirky bits of humour between the characters.

Though a bit long, The Good, the Bad, the Weird is quite entertaining with stylish direction and a good cast. As a non-Korean I found it hard at first keeping track of names, and since to non-speakers Korean and Japanese sound similar, I missed any differences between Korean and Japanese accents that might have proved meaningful.

*kimchi: a spicy kraut dish–a Korean daily staple, just as pasta is for Italians

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Consensus: Although The Good, The Bad, The Weird is ultimately a little long at over two hours, there is enough here to make for a fairly entertaining, but very violent rental. **1/2 (Out of 4)