morganseer

Yet another soulless, humorless rom-something from the German film-churning machine. It is not a comedy, nor is it a drama. It is a cookie cutter something without character. A perfectly manicured woman meets Mr. GQ who arrives on a horse (I kid you not) as the lovely but plastic woman takes a dip in the lake in what some hopeful person labeled as "idyllic setting" in the keywords. (It will seem idyllic only if you like every blade of grass perfectly parallel to every other, and carefully trimmed with scissors.)

The man pursues the woman, and has conflicts with his father. That's as much as I was able to gather from the half hour I could stand to watch it, and accidentally catching the end. For the whole story I will defer to a more patient soul than me.

The look of the movie is as if it were shot on video-overly bright and sterile. It immediately identifies the movie as belonging to the rom-something "genre." It also immediately evokes a desire to step into a smoke-filled Victorian city to get some life into your lungs again.

On the whole I love European and Asian films. This particular "genre" from this particular country excluded. I gave it two stars only because it didn't contain slime-dripping creatures from out of space.

This is a romantic film that consists of perfection and magic, and I don't mean that in a good way. You can forget about humor or substance. I checked out after a painfully dull beginning to watch a documentary, only to come back and find that I hadn't missed a thing.

So let's start with the perfection. Two platinum blond, immaculately dressed German Stepford sisters are sailing on a cruise ship straight into the Nevada desert in order for one of them to get married in Las Vegas, where their mother lives. The sisters are well-formed, but not attractive, since they lack any semblance of personality. Their matching boyfriends accompany them. And yes, you heard right. They are on a cruise ship, and they sail all the way to a lovely CGI Las Vegas.

How do I know it's CGI? Because Las Vegas, though sporting all the familiar buildings and signs, looks absolutely pristine, freshly painted in blinding white and pastel colors. Gone are the t-shirt clad masses. Gone are the sweeping parking lots, and the streets are mostly devoid of cars. The few people we encounter are apparently all upper crust, and their few cars have just rolled out of the dealership. And where are all the people of color? (Well, to be fair, I did miss that hour in the middle). After adding a very pale blue sky, the effect is somehow more reminiscent of a northern harbor than a sweltering Nevada city. Perhaps to accommodate the cruise ship.

The last act does contain some magic. By that I don't mean charm, but the abracadabra sort. It seemed gratuitous, stuck in there just for the heck of it, but hey, I did miss that middle of the movie.

So let's summarize. All fluff and polish, and no substance. I'd call it a fairy tale, but it has no charm and no moral. It's more like watching Paris Hilton put on make-up, except emptier.

I've seen (bits of) many such movies, romances in particular, coming out of the German studios. Glitzy, sterile, empty. They seem to churn them out as fast as Hollywood churns out reality shows. Frankly, I'd rather watch the reality shows, because at least they show signs of life.

A sweet little Korean movie about an arranged marriage, and the upcoming wedding ceremony. The bride is lovely and the groom is rich, though otherwise an enigma because the marriage broker, blinded by the groom's vast wealth, forgot to ask to meet him. Everyone connected with the bride is excited for her, until a troubling rumor gets out about the groom, and suddenly the bride faces ridicule, and the bride's family faces a dilemma. Should they proceed with the wedding to which they formally agreed, and return the rich gifts, or should they cancel it and lose face? Then one family member gets a brilliant idea...

This is one of those beautifully shot black and white films that looks better than it would in color. Somehow the cinematography reminded me of Black Narcissus and of early Ingmar Bergman films. The story is simple but engaging. The acting style and the story reflect the time and the place, so don't expect modern sophistication, but for me they were just fine. The only problem with the film is that the subtitles were provided by volunteers, and are slightly ahead of the speaker.

Nevertheless, I'm surprised at the mediocre (6.3) score on IMDb. Maybe it's not quite up to the 8.7 shown on Viki, where it is currently playing for free, but I give it a solid 8, because it's a movie I truly love and will probably return to more than once.