Yeseuteodei

YESTERDAY is a South Korean movie, so right away you know that despite the flashy visuals and the high production values that most of the characters, especially the lead villain and the lead female, will walk around and talk like they just came from a funeral. I mean, this IS South Korea cinema, folks. If the entire industry is known for one thing, it's their drama, which because of its inherently understate and amazingly low-energy, most WEsterners mistake for subtlety. It's NOT subtlety, it's just WHO THEY ARE.

Which is why YESTERDAY isn't any better than just good. Despite the BLADE RUNNER-esque background and high octane action, the movie is so lacking in energy, that you wonder why they bother with these type of "HOllywood blockbuster" movies in the first place. I mean, can't these actors muster up SOME energy for the role? If you compare YESTERDAY to, say, MINORITY REPORT, it's like comparing a funeral (YESTERDAY) to MINORITY REPORT (roller coaster ride). Do you see the difference? And both movies are pretty much great to look at!

So there you go. If you want a thrill ride actioner, go with Hollywood. If you want a slow, "it's real because everyone looks like they're about to commit suicide" drama, then watch a South Korean movie. But a South Korean sci-fi Actioner? Forget about it!

Yesterday, an thrilling, exiting, sinister science fiction movie fresh out of Korea.

I do agree that i`ts kind of hard to keep track with the plot, but once you do get its a genius idea that confronts the ethics concerning cloning and gene manipulation.

The action scenes are a mere feast with fast moving handheld camera. It has its slow moments at the end of the movie, but cleverly used to reveal the "truth".

Well Recommended!

Set in the not so distant future on the Korean Peninsula, Yesterday tells a crime thriller story. The chief of the police gets kidnapped right in front of his daughter. A special investigations unit is put on the case and slowly an old mystery starts to emerge, as well as a mysterious link between the daughter and the leader of the SI unit.

The biggest problem this film has is its utter incapability to engage its viewers. Things happen on the screen, but you're constantly lost in time and space. Scenes don't flow smoothly from one to another, you're never quite sure where anything is happening. The dialogues are also more than a bit stunted and none of the characters are given any meaningful backstory. Most of them are there to look cool and pull off stunts. The two main leads (played by Seung-woo Kim and Yunjin Kim) have to be given something, but even that is so cardboard textbook that you instantly file it away and forget about it.

And actually, that's another huge problem. It's been a few days after I saw the film and I literally had to go and read the plot summary to even remember what this movie was about. I can remember four characters (the film had dozens all told), perhaps a scene or two, and after reading the summary, I'm sort of clear on what happened. Can't remember the ending at all, though.

If I had to find one thing to praise... The special effects were okay, as were some of the stunts, the first scene had some promise and it honestly looked like some of the actors were honestly trying. The script just wouldn't let them.

So yeah, hard skip for this one.

Asian cinema has progressed in many ways. Nowadays the production values of for instance South Korean films are almost as high as for standard Hollywood-fare. But still there is some way to go before the quality in all aspects rise up to what we've become accustomed to.

"Yesterday" is basically your standard Asian techno-thriller. Flashy visuals, nice special effects and flawless technical quality throughout. But like many other Asian movies i feel the script would have needed another run-through. The story of missing children being used for experimental research, and the connections to modern-day homicides, is just too messy. I never got a feel for the characters, never got a feel for the story. Also the actors feel a bit low on expressions, which doesn't really contribute when i already had trouble feeling anything at all about the movie. Simply put, this is not engaging enough.

And another problem that is also tied to the script is the fact that the movie is overly long. At just over two hours it stretches the script very thin. Since there are a few really nice action scenes, and a lot of promise in the visuals and general stylish look of the movie, i would like to see a more compressed story. Maybe twenty minutes shorter and some of the slower less meaningful scenes could have been cut out. In general i think both pace and story would have benefited from that.

In the end this movie failed to excite me. While it looked nice (and sounded nice) it didn't have much to offer in the way of plot or character development. And in the end nice visuals and a hefty budget is not enough to keep me entertained for over two hours. With a better script and less drawn-out filling scenes this could have been good. Now it's hardly mediocre. I rate it 4/10.

If you go to see Yesterday expecting a Hollywood style science-fiction blockbuster you're bound to be disappointed. This film has a slow and morbid pace and tension and comparisons to Minority Report are misguided. A better comparison is Se7en, although it's considerably less gory.

The version I saw was sub-titled and was clearly translated by someone for whom English wasn't their first language. There are a number of lines in the film that simply don't make sense. At one point the detective asks for a "posterior analysis" to be made, which brought a smile to my face. During the credits sequence at the beginning the dialogue translations are mixed with the credits causing considerable confusion. These faults don't generally impede enjoyment of the film but they don't help.

It's certainly worth watching this film if you enjoy more intelligent science-fiction, but I can't see it making a wider impact.