Escape from Mogadishu

Mogadishu is the capital city of Somalia. The North and South Korean diplomats are constantly fighting an unseen war. In 1991, rebels attack the city. The North Koreans have to abandon their embassy. Despite their distrust, they are forced to seek help from the South Koreans.

This is supposed to be based on true events. As always, one is never sure how much is true. It's a compelling story. There are some good drama and interesting characters. It has good action although some of it is closer to a Hollywood shoot them up movie. There is too much shooting to result in so few Korean dead. Sometimes, no shooting is just as intense or even more intense than chaotic Hollywood action. I really like some of the inter-Korean conflicts. It's a bit eye-opening for an outsider like me. All in all, this is a compelling movie with a whole lot of shooting action.

It looked more like a documentary shot and recorded by a journalist and his camera man. I don't know how this Korean director did it, but it just blow my mind. The riot on the streets, the beatings, the killings, the storming assaults on those foreign embassies' buildings, it's just so top-notched directing. As to the Korean part, whether they played the roles from either side of the 30-octave north latitude, all well acted, albeit sometime had to be a bit of overly dramatic to show how people would have acted under extreme danger.

I don't care about some viewers' narrow-minded complaints, saying this movie was not made in Somali, all the people were not real Somalians. Well, why it should be made in Somali? Why you had to hire the REAL Somali actors or people to play those roles? If we shoot a movie about Nazi or Nazi Germany, do we have to hire REAL Nazis or it won't look real? This is a movie, okay? All I can say is that most part of this movie just looked so real, absolutely incredible and terrifying.

South Korea's official entry to 2022's Oscars is a solid political thriller. It's mind blowing and intense. It's based on a beautiful interesting true story that delivers a great important message. Original score is amazing. Action and chasing scenes are awesome too.

This works much better when it's speaking about the South and North Koreans relationships than when it's talkig about Somalia (it completely fails on that field). The thid act is very strong and compensates for a very hesitant first act.

Don't expect a artsy or a very contemplative film. This is a blockbuster and should be watched and reviewed like one.

Movies of this type dealing with escape from civil war like 13 hours, Black Hawk Down, Hotel Rwanda and Argo, each have their good points and unique perspective. I found Escape from Mogadishu to be the most all round entertaining movie of this genre. It has the good elements of each of those movies and the result is a scary thriller that shows the horrors of being caught in a civil war and yet has individual civilian characters that are are involving and easily identifiable so it's more tense than just a soldier vs rebels story like BHD. Firstly the action scenes including street battles and car escape are outstanding even if you think you've seen it before. The murderous rebels are scarier than any zombie horror movie. The director had just the right touch balancing excitement and some humor now and then to keep things from getting overwrought. The twists and turns of escaping and the North South diplomatic complications are interesting. Everything is good about this movie, the story, the pace, the cinematography, the direction, and the production values. S Korea has done it better than Hollywood again.