Doomsday Book

This Anthology features 3 tales, 2 of which are somewhat religious and another one dabs more on an alien Hitchhiker's Guide to The Galaxy way. All three have to do with the fall of mankind.

Story 1: 9/10 My favorite, A Brave New World, depicts a basic zombie uprising, in the plague form, but what is different is the overall direction the story goes, and the characters development... of zombies. Rarely do zombie films give the zombie POV, but we are able to get that here. A great aspect of this story is the strong acting by the leading actor, a guy who gets bullied by those around him and is very awkward, in a nerdy way. He goes on a date with this girl, and they seem to have a great connection, but then he begins to turn, and she is scared off. What happens at the end throws in a bible element to the story, which I didn't much care for, but I understood the creators message of a new world. Overall, I thought this tale was hilarious and sweet and well acted with enough zombie chaos to intrigue hardcore zombie fans.

Story 2: 6/10 The Heavenly Creature. This story is about a Robot that becomes Buddha, or at least to the monks. When the factory finds out, they seek to destroy the machine for attempting to forget it's duty to serve man and instead attaining man's greatest goal. This is deemed a threat and an insult to mankind. While I like the message of man's jealousy over a near perfect machine, I was turned off by the Robot's final message to man. It seemed idealistic to me, and hard to swallow. Overall, it was slow paced and more of a thought provoking study on people and our desires and fears. Might be a good watch for a philosophy/Buddhist student.

Story 3: 5/10 Happy Birthday, to me this was the cheesiest of all the stories, and cute, but less thought provoking. Like the first story, it had comical moments, and was quite enjoyable at times, it also felt like a family story and not on the same level as the other stories. You could actually watch this one with your 8 year old, and they might really like it. A problem with this story to me is how things aren't really explained, especially a scene in the end. I laughed off my interpretation of it, but am unsure of the message. There is a adorable aspect of it about trusting your child and having faith in them, which was very sweet, but for me, it wasn't enough to give it a very favorable review. I would have definitely liked to have seen a different story here that didn't have such an absurd scenario... I giant 8 ball heading to earth... why would aliens have giant pool tables and websites dedicated to selling individual balls to different planets? Too silly to me.

We waited 6 years for this?

Doomsday Book is a 3 part Korean anthology film about the future of mankind. Its 3 separate story lines are basically broken down as follows: 1. Zombie Apocalypse, 2. Robot Enlightenment, and 3. Alien/Asteroid destruction. Each of the stories is independent from one another and all are acted, written, and directed by various teams.

SPOILERS AHEAD!

While not terrible, this movie does have some problems, and it seems strangely out dated (despite its futuristic themes). This film debuted earlier this year (2012), and therein lies the bulk of its problems; this production originally began back in 2006, but funding problems and other delays hampered its release and it was shelved for quite a while. As a result, some stories were wrapped up years ago, one never got made, another was added on post haste to finally get the film out the door, etc...The end result is an uneven amalgam of flavors and styles and eras that doesn't quite come together as a whole as was hoped for.

Story 1. "Brave New World" (i.e. "the Zombie" story). Easily my least favorite of the 3 works, and the one that suffers the most from the production delays. This story has 2006 written all over it, and revolves around the world's population de-evolving into zombie like creatures as a result of a virus born of tainted meat processing procedures. This would have been right proper back in '06, but, how many stories about contaminated mass food production, end of world viruses, etc, have been made since then?... And, we've got zombies! Sorry, but it's almost 2013 now, so enough with the freakin zombies already unless you have a more original idea to implement them! This story is ultimately not worth investing in (primarily because it was so overdone by the time it was released). There's also no zombie "love story" angle as suggested that I can recall, unless there is some extended version I haven't seen. Basically, guy goes on a date, guy runs into date later on during the wash, and, everybody is now a zombie or will soon become one!

Summary: Somewhat OK (I guess)!

Story 2. "Creation of Heaven" (i.e. the "Robot with a soul" story). Probably the best of the 3 stories, and easily the most philosophical & cerebral. Fairly interesting and well done story overall. It's basically your human created machine gains intelligence, sentience, thought, free will, etc. Then, various humans with differing opinions and motives on the subject must decide what to do with it. This story would perhaps have been better suited to be a full feature movie on its own. It does work pretty well as a short, but I could easily see it being successfully expanded into a longer production (similar to what was done with the "Dumplings" portion of the "3 Extremes" anthology).

Summary: Not bad at all!

Story 3. "Happy Birthday" (i.e. the "We need to tack on another 30-40 minute tale 6 years later to finally release this film" story). I like the somewhat odd premise of this segment, but unfortunately, it just doesn't work that well overall. This is the story that has the young girl trying to replace her dad's missing 8-ball via the internet. The internet is a magical place indeed, but I think we're still a long way away from alien races fulfilling Amazon.com orders through space and time via giant asteroids. This episode felt a bit rushed, and, I think would have been far better served if it played up the comedic/surreal aspect of the plot (which it reluctantly seemed to not want to fully embrace).

Summary: Ultimately disappointing!

Bottom Line: Overall, I was not impressed! A bit of a missed opportunity that's "OK" to watch, but I recommend you don't set your hopes too high going in if you're going to check it out. I'm not going to destroy it, because it ain't terrible. Occasionally though, delays/timing/funding get in the way of the best laid plans; here's Exhibit A in regards! That's just the way it goes sometimes!

6 out of 10 stars overall!

You get three directors (on one theme) and of course three different ways they handle that. Completely different ways that is. The first short (still about 40 mins long each of them) is more on the funny side of the spectrum, the second one is more philosophical and the last one tries to combine those two "worlds" (no pun intended). Each does so with a great finesse.

It's hard for me to decide which one I liked best, but if I had to say one, I'd say it's the middle piece. The framing especially is more than gorgeous. But they all have their charming qualities and the third one is just so out there you will either love it or dismiss it, for its craziness. Hopefully the former, but whatever the case, if you like Korean cinema you'll enjoy it no matter what. If not you might want to change the order of the shorts and watch them backwards (3, 2, 1)! I have a feeling that might work better for some

Part of the appeal of movies is the chance to see other cultures. Doomsday Book starts off with a great view of Korea, not so unlike here in Australia, which was refreshing. I hadn't read anything about this movie before I watched it and was disappointed when the first of three stories descended into rather ordinary zombie fare. For me, it was kept afloat by my unfamiliarity with the country and its customs, but that was all. The next story, concerning robotics, is a quantum leap better, well directed, acted and edited, showing some class. The final idea, concerning a meteorite, had some of the sparkle I last enjoyed watching The Host, with a similar family dynamic. It wasn't as well thought through as the former idea however, and was confusing for the first half. When I got it though, it was a good idea, if a tad on the weird side. There was a welcome scattering of sci-fi visuals throughout the three stories. As a trilogy of shorts I feel this endeavour could have been better served with a more original idea for the first part.

If there's a common point that links all 3 of these short movies, it's how they show human stupidity and the realistic statement that that's the reason why we are coming to our own end.

The first movie present us with a zombie scenario, more credible than those created by other movies. It's a superb critic of a society drowned in consumerism, the abuse of other life forms and the worshipping of the shallow. It also presents us with the hypocrisy people live by, with somehow subtle imagery of religion and the disregard for those same values when it comes to feeling pleasure through the material and sex. The point of view is original, for which we see the event unfold mostly from the perspective of a zombie, rather than a hero trying to save him/herself. The film is filled with humour, although an underlying seriousness is palpable.

The second movie is a completely different story. It's comparable to Ghost in the Shell for its cyberpunk elements as well as deep philosophy. There's no comedy here. It's the only film with no direct doomsday scenario, although the human folly is obviously present. The future presented here is most plausible and, indeed, this is likely to happen sooner or later. This film is worth watching on its own, if you want to skip the other 2.

The last film is pure absurd comedy. I personally didn't find it amusing, particularly after watching the previous one. The nonsensical idea of this movie is not helped by the fact that the plot wasn't really thought throughly, and not much effort was put into giving any sense to anything, even to the parts that supposedly help the movie unfolds (i.e.: they randomly find silly solutions out of nowhere, comparable to the "deus ex machina" a child playing with toys would create).

Alas, I'd give individual scores as follows: First movie 5/10 Second one 7/10 Final movie 2/10