Review by subxerogravity

I just saw another Korean epic called Assassination last week at my local theater so I thought I give this one a shot.

The two movies are similar in their epicness, as they both had great cinematography that made it feel like a painting come to life and they seem to be working a very large story with lots of elements but is not too hard to follow, which is good for me cause subtitles can be too much to read sometimes. The scope of Memories of the Sword was big and long (at two hours and sixteen minutes), and covered a lot of drama.

I don't think I've ever seen Lee Byung-hun, who I know to be a actor from Korea, in a Korean film. He's somewhat a thing in the states, so I assumed that made him a huge star in his native land. It's the first time I did not see him in an action film with his shirt off holding a sword. It's a little misleading for those of us expecting more battle scenes from him, instead he plays more of a dramatic role that evolves romance, which I rarely see in Asian films cause I mostly deal in marshal arts action.

Which the movie does not have a lot of, but the little it does I was very impress with. Overall it was not a bad movie to sit through.