Plot Outline: In ancient China a young warrior in training named Jinha meets a young girl named Sullie while in the woods. Sullie and Jinha grow fond of each other over time, but Sullie is eventually taken away from Jinha by her father who wishes to marry her to a powerful warlord. Jinha, wishing to help her cannot because his master demands that he learn his families secret martial arts. It is later revealed to Jinha that his family were massacred at the hands of Sullie’s father. Jinha then sets out for revenge, and Sullie.
The Review: What do you get when you combine the amazing wuxia style fight choreography of Hong Kong, mixed with a Korean perspective? Well, a whole lot less than what I was hoping for. Bichunmoo suffers from many things, but the highest on the list would be it’s incoherent plot and botched editing. After watching the film it’s actually hard for me to even remember what happened. At one point in the film I think Jinha, the hero, became a villain or something. I’ve watched the film twice now but the story just doesn’t ever stick. It’s confusing, and the pieces don’t really fit together. Other than that the film is overly long, boring and try as it might, is not as epic as it would have us believe it is. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t particularly hate the film, it was entertaining enough and I’ll get to the positives in a moment, I just generally like to know what’s going on when I’m watching a movie.
Bichunmoo does have some good things going for it. The martial arts in the film, while not spectacular, are definitely nice to look at. I always find it fun to watch people flying through the air, so maybe it’s just me. The best thing about the film though would be the cinematography. Although the camera gets too low to the ground during some of the fight scenes and tends to wander around too much, it’s still a beautiful looking film. Beautiful colors and some interesting shots makes the film worthwhile just for the visuals alone. The acting, for the most part, I found to be good enough. I’ve read some complaints but I didn’t really get any bad vibes from the leads at anytime. Well, Jinha is the only character I didn’t care for. His withdrawn personality kind of made him seem calculating most of the time. He seemed more like a villain than a man torn by love.
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