Change Your Image
kenn-alcantara
Ratings
Most Recently Rated
Reviews
Extracurricular (2020)
The sad truth about youth's modern day struggles
I want to provide a little bit of background of how I score films/series that I've watched. For me there are three important factors that they should excel on: Acting, Script, Technicality. Script as being the highest followed by film technicalities and acting. This three are the main factors that revolve around my review for Extracurricular.
I want to discuss first about its script and how it epitomized today's mental health issues. The message of the series is very clear, it is how youth nowadays are being put the test and into pressure from today's perfectionist society, and how these pressures resulted into rebellious actions. Jisoo, the main character, is just one of the victims of this society. At an early age he was already left by his parents to live on his own thus limiting his chances of graduating from school and limiting his living needs due to financial reasons. The pressure of providing for himself and getting a good job in the future are what make him create his own illegal business. This right here is a one action that a young person is bound to do when left alone with tremendous pressure. In comparison, Gyuri's character despite having a stable provision of needs from her parents, still experienced this pressure by having her future decided by her parents into becoming the CEO of their company. That pressure right there of becoming a perfect and mature woman for her parents took a toll of her mind thus becoming a self-determined, aggressive woman towards Jisoo. The opportunity of being someone without her parents' influence is what makes her so determine to be in business with Jisoo. You see there are just two actions that a young person can do against this perfectionist society, one is to survive it by doing whats neccessary even if it is illegal or by rebelling against it and veering away from what's expected from him/her. What I like about this is that both of the main leads encapsulate these decisions into their own personalities while the story move forward with consequences it brought to them. The series realistically made us, the audience, understand the struggles of the youth but also capture the consequences it can bring if they do these actions. There are no solutions given by this series, it just wanted to show the true horror that the youth can experience if they continue to be in this perfectionist society. This is a message for both the youth and the adults who are responsible of guiding them. All in all, the message was perfectly delivered but in terms of the progression of the story and characters it kinda falls flat during the latter episodes as they were so focused on showcasing the struggles of the characters leaving an opportunity to showcase the effect of these into their personalities and character development.
As for the acting, hands down to all of the actors who portrayed their characters so well. Kim Dong Hee is a rising star in the making and can be the actor that can ignite a different genre of kdrama. Park Ju Hyun on the other hand is a versatile actress as she made you want to kill her in the first few episodes but ended up loving her because of her charisma and angst that she brings into the character. I feel like the second leads could have been better but for me this is not the actors' fault but rather on the script's side. I hope that they can provide a good character devlopemen for these characters if they decided to do a second season.
The series itself is a beautiul art that mastered the techniques of filmmaking. The angles and frames are perfect for the mood that they want to establish in the scene. The hallway fights and rooftop brawl in the penultimate episode was a perfect shot brought out from a camera, kinda reminds me of Oldboy and The Raid Redemption. The series had well-balanced shots as it also bring that lovely romantic vibe between the leads in a non-cringey way. Netflix surely has provided another avenue for korean filmmakers to expand and hone their craft away from the norm.
All in all, this series is not your typical romantic kdrama as it brought a different vibe and genre into it. It is very timely as it portrays the current mental health issue that the youth is mostly sufffering nowadays. A crime drama that has grounded motivation from the characters and a realistic portrayal of the comsequences from the characters' actions and motivations.
Extracurricular (2020)
The sad truth about youth's modern day struggles
I want to provide a little bit of background of how I score films/series that I've watched. For me there are three important factors that they should excel on: Acting, Script, Technicality. Script as being the highest followed by film technicalities and acting. This three are the main factors that revolve around my review for Extracurricular.
I want to discuss first about its script and how it epitomized today's mental health issues. The message of the series is very clear, it is how youth nowadays are being put the test and into pressure from today's perfectionist society, and how these pressures resulted into rebellious actions. Jisoo, the main character, is just one of the victims of this society. At an early age he was already left by his parents to live on his own thus limiting his chances of graduating from school and limiting his living needs due to financial reasons. The pressure of providing for himself and getting a good job in the future are what make him create his own illegal business. This right here is a one action that a young person is bound to do when left alone with tremendous pressure. In comparison, Gyuri's character despite having a stable provision of needs from her parents, still experienced this pressure by having her future decided by her parents into becoming the CEO of their company. That pressure right there of becoming a perfect and mature woman for her parents took a toll of her mind thus becoming a self-determined, aggressive woman towards Jisoo. The opportunity of being someone without her parents' influence is what makes her so determine to be in business with Jisoo. You see there are just two actions that a young person can do against this perfectionist society, one is to survive it by doing whats neccessary even if it is illegal or by rebelling against it and veering away from what's expected from him/her. What I like about this is that both of the main leads encapsulate these decisions into their own personalities while the story move forward with consequences it brought to them. The series realistically made us, the audience, understand the struggles of the youth but also capture the consequences it can bring if they do these actions. There are no solutions given by this series, it just wanted to show the true horror that the youth can experience if they continue to be in this perfectionist society. This is a message for both the youth and the adults who are responsible of guiding them. All in all, the message was perfectly delivered but in terms of the progression of the story and characters it kinda falls flat during the latter episodes as they were so focused on showcasing the struggles of the characters leaving an opportunity to showcase the effect of these into their personalities and character development.
As for the acting, hands down to all of the actors who portrayed their characters so well. Kim Dong Hee is a rising star in the making and can be the actor that can ignite a different genre of kdrama. Park Ju Hyun on the other hand is a versatile actress as she made you want to kill her in the first few episodes but ended up loving her because of her charisma and angst that she brings into the character. I feel like the second leads could have been better but for me this is not the actors' fault but rather on the script's side. I hope that they can provide a good character devlopemen for these characters if they decided to do a second season.
The series itself is a beautiul art that mastered the techniques of filmmaking. The angles and frames are perfect for the mood that they want to establish in the scene. The hallway fights and rooftop brawl in the penultimate episode was a perfect shot brought out from a camera, kinda reminds me of Oldboy and The Raid Redemption. The series had well-balanced shots as it also bring that lovely romantic vibe between the leads in a non-cringey way. Netflix surely has provided another avenue for korean filmmakers to expand and hone their craft away from the norm.
All in all, this series is not your typical romantic kdrama as it brought a different vibe and genre into it. It is very timely as it portrays the current mental health issue that the youth is mostly sufffering nowadays. A crime drama that has grounded motivation from the characters and a realistic portrayal of the comsequences from the characters' actions and motivations.
Heatstroke (2013)
This movie gave me a "Heatstroke"
Allow me to tell you that this movie will give you delight because of the actors but will give you anger because of its dull, nonsense story line.
From the first minutes, I thought that this movie is worth it. Once I saw the faces of the leading actors acting in their natural way I was already starting to get hooked but as the story progresses I was slowly losing my interest to it. I only finished it for the sake of having it started. What makes this movie worse is the poor cinematography and poor script resulting in a dull, unemotional scenes. I was expecting more emotions especially that it came from a novel but sadly the creators didn't meet that expectation of mine, but only the actors, I salute them for giving a superb performances, especially for Maisie Williams for making me hate her role.
I do not want to give any more plot points that made me dislike this movie. If you want some fast-paced, thrilling movie then see it for yourself but if your interest requires a distinct, sensible story line then don't waste your time watching this.
I rate this 6 out of 10
The Fault in Our Stars (2014)
I respect the book but this movie...... not so much
When I first saw the trailer of this movie I already felt the hyped inside of me. Feeling that it will give me the A-walk-to-remember feeling all over again. I haven't read the book - YET - but seeing those positive feed backs of the trailer from the book lovers made me think that probably my excitement for this adaptation could be worth it.
Then June 07, 2014 happened. I could say that my sister and I picked the best seats inside the theater but as the opening credits and some scenes started showing I thought that maybe we didn't picked the best movie.
I was very disappointed in the opening scenes especially the opening credits putting a series of scenes from the movie. I mean, what is that?? are you trying to spoil what will happen before we can even watch it?! and what is the purpose of those opening scenes? For us to get excited before the movie? Well I surely lost my excitement after seeing those scenes.
Another "turn off" factor for this movie is the monologue of Shailene Woodley in the beginning. Surely a lot of people are raping that replay button once the trailer was released and they have probably memorized those lines, I myself memorized some of it after watching it two or three times. They could have at least alter some of the lines for the movie's opening after letting it be the opening of the trailer.
Enough of the movie's structures, I shall go now to its story line which gave the movie justice after that poor opening scenes followed by those cheesy-courting-twilight-cliché of the two characters in the beginning. And I am talking about the scenes from the Amsterdam. I think that it is where the story became mature and complex and I'm glad for it because I will surely leave the theater if it wasn't for that.
To sum this all up, the movie have pros and cons of course like any other movie. Besides the bad introduction, the actors also contributed to the movie's cons. I think Shailene is not ready for those kinds of roles, she can stick with her "Divergent" role first and let her potential evolve there. As for Ansel he lacks charisma and weak delivery of his lines, lines in which contributed to the movie's pros. Those lines are marvelous and for me I think it hasn't been done justice by the lead characters except Nat Wolff's delivery of his eulogy for Augustus, that almost made me cry.
I rate this movie 7/10 for the "Amsterdam" story of course
Dawn of the Dead (2004)
Classic zombie movie never gets old
I decided to review this movie because of my love for zombie movies, from the slow-paced walkers of "Walking Dead" to the fast-paced runners of "28 days later". Well, speaking of fast-paced zombies, this movie definitely took me to a one thrill experience.
I have not watched the work of George A. Romero back in 1978 but the name Zack Snyder (300, Watchmen) as the director of this remake gives me all the reason to watch this movie. Remake or not I think it is a solid movie for zombie fans like me. I love the storyline, actors, and the pace. All the factors that you are finding for a zombie movie is in here.
Maybe, you are wondering why my approach towards this movie is overly- biased but for me what's not to like? Perhaps, it cannot be compared to the greatness from the classic 1984 Dawn of the Dead but this move from the production companies to remake this movie definitely reached out a of lot people in this generation to give rise yet again to the true horror of zombies especially it was written by George Romero himself. I think I shall let the movie do the talking, enjoy! :D