Tubi Tales: The Fucky Films of Kim Ki-Duk

Look upon the hateful face of this fucky man. That mean lookin fuk is Mr. Kim Ki-Duk. I discovered this director by accident when I watched 3-Iron and then was too lazy to get up as it auto-played another of his movies. I became intrigued and searched for more. 

Mr. Duk has a uniquely serene and contemplative style, which juxtaposes hypnotically with the deranged subject matter of his films. Some of these have really bizarre plots, but they’re not in your face about it, it’s all very matter of fact like it’s the most normal shit in the world. 

Of his many films I've now watched 4, and I'm gonna tell ya about em before i watch more. 

 3 Iron

This is an odd little romance movie that seems to follow a kind of dream-logic. It starts with a homeless dude who’s worked out a clever system for learning when people are on vacation so he can squat in their houses. He ends up meeting a chick with a nasty husband, so he pelts the husband with golfballs and she runs off with him. But then he goes to jail, where he develops an even cleverer system of standing behind people so perfectly they can never see him. Are you still following? Cause he is. This movie is insane. 

With his newly honed shadow-lord powers he… you know what, it’s better if you just watch it yourself. Don’t watch the trailer cause it spoils too much. Even the damn poster spoils too much. I basically told you the whole plot as it is, but the promotional material literally just shows the conclusion and presents it like it’s the entire movie, which cheapens it. 

It's a nice little film, and the story is just the right amount of ludicrously insane while still feeling weirdly grounded. It’s absurd, but sincere. Good movie. 

Spring Summer Autumn Winter… and Spring

This is the one that auto-played for me after 3-iron, and something about it just hooked me right away. I raw-dogged it without even reading what it’s about, that’s how immediately compelling it was. I can’t think of another movie I've seen quite like this. It’s minimalist and tranquil, but also purposeful and compelling, with a story that feels universal, in a setting that is one-of-a-kind. 

It all takes place in one location, a tiny floating temple in the middle of a lake, deep in a secluded forest, basically my dream-house. It’s one of the most beautiful lookin fuckin films I've ever peeped. The setting cycles through the seasons as the protagonist cycles through the seasons of his life. A lot happens, and nothing happens. He ends up back where he started, but changed, and a new story begins as nature remains the same. The earth abides. 

This is easily my favorite of these flicks. It feels effortlessly profound, relaxing but never boring. Definitely check this one out. Good movie. 

Moebius

Here’s where things start to get really fucky. This one is nuts. An uncomfortable Oedipal trauma-tale that starts out completely demented and just keeps tumbling further down the helly-hole. You want to know the plot? Fine. I’ll tell you of the terrible things I saw. 

A lady goes fuckin crazy at her husband for finding some happiness on the side. She tries to cut his weiner off, fails, and gets kicked out of the bedroom. Not beaten within an inch of her life, handcuffed to the fridge, or thrown in the back of a cop car, just kicked out of the bedroom. The guy literally tries to go back to sleep with her still in the house. Bruh, I think now might be a good time to put some jeans on and have a coffee. 

This bitch has fuckin lost it. She can’t get back in the bedroom so she decides to visit the teenage son, her own teenage son, and cut his weiner off instead. Then she eats it. Wow that was fucked up, what a crazy movie, right? Sit down. That was only the first 10 minutes. 

If you’re wondering where it can possibly go from here, the answer is all kinds of places. I’m torn between giving a full play by play or letting the bravest among you see for yourself how insane this flick is. 

For a while it settles into a series of sad events in the boy’s now ruined life, while the father desperately researches wang transplants. After a while, the mom returns and things get even more miserable. Hell, they get downright stupid.  

It might sound unwatchable, but it did remain compelling throughout. Nothing here is portrayed as exploitatively as it could be, the director is deliberate in telling this deranged story with a genuine sensitivity. The young man’s struggles are upsetting to watch but are shown with great sympathy, as are the father’s overwhelming guilt and attempts to help.

I haven’t even mentioned yet the most interesting thing about the movie, which is that there is no dialogue. Everything is conveyed wordlessly and it’s done really well. I’m sure no other director would ever make this movie but I'm just as sure that a lesser director would not be able to pull this off without dialogue, and it wouldn’t be nearly as effective with dialogue.

I think it would all just be too much if the characters were monologuing and pontificating about the lost dick. We don’t need scenes of these characters reiterating to everyone who needs to know that his mom ate his dick. I don't want to hear that conversation once, let alone 50 times. Fucky-Duk has a gift for taking completely bizarre stories and showing them in a way that seems empathetic, and human enough to remain believable, for the most part. 

There is a moment in this film where my suspension of disbelief breaks. Eventually the good-for-nothing piece of shit wife returns home, after having left the family high to dry to deal with the hellishness she inflicted on them. She never went to prison, or to the nuthouse, or died in a ditch like a creature of her kind deserves. She just left, and then shows up again… and stays. They let her stay. 

I won’t spoil the climax of these events, it’s just perplexing to me that they don’t immediately call the police or toss her out into the garbage as soon as she shows her stupid face. In a movie where characters make insane choices, this is the one moment that was too insane. 

It might even be a silly thing to complain about considering what happens next is even more insane, but it's insane in a way that fits with the insanity of the rest of the film, so I can accept it. But to get there I first have to accept that they accepted her back into the family, and that’s the point where my brain totally short circuits. That’s where the movie broke me.

By the end of it, I was left feeling empty and confused, despite being invested for most of the runtime. 

Good movie? But also bad movie. 

One on One

Here’s where my story concludes. When discovering a new director there comes a point where you say okay, that’s enough of this guy for now. This movie stunk. It was boring as hell and seemed utterly pointless. 

I’m not the only one who thinks so. Just now I looked up a ranking of all 22 Kim Ki-Duk films, and by sheer chance the other 3 I watched were among the highest acclaimed while this one is eating shit at the bottom. 

The other ones I watched all had minimal dialogue, one of them having none at all. It works well, creating a unique, dreamy kind of tone. But in this one the characters never shut up, and there’s a lot of characters, and not once did I ever really know what the hell they were talking about. 

Something about a girl who gets attacked by a bunch of dudes, and then one by one the dudes get interrogated by some terrorist cell out for justice i guess, but i don’t really know what their deal is. Meanwhile there’s a guy in a restaurant spitting in food. I don’t even know what’s happening, I had already stopped paying attention by that point. I don’t care about this anymore. 

Fuck it. Bad movie. 

Well there you have it, 4 reviews of 4 foreign films you’ll probably never watch from a director you hadn’t heard of and don’t care about. You’re welcome. Kim Ki-Duk died from covid so he only has 18 more movies for me to watch. Whenever that happens, I’ll let ya know. But I've had enough weird Korean bullshit for now, so it’s back to Star Trek and Family Guy.