I was in South Korea recently and was chatting with colleagues there about the films I had seen from their country – a rather humbling experience since I knew so few. Anyway, this film came up since it had recently been very successful and, after some internet searching, I found the English title. I was only able to get hold of an American dubbed version of the film, although I was keen to see the film on the recommendation of my colleague. The film is a thriller set during the invasion of Korea by the Manchurian, archer Nam Yi sets out to rescue his sister Ja In, who has been kidnapped by the invaders.
The plot sets up a chase featuring a lone bowman against a small unit also trying to stop him from his rescue and it offers the potential for plenty of excitement. Indeed this is what it seems to be focused on because the film has little room for anything but forward motion in regards the chase and the arrow action. Unfortunately this aspect of the film is nowhere near strong enough to make it be as much of the film as it is. Running to over two hours, the film doesn't provide as much plotting or character as I would have liked to engage me for this amount of time. The action isn't good enough to take up the slack. The nature of the delivery suggested some arrow-fu style action would be on the cards but it is rarely up to scratch. Occasionally there are tense moments which are well-delivered, but otherwise the action failed to move me. It lacked tension and thrills and really did come down to quite a lot of scenes of people running from one another; there are standoffs and individual moments which worked very well but the majority did not.
Overall The War of the Arrows didn't convince me as the blockbuster it was in its own country. The dubbing didn't help for sure, but the greater damage was the workmanlike plot being combined with action which is never as balletic or thrilling as it needed to be to carry the long running time.
The plot sets up a chase featuring a lone bowman against a small unit also trying to stop him from his rescue and it offers the potential for plenty of excitement. Indeed this is what it seems to be focused on because the film has little room for anything but forward motion in regards the chase and the arrow action. Unfortunately this aspect of the film is nowhere near strong enough to make it be as much of the film as it is. Running to over two hours, the film doesn't provide as much plotting or character as I would have liked to engage me for this amount of time. The action isn't good enough to take up the slack. The nature of the delivery suggested some arrow-fu style action would be on the cards but it is rarely up to scratch. Occasionally there are tense moments which are well-delivered, but otherwise the action failed to move me. It lacked tension and thrills and really did come down to quite a lot of scenes of people running from one another; there are standoffs and individual moments which worked very well but the majority did not.
Overall The War of the Arrows didn't convince me as the blockbuster it was in its own country. The dubbing didn't help for sure, but the greater damage was the workmanlike plot being combined with action which is never as balletic or thrilling as it needed to be to carry the long running time.