Minggu, 02 Maret 2014

Movie Review: COLD EYES (2013)


“Cold Eyes” is a South Korean action-drama film starring Jung Woo-sung, Han Hyo-Joo, Sol Kyung-gu, and Lee Jun-ho. 
Han Hyo-joo as Ha Yoon-jo

Jung Woo-sung as James

Sol Kyung-gu as Detective Hwang

Lee Jun-ho as Agent "Squirrel"

This film which is a remake of a Hongkong film titled “Eye in the Sky” (2007) was released in July 2013. The film tells a story about a special surveillance team of Korean Police which is in a mission to take down a bank robbing-organization. The script was written by Jo Ui-seok and the movie was directed by Jo Ui-seok and Kim Byung-seo.

The first scene of the movie took place in a subway where a girl was keeping an eye on a middle-aged man reading a news paper. The girl kept on following the man even until he got off the subway and walked on the city’s street. Unlucky, the girl was caught off by the middle-aged man. The girl turned out to be a candidate of a surveillance team and it was her test to spy the man. Her name is Ha Yoon-joo (Han Hyo-joo) and the man, Detective Hwang (Sol Kyung-gu), was actually the section chief of the surveillance team. Eventhough Yoon-joo was caught off, but she passed the test because of her great observation skills and memorization. Then, she officially became a new member of the team with code name ”Piglet”.

On the other place, the movie showed a scene of a mysterious man standing on a skyscraper’s rooftop while commanding a bank robbery mission through his cellphone. The robbery succeeded, thanks to the mysterious man’s guidance, eventhough they almost caught off by the police. But, unfortunately, one of the robber’s face, nicknamed “Hippo”, was seen by the CCTV. Later on, the Korean Police tried to track down this robber organization based on the CCTV’s record.

The Korean Police then gave the mission of tracking down the robber organization to the surveillance team. This was Yoon-joo’s first mission after being a member of the team. Other than her, there were also another member who joined this mission. They were the team leader: Detective Hwang, Agent “Squirrel” (Lee Jun-ho), Department head, Ms. Lee, and some other agents too. The started off the mission by splitting up around the city and waited for Hippo’s appearance. Three days and they still couldn’t find any hint of the target. Yoon-joo told Detective Hwang to change their observation area and finally they caught a glimpse of their target, Hippo. Yoon-joo followed Hippo to his apartment and got his address. After that, Agent Squirrel came to help her and put some secret cameras near Hippo’s apartment.

After some days of observation, they found out about the organization’s plan to rob a stock market. The police and surveillance team guard the area and wait for the robber to come. They almost caught the organization team, but the operation failed because James (Jung Woo-sung), the mysterious man earlier, who happened to be their leader, knew the police’s plan to take them down. He commanded the robbers to abort their operation by his cellphone. The surveillance team then tracked down James’s position by his cellphone. Finally, James and the team were on an intense chasing action. Yoon-joo succeded to find his position but she couldn’t get closer to him. Later on,  Agent Squirrel came to help her to stop James but he was killed by James. TT_______TT (WHY DID YOU KILL HIM, JAMES?!) *oops sorry ._.v*

Agent Squirrel’s death shocked all of the team. This brought the surveillance team into a breakdown, including Yoon-joo. She felt depressed because she had just lost her team mate. But Detective Hwang came to comfort her. He said, “This is our job. You need to set aside your feeling or you will lose. You need to be insane to win this game.”

One day, Yoon-joo bumped into James on the subway. She contacted the Police Department and followed James. Upon hearing the news, Detective Hwang also on standby to help Yoon-joo. Finally Yoon-joo followed James into a restaurant. James, who was suspicious of Yoon-joo came to confront her. But, thanks to her great acting skill, James lost his suspicion toward her and was about to leave when Hwang entered the restaurant. James recognized Hwang’s face and attacked him while the two of them were on a parking area. Yoon-joo found the bleeding Hwang but he told her not to worry about him and keep on chasing James.

She found James and followed him into an unused subway platform but then lost him. James actually was standing behind her and threaten her by a gun. The police came to the platform but James used Yoon-joo as a hostage. Yoon-joo stabbed his leg using a pen and it made James let go of her. James then escaped and ran along the subway track. On the other scene, Hwang ran into the other side of the subway track and was face to face to James. He and James were ready to shoot each other with their gun. Ms. Lee commanded him not to shoot James because it was too risky, but then Hwang replied her by saying, “You need to be insane to win this game.” Then, James and Hwang involved in a dramatic shooting battle. James was shot to death and the police caught him. Yoon-joo ran to find Hwang. They finally succeeded the mission. All of the team member cheered happily.
The last scene of the movie showed Yoon-jo and Hwang in a mission to take down their new target, an international villain who once worked with James before.

Sooo.. that was a long-long retell about the movie. My personal opinion about the movie: A+ for the special effects and the nerve wrecking atmosphere throughout the movie. And another A+ for the way they showed how a surveillance mission works. The strategy, the hi-tech, and many other things. I love the casts, their acting was so good and felt so natural. Well, the main plot maybe similar to another movies with a same genre, making the ending  a bit predictable. But.. trust me, the way the director conducted the movie was so great that it will make you keep wanting to know what will happen next. You can feel the nervousness and thrilling atmosphere created by the movie. Weeeell, my conclusion is this movie is totally worth to watch! Four stars out of five! :)


Thanks for reading! ^^