Korean Reviews Reviews

Film Review: A Hard Day (2014) by Kim Seong-hun

Detective Ko Gun-su is a troubled homicide detective. His mother recently died and the Internal Affairs are investigating his department over bribery charges. Furthermore, as he is driving to his mother's funeral, he runs over a man and because he cannot take any more drama, he puts the body in his trunk and continues his course.

A Hard Day Amazon

Unfortunately, he is stopped by traffic policemen, an encounter that leads to pepper spraying, tasing and eventually slapping. However, his worst idea comes a bit later, when he decides to hide the body in his mother's casket. Lastly, at one point, he receives a phone call from a man who claims to know everything that happened.

Check also this interview

Kim Seong-hun directs a film that constantly lingers between dark comedy and thriller, succeeding in the portrayal of both and thus creating a highly entertaining picture, where the spectator laughs and at the same time has a constant sense of agony for the protagonist.

The general pace is rapid and is shot in many close-ups, a technique , who plays Gun-su, exploits to the fullest in order to present a character who seems resourceful, but ends up failing every time. Cho Jin-woong, who plays his “enemy”, is also very convincing, emitting cruelness despite his exterior that suggests otherwise. The various fights between the two are magnificent as they are agonizing, with the upper hand constantly changing.

” is a very entertaining film, that stands apart from the plethora of similar productions because it does take itself very seriously

About the author

Panos Kotzathanasis

My name is Panos Kotzathanasis and I am Greek. Being a fan of Asian cinema and especially of Chinese kung fu and Japanese samurai movies since I was a little kid, I cultivated that love during my adolescence, to extend to the whole of SE Asia.

Starting from my own blog in Greek, I then moved on to write for some of the major publications in Greece, and in a number of websites dealing with (Asian) cinema, such as Taste of Cinema, Hancinema, EasternKicks, Chinese Policy Institute, and of course, Asian Movie Pulse. in which I still continue to contribute.

In the beginning of 2017, I launched my own website, Asian Film Vault, which I merged in 2018 with Asian Movie Pulse, creating the most complete website about the Asian movie industry, as it deals with almost every country from East and South Asia, and definitely all genres.

You can follow me on Facebook and Twitter.

  • I wouldn’t say it was great, but it was crazy and entertaining as hell, I can say that for sure. It gets really insane towards the end, too.

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