Forty years ago, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly set a new standard for outlaw cool, reinventing the western in the process. They never saw the Koreans coming. For the last decade, South Korea has produced some of the world's most exciting cinema. So it's fitting that The Good, the Bad, the Weird reinvents this landmark film with a thrilling kimchi twist.
In a lawless Manchurian desert during the tumultuous thirties, three Korean men meet on a train. Do-won (Jung Woo-sung), the Good, is an infamous bounty hunter with a deadly shot. Chang-yi (Lee Byung-hun) is the Bad, a merciless gang leader with a colossal ego. Tae-goo (Song Kang-ho), the Weird, is a gifted but unpredictable train robber who favours his motor scooter over horseback. Along with the Japanese army and hordes of bandits grappling for control of this desert territory, the Good, the Bad and the Weird face off in every possible combination. They seize and cede power in quick succession, all the while trying to exploit a mysterious map that promises huge riches.
Award-winning filmmaker Kim Jee-woon has explored comedy, film noir, horror and hybrids in his past work. Here he conjures a wild, wild East, loaded with racing steam engines, dashing bandits, opium dens and breathtaking chase sequences. But even amid all the action, this is a character piece, with Kim directing his huge stars Jung, Lee and Song to detailed performances that capture each actor's quirks.
The Good, the Bad, the Weird is the biggest-budget Korean film ever made, and is already on its way to becoming a massive box-office champion at home. Harking back not just to the spaghetti western but to unabashed thrill rides like the Indiana Jones movies, this is an adventure that cries out to be seen for the vitality of its direction and the pure pleasure it offers an audience.
Kim Jee-woon was born in Seoul, South Korea, and was a theatre actor and director before making his writing-directing debut with The Quiet Family in 1998. He has also written and directed the films The Foul King (00), the Memories segment of the horror film anthology 3 Extremes II (02), A Tale of Two Sisters (03), A Bittersweet Life (05) and The Good, the Bad, the Weird (08).