As the name suggests, “The Good, The Bad, The Weird” pays homage to Clint Eastwood’s 1966 “The Good, The Bad, The Ugly” but it is far from a carbon copy. In fact, it doesn’t resemble anything close to Eastwood’s work aside from being a western. While Eastwood’s film focused on excellent pacing to achieve tension between the characters, director Jee-woon Kim opted for a different approach; nonstop action…and it works.
The movie takes place in 1940s Manchuria. A petty thief, Yoon Tae-goo (a.k.a. The Weird) steals a treasure map while on board a moving train. Park Chang-yi (a.k.a. The Bad) is a notorious fugitive hired to steal the same map. He takes a much more direct approach by stopping the train with burning logs, raids the train with his small army of bandits, and pretty much shoots everything and everyone on sight. Park Do-won (a.k.a. The Good) is a bounty hunter hired by the Korean Independence Army to steal the map and also to collect the enormous bounty on The Bad.
The opening train scene shows off director Jee-woon Kim’s cinematography skills. A long continuous shot following The Weird going from car to car helps build up anticipation for some action which is rewarded in the form of a showdown with soldiers escorting a wealthy Japanese banker. Wide desert shots with a lone train shows how barren and empty the environment is. However, it’s the action sequences where Kim’s camera ability really shines.
High octane camera movements are edited with quick cuts for a nice blend of speed and power. A good example of this is when a big member of The Bad’s crew runs to the back of the train, slamming each door open like a hormonal teenager and is greeted with a shotgun blast that sends him flying back five feet and into the doorway with tremendous force.
A small complaint I have is that the guns lack the realistic recoil and muzzle flash seen in modern Hollywood films, but they do pack plenty of smoke. The sound effects are also a little dated, especially one in particular of a gun reloading, which I remember once hearing in the 1997 Nintendo 64 game, Goldeneye 007.
Amidst all the gunfights, chase scenes and humorous antics of The Weird, the story takes a hit. There’s practically no character development (with the possible exception of The Weird). The Bad and The Good are pretty much walking stereotypes of the villain and the hero, respectively. Although this movie is an action flick all the way through, it would have been nice for Kim to be able to interweave an engaging story like he did in his 2006 gangster film, “A Bittersweet Life.”
Also, The Good, The Bad and the Weird seem more interested in each other than gold. And I don’t mean the Brokeback-Mountain-kind of interest either; I’m talking about the Bill-O’Reilly-in-a-black-neighborhood-kind of interest. These guys want to tear each other apart. They seem to be motivated more by revenge than greed, which makes the whole treasure-map-leads-to-gold plot seem a bit pointless.
“The Good, The Bad, The Weird” is a great movie to watch If you’re looking for a fun action flick with great cinematographic sequences. Just don’t expect a story.
Here’s my rating for the movie using its title! Clever, right?
The Good – Amazing cinematographic shots; nonstop action; opening train sequence; ending chase sequence; ending three-way duel
The Bad – no character development; sub-par plot; dated sound effects; CGI looks too computerized at some points
The Weird – South Koreans in cowboy outfits; that one Asian with dreadlocks who looks surprisingly similar to the rapper, Twista.
Rating: 8/10
