Reviews

Until I saw Yakuza to kazoku, I never knew that the Japanese society has changed its policy toward Yakuza. So I checked the web to see what has happened. Lo and behold, the Japanese government crackdown on Yakuza has been so effective and cruel that Yakuza is not what it used to be.

It's sort of too bad that the days of Yakuza are gone because they had style and manhood. Unlike the organized crimes in other countries, Yakuza had loyalty, respect, and tradition like the samurai class.

The boss who is dying of cancer doesn't deserve sympathy because he enjoyed his glory and power during the heydays of Yakuza. It is Kenji who is to be pitied. He didn't get to enjoy its power and glory. And he tasted the love of his life only briefly. After his release from prison, everything was taken away from him.

The Japanese government tried to eradicate Yakuza by making it, not a battle between the state and Yakuza, but a battle between the people and Yakuza in excluding them and everyone associated with them. It is an effective strategy, but it leaves innocent victims like the family.

The leading actor displays the emotions of the protagonist very well. His interactions with his girlfriend ring true. His daughter is very beautiful. A wonderful movie.

I must be an old-fashioned conservative of the old values because I love this movie for the first twenty minutes - until the end of the birthday party. What comes after is a tragic breakdown of the family heritage and the collapse of the old Italy, which is painful to watch.

But the first twenty minutes take a rare look into an aristocratic, Milanese Italian family. The mansion plays a big role in presenting the class and sophistication of a major industrialist family. Although the time it takes to serve the soup seems too long and the soup must grow cold, the family celebration of the patriarch's birthday gives me a glimpse into another culture and another social class.

Apparently the film depicts not only the transformation of the protagonist family but also the transformation of the Italian society from the old reality to the new reality of globalization, diversity of people and sexual orientation. The Recchi family-owned textile mill can't compete in the global market of cheap labor and competition. Although the heirs of the family fortune makes a lot of money from selling the company, it suggests the end of an era. It is sad to see the heirs of the family fortune aren't willing to brave the changing environment but want to make quick bucks by selling it off to a foreign buyer.

If I were the patriarch founder of the family fortune, I would be very sad to see my life-time work sold off to a stranger. I don't believe that pursuing one's heart and love justifies the renunciation of the family legacy and pride. But that's my personal belief.

The beginning of the drama resembles The Sassy Girl, where the rude behavior of the girl catches the guy off guard. The Sassy Girl was a romantic comedy, but Doona! Lacks the comic element, especially for the male lead character, who is wooden, hesitant, and whimpish.

What keeps the story going in Doona's character. The story kept me wondering how the relationship would turn out in the end. I sort of expected that Doona was in the control of an older and father-like, powerful man whom she couldn't forget or get away from. She was like a kept woman of this manager/supervisor/father figure.

At first, I had high hopes for this drama, but the storyline had its severe limitations. No character development, no innovations, but the repetition of the same old stories -- love that can't work.

Reptile has many things that could have made this a find movie. The biggest weakness of the movie is the cliche conclusion after much goose chasing. It has a promising start. The dark shadow over the murdered woman and her husband is duplicated over Del Toro and his wife. Fod a moment I felt that Del Toro might murder his wife in the same way the victim was murdered. But the story went in a different direction, to a cliche conclusion that we so often see in many crime movies dealing with drugs and police corruption. Somehow drugs and police corruption don't go too well with the suburban milieu of the Town of Scarborough. It would have been better if the story dealt more with the deep darkness of humans.

Another thing I couldn't understand was the use of several old pop hits like Just Like an Angel. What does it have to do with the story of the movie?

The movie could have been good. The only strength of the movie is the solid performance of Del Toro. It was for him that I watched the movie to the end.

Kim Philby may argue vehemently that he's not a traitor. But that does not deny the fact that he was a liar and a cheater. He lied to his family, friends, vocation, and country, and he was very good at it. Some may argue that the very profession of espionage compels you to lie. But you have to be honest to someone sometime. Philby was honest to no one at no time, except to his KGB cutout.

The story does not do a convincing job explaining why Philby became a communist. His experience in Vienna at the hand of the Nazis is not enough. It doesn't explain why he continued to work for the Soviet Union after the Nazis were defeated.

Instead of trying to find his reason for betraying his country from the war-time experience, Elliot's explanation is persuasive: Philby thrives in being a spy. So he had to spy, not only on his enemies, but also on his friends.

The Establishment code of ethics of protecting its own is laughable. They don't really seem to be the privileged upper class of England in the first place. Just because you went to private schools and Oxbridge doesn't make you part of the Establishment. These spoiled men took themselves too seriously. Later Joh LeCarre pointed to such people as those responsible for the demise of the British Empire.

Nonetheless, A Spy Among Friends is a true espionage thriller that only the British can make. True espionage work is conducted this way. Americans, on the other hand, throw money around and make a lot of noise. The greatest damage done to the British intelligence by Philby's betrayal was probably losing their credibility to the Americans. Americans were sloppy in filtering out the moles among their British cousins.

Sending Philby to Russia was a sort of punishment for his life of crime. Living the rest of his life in Russia was comparable to serving a life sentence in a British or American penitentiary. It's probably worse because Philby can't trust the people who are supposed to be his comrades. The Soviet KGB wasn't going to trust him. There was enough ground of suspecting that Elliot had turned Philby as a triple agent. It was for that reason that Elliot took Philby out to the balcony to talk for a few minutes, knowing fully well that they were being observed.

The Cold War ended with the American victory. The KGB's espionage coups couldn't save communism. The state power, however potent it may be, cannot save a faulty social system. I hope the same principle will apply to China.

A Spy Among Friends, shown on Prime Video, is one of the best espionage thrillers in a long time. This is the way true espionage is done -- both internationally and domestically. American-made spy movies focus on foreign operations, making spies look like tourists. But ASAF shows that spying work takes place in the drawing rooms in Kensington and in the corridors of Whitehall.

Overall, a great thriller and I recommend it enthusiastically to anyone desiring to watch true espionage thrillers.

Aren't we sick and tired of Jame Bond flicks where spies are slick playboys driving sports cars and drinking martinis with beautiful women, while spending an unlimited budget on saving the world? But we all know that the real world of espionage is never like that. Some recent espionage films have learned the lesson and toned down the drama a little bit, so that the protagonists have a qualm of conscience between their loyalty and their own sense of right and wrong. Nonetheless, movies like "Body of Lies" and "24" place the protagonists in impossibly dangerous situations with incredible action sequences. But none of such scenarios is true; they are all escapist stories.

Page Eight is a quintessential British spy story, very similar to John LeCarre's novels, where the institutions that one works for are immoral, or amoral, and truth is buried under political considerations and everyone is morally murky. Nothing seems perfect -- jobs, institutions, nation, family, marriage, and children. Nonetheless one doesn't give up on his life because he or she believes that certain things are worth fighting for. In this movie, the truth about the death of a peace activist and the lies covered up by the people in power. Americans may regard this story as being too liberal, but that's because Americans have been taught to think and black and white.

There's an element of incredibility in the chemistry between Bill Nighy and Rachel Weisz. It seems like an incredible coincidence that they happen to live opposite each other. Throughout the movie, I couldn't shake off the suspicion that Rachel was some kind of a plant to play tricks on Bill Nighy.

Another incredible thing is the nonchalance with which Bill Nighy carries a big amount of cash in a half-transparent plastic bag. It symbolizes the nonchalance attitude he has toward the things others take very seriously.

All in all, a very enjoyable spy thriller, especially to an old man like me. I can sympathize with the man in the evening of his life with failed marriage and alienated children, trying to hold on to the things that really matter in life. I recommend this movie highly to anyone who is looking for a real spy flick.