May 18 (Splendid Holiday)

Back to school soon. Yay. Good bye summer! On another note, did you know I have done more than 52 consistent reviews? That's right, it's been over a year since I returned to blogging!

My Dad lent me this film (in all it's limited edition box set glory) saying that it wasn't that good. But, based on true events May 18  is most tragic, tear-jerking tale I've ever witnessed!! No joke about the fact that this is the first time I've actually cried at a piece of media! May 18 is the date in which the citizens of Gwangju, Korea, took arms against the army. The events are true but obviously the characters have been made with the purpose of making every one cry. Brothers Min-woo and Jin-woo are living life quite happily despite having lost their parents (an added detail which I hate for it's cliché). But when soldiers are sent to beat down supposed conspirators from colleges Jin-woo leads his school in protesting. The soldiers are depicted mowing down any college student they see while many others get caught in the middle. It's difficult to pass judgement on this because I know nothing about the incident myself I couldn't say if they've exaggerated it or omitted important facts to make it a greater sob story.
But the story really gets going after a student is killed by soldiers causing full-blown protesting which gets progressively more violent. It eventually comes to a point where the citizens have to form they're own army to try combat the advancing military. It does not end pretty. Min-woo is just one of the many trying to get through this battle while protecting as many of his loved ones as possible, but with all the death around  him a happy ending is impossible. The saddest part is at the end of the film they show a group photo of every one alive and happy together, what should of happened if the military didn't intrude.
Obviously in a film like this they try to make the characters as ordinary as possible, but they kind of killed that when they gave Min-woo and Jin-woo the horrible "We only have each other left!" moment. Other than that they had a collection of ordinary citizens. The poor priest bought in a bit of religion to the film (which I think is a good thing) and the innocence of the Nurse involved and impact the incident had on her was probably the saddest thing! Unlike Min-woo, who is incredibly strong and copes with things well, the Nurse is so normal, she just breaks in the situation. In fact, the whole hospital was like that as they tried quite unsuccessfully to save patients.... I just wanted to give them a big hug! They even put a little boy into it and every one knows that things are getting serious when they make the little boy cry!
Obviously, most of the film has a morbid tone, so there's nearly always some one crying. Usually this would get on my nerves because there's ALWAYS one idiot actor who can't cry properly, but I didn't have a problem with it in this film! Even the little boy was quite convincing with his tears! Although the blood looked pretty fake and some of the explosions where bad, in general, it was produced with a believable amount of realism with out any disgusting scenes of people who's faces got shot off or something off-putting like that.
I've seen all sorts of true event tragedy films, (Titanic, Anne Frank, Blood Diamond, ect.) but never have I been so deeply effected by one. My theory is that I've never had a single lesson on what's happened in Korea, so unlike any of the other films I was truly shocked at what happened!! Really, I view this film from an educational stand-point rather than focussing on the individual characters I preferred to see the general progression of things, but maybe that's just because I'm a nerd! Any one with a heart will be touched by this film. Of course, if you want to stay blissfully ignorant or just try to avoid the sad films, just keep away from this in all ways possible. But you should watch it! It was certainly new to me, the love story was so sad, the music was beautiful and the acting was perfection. There is no reason for you not to watch it! It's just a REALLY sad film!!

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