Let me explain why I was disappointed with this film. The reason I've analysed in so much detail was to try and understand exactly why I felt this way about a movie which, on the surface, seems pretty good. Windstruck has all of the elements required to be a fantastic melodramatic film. There are two believable characters, a romance, lots of action, a recurring theme (wind), memorable lines, an untimely death and plenty of emotional moments. Every box is ticked, yet it feels as if there is something missing...
The director has tried to combine several different genres into one movie, and when you're trying to do a lot of things at once then you need to take extra care that the transitions are seamless and the story follows logically and at a suitable pace. The first thing a successful love tragedy has to do is introduce characters which the viewer cares about, and then create a convincing relationship between them. If the audience doesn't feel that emotional involvement then the story will fall flat, no matter how beautiful or touching the upcoming action may be. Creating this sort of background usually takes several scenes in which the characters meet, get to know each other, hang out together and ultimately realise that they have feelings for each other. A movie such as MSG does this brilliantly.
For me, Windstruck fell down on the above point by not spending enough time introducing the characters and their relationship. The supposed "bond" built between the two leads is never explained or explored in enough depth. One minute they are sleeping in handcuffs after spending the night running around, and in the next scene they are suddenly boyfriend/girlfriend. Fastforward another two scenes and they are inexplicably traveling around the countryside in a recently purchased motor vehicle, and seem to share a love as deep as if they had been married for several years. While we are still trying to process this turn of events, there is a sudden car crash merely minutes later and Myungwoo almost dies! Although many have criticised the film for being too long, in these first few chapters Windstruck moves far too quickly to create a real and credible connection. This causes problems later on because Kyungjin's reaction seems exaggerated compared to the extent of their relationship.
A related aspect to this is the 'emotional pacing' of the film. A skilled director understands that to create genuinely moving melodramatic moments there needs to be a balance between emotional scenes and other plot development scenes. Graphically, it should look like this __/\__/\__/\__ where the emotional tension builds to a climax and is then released before building up again. You cannot keep people interested if you ask them to remain in a state of extended high emotion. After the car crash, Windstruck attempts to do exactly this with a plethora of lengthy emotional scenes one after the other. Before you've even recovered from Myungwoo's near death in the car crash, he's down on the ground AGAIN. A scene where the girl cradles her dying lover in her arms is very powerful, but you can only use it ONCE per movie! After a while it all becomes a bit too much. Even those who initially sympathised with the characters may find themselves withdrawing emotionally and wondering "when is she going to stop crying?" or "dammit, is she ever gonna die?"
Another area in which this film contrasts with other movies of this genre is the difference between showing and telling. Telling is when the main character says "I am sad". Showing is when the director demonstrates through actions, events, montages or even facial expressions that the character is sad. Now, being a huge fan of Shunji Iwai, I concede that I am biased in favour of films which leave the interpretation up to the viewer and convey strong emotional scenes without excessive dialogue. For me, the most powerful scenes are the ones in which simple or seemingly trivial actions/events take on a special meaning and become beautiful because of the context and the action leading up to it. There is too much telling or narrating in Windstruck, when the same points could have otherwise been made more powerfully. At times it seemed the only way Kyungjin could express her grief was by crying and screaming out her dead lover's name.
The next problem is credibility. The reason why I don't like action films as a genre is because of the sheer implausibility of most of the story. Hero is involved in XYZ dangerous situations and miraculously escapes unscathed, and just when you think he is finally dead he STILL lives to save the day. Yawn. It's boring because no matter how terrifying the scenario, you already know that hero won't die. I call bs in several scenes in Windstruck, most notably when Kyungjin suicide jumps on top of a balloon, survives after being shot in the heart at point blank range, and "miraculously" avoids being shot in multiple gun battles with criminals. There are also plot holes surrounding Kyungjin's work and general police conduct, as well as the lack of investigation after she was implicated in Myungwoo's death.
I was also disappointed with the introduction of a paranormal element into the story, because it killed any sense of ambiguity or metaphorical beauty brought about by the wind scenes. Once again, the director decided to "tell" instead of show with a lengthy and unnecessary goodbye moment.
Now that I've spent the last few paragraphs bashing various elements of the plot and structure, unfortunately I've run out of words to talk about the things I like. Put briefly, the music is great, the acting and special effects are good throughout and there are some nice touches of humour at certain points.
Hopefully this explains to some people why I (and others) don't rate this nearly as highly as other Korean melodramas such as MSG or Failan.
The director has tried to combine several different genres into one movie, and when you're trying to do a lot of things at once then you need to take extra care that the transitions are seamless and the story follows logically and at a suitable pace. The first thing a successful love tragedy has to do is introduce characters which the viewer cares about, and then create a convincing relationship between them. If the audience doesn't feel that emotional involvement then the story will fall flat, no matter how beautiful or touching the upcoming action may be. Creating this sort of background usually takes several scenes in which the characters meet, get to know each other, hang out together and ultimately realise that they have feelings for each other. A movie such as MSG does this brilliantly.
For me, Windstruck fell down on the above point by not spending enough time introducing the characters and their relationship. The supposed "bond" built between the two leads is never explained or explored in enough depth. One minute they are sleeping in handcuffs after spending the night running around, and in the next scene they are suddenly boyfriend/girlfriend. Fastforward another two scenes and they are inexplicably traveling around the countryside in a recently purchased motor vehicle, and seem to share a love as deep as if they had been married for several years. While we are still trying to process this turn of events, there is a sudden car crash merely minutes later and Myungwoo almost dies! Although many have criticised the film for being too long, in these first few chapters Windstruck moves far too quickly to create a real and credible connection. This causes problems later on because Kyungjin's reaction seems exaggerated compared to the extent of their relationship.
A related aspect to this is the 'emotional pacing' of the film. A skilled director understands that to create genuinely moving melodramatic moments there needs to be a balance between emotional scenes and other plot development scenes. Graphically, it should look like this __/\__/\__/\__ where the emotional tension builds to a climax and is then released before building up again. You cannot keep people interested if you ask them to remain in a state of extended high emotion. After the car crash, Windstruck attempts to do exactly this with a plethora of lengthy emotional scenes one after the other. Before you've even recovered from Myungwoo's near death in the car crash, he's down on the ground AGAIN. A scene where the girl cradles her dying lover in her arms is very powerful, but you can only use it ONCE per movie! After a while it all becomes a bit too much. Even those who initially sympathised with the characters may find themselves withdrawing emotionally and wondering "when is she going to stop crying?" or "dammit, is she ever gonna die?"
Another area in which this film contrasts with other movies of this genre is the difference between showing and telling. Telling is when the main character says "I am sad". Showing is when the director demonstrates through actions, events, montages or even facial expressions that the character is sad. Now, being a huge fan of Shunji Iwai, I concede that I am biased in favour of films which leave the interpretation up to the viewer and convey strong emotional scenes without excessive dialogue. For me, the most powerful scenes are the ones in which simple or seemingly trivial actions/events take on a special meaning and become beautiful because of the context and the action leading up to it. There is too much telling or narrating in Windstruck, when the same points could have otherwise been made more powerfully. At times it seemed the only way Kyungjin could express her grief was by crying and screaming out her dead lover's name.
The next problem is credibility. The reason why I don't like action films as a genre is because of the sheer implausibility of most of the story. Hero is involved in XYZ dangerous situations and miraculously escapes unscathed, and just when you think he is finally dead he STILL lives to save the day. Yawn. It's boring because no matter how terrifying the scenario, you already know that hero won't die. I call bs in several scenes in Windstruck, most notably when Kyungjin suicide jumps on top of a balloon, survives after being shot in the heart at point blank range, and "miraculously" avoids being shot in multiple gun battles with criminals. There are also plot holes surrounding Kyungjin's work and general police conduct, as well as the lack of investigation after she was implicated in Myungwoo's death.
I was also disappointed with the introduction of a paranormal element into the story, because it killed any sense of ambiguity or metaphorical beauty brought about by the wind scenes. Once again, the director decided to "tell" instead of show with a lengthy and unnecessary goodbye moment.
Now that I've spent the last few paragraphs bashing various elements of the plot and structure, unfortunately I've run out of words to talk about the things I like. Put briefly, the music is great, the acting and special effects are good throughout and there are some nice touches of humour at certain points.
Hopefully this explains to some people why I (and others) don't rate this nearly as highly as other Korean melodramas such as MSG or Failan.