Han Gi-su (Lee Min-gi) was the leader of a biker gang that would joy ride through the streets of Seoul acting bad, but rarely causing any real havoc. All that changed the night his girl Chun-shim (Kang Ye-won) caught him making out with someone else. This prompts her to track him down and yell at him from her bike. The argument escalates and eventually the two lose track of their place in the road and cause a huge pileup at a busy intersection. Fast forward six years, and we find Gi-su is known as the quickest courier messenger in the entire city. One day he is told to deliver a small brown box to a chemical building in the downtown area. After the delivery and climbing onto his bike, the place explodes with him just mere feet from the site. He gets taken in for questioning, but the authorities release him because of his lack of coherence. Within hours he is back on the road, this time to pick up local pop idol Ah-rom from the all girl group OK Girls. Lo and behold it’s actually Chun-shim, who may or may not have purposefully ordered his services in particular. Still cross about the extra curricular kissing, she takes his helmet away from him, to his chagrin, and buckles it. Little do either of them know that she has just activated a time sensitive bomb. A few second later, a mysterious voice comes through over a Bluetooth headset that says he must complete “deliveries” within strict time allotments, or the helmet will explode. Shaken and out of sorts, Gi-su has no choice but to take Chun along on a crazy, but often funny, blazing trail filled with police chases, narrow escapes, and of course explosions.
I won’t claim to be a foreign film enthusiast. I can probably count on two hands how many I’ve seen, and it would take some thought to come up with that many. Although, for some reason, I have found myself to take in more films from Korea than any other country. 2006’s The Host was a pretty effective homage to classic Asian monster films of yesteryear. But the best film from the country that I’ve ever seen is the absolutely amazing The Man From Nowhere directed by Jeong-beom Lee and starring Bin Won. Flat out, it’s the best crime film I’ve seen since American Gangster, and if you have Netflix streaming I implore you to give it a viewing. So, I’ve had some, but minimal exposure to Korean flicks, and reviewing this one was a welcome opportunity.
Quick was initially released in 2011 and garnered some success in it’s homeland. This is directed by Beom-gu Cho, who is able to strike a good chord between serious action and silly comedy. Naturally I had no prior knowledge of the movie, so I was under the impression it was going to be a strict crime joint. On up until about three minutes in, when one of the “bikers” happened to be a delivery boy from Papa John’s and was being berated by the lead detective in the film. So, at this point I knew not everything was on the “straight and narrow” and to expect a good portion of humor. I think this approach works best with the storyline, plot, and script put together by Cho, Soo-jin Park, and Youn Jk. Not because the story and happenings aren’t believable, (I mean, even the most beloved action films rarely occupy what is possible) it’s just not as “multi-layered” as it would need to be if it were just and action flick. Outside of one or two “twists,” this thing stays on one set of straight tracks. So to make it a fun watch, Min-gi, Ye-won, and others put in solid work to enforce the comedy when appropriate. The most laughs come from In-kwon Kim, who plays the goofball/fumbling idiot type cop and is “madly in love” with Ah-rom. The best aspect of Quick are the really good action sequences that take place. The opening crash scene is quite elaborate and orchestrated well. And all the other moments of screeching tires, car flipping, and fire hold action as the steady vein feeding the rest of the production. Inherently, this is going to have it’s limitations. But at no point does Quick apologize for being confined to the appropriate labels.
Aesthetically speaking, this is something you’d find come out of “big budget” Hollywood. The resolution is great, and stays vibrant through the biggest blow ups and solemnest of slow bits. The original Korean spoken audio track is done in DTS-HD Master 5.1. Or there’s and English overdub available in Dolby Digital 5.1. Some action Blu-rays get inflicted with just being loud and out of sorts, but this audio work is smooth and balanced while delivering decent thrills when need be. Additionally, I was pleasantly surprised by the really nice Special Features section offered on this disk. Quite frankly, Shout! Factory have never been known to have suitable SF sections. So I’m glad I don’t have to dole out the usual “1” in the complete absence of extras.
-“The Making of Quick” is an hour long behind-the-scenes peek into the construction of all aspects in the film and how get meticulously layered to create the final product.
-“Stunt Featurette” takes a look at the intricate planning and execution of the film’s elaborate stunt sequences.
-“CGI Featurette” details how the technology used for the movie not only created the exclusively “fabricated” bits, but also assisted in the “story board” process by rendering 3D models to follow in live action to create perfectly real shots.
-“Creation of the Movie Poster” is a uniquely interesting piece that shows the photo shoots with a few of the actors used to construct the film’s defining image.
There is also a theatrical trailer.