introduction:

The Orient has always been full of inspiring and originality,especially when it comes to their movies.This is a guide to the essential modern day flicks that have helped bring worldwide attention to the eastern style of cinema.

Infernal Affairs

A masterpiece that reawakened the interest in Hong Kong cinema.Infernal affairs tells the tale of  a cop and a triad member.Andy Lau/Edison Chen play a triad member who infiltrates the police and becomes high ranked but all the time helping his boss in the Jiang Hu.Tony Leung/Shawn Yue plays a cop who must go undercover as a triad member.After 13 years they are both still undercover and finding it increasingly harder to get out.Anthony Wong plays the inspector trying to hunt down the mole,while Eric Tsang plays his arch enemy as leader of the triad gang.

Emotional,tense and atmospheric,Infernal Affairs was a true original script in a tired old genre of cops vs gang.Fine performances and fantastic direction made this a must see film.

The Ring

The movie that started it all.This creepy little tale brought the attention of Hollywood.Desperate for some original horror and scares that was no longer available in the west people began to search elsewhere and the Ring is what they found.

With zero gore,little action and a low budget,The Ring managed to pull off a tale which creeped out a nation and had us all wary of watching a video.The curse of Sadako, the young girl who was pushed into a well and after much struggle died vowing vengeance.It was truly amazing to see a film where we had no idea what Sadako looked like until the last toe curling shocking scenes.The Ring kick started a transformation across the world in the way we see horror,Now inferior copies of The Ring can been seen in every nation.

I also recommend seeing Ring 0 which offers a great deal of insight into how and why Sadako was killed as this is the tale of her.Ring 0 foregoes the scare but really helps close up some of the open story left by the Ring.

Battle Royale

The book that caused an outcry in Japan.The film itself was banned from the US due to it's nature.Spawning countless T'shirts,toys and a Tokyo Pop manga comic series,Battle Royale became infamous for it's brutality and ability to show the personality of each of it's students.Battle Royale tells the story of a program that has been started by the government to halt the unruly behavior of teens.The program runs each year where a class from one school is drawn in a 'lucky' dip and are taken to a secret location where they are forced to kill each other or die as one.What was so unique about the book and the film is that every character was fully explored and we wasn't just concentrating on the stars.

After seeing the movie everyone asked themselves who they would be like.Would they hide out in a group of Friends and just pretend like nothing's changed and prepare for the end?Would they commit sucide with their nearest and dearest,refusing to play the sadistic game? Would they stick it to the governemt and plan how to destroy the base?or like Kiriyama and Mitsuko would they opt to wipe out anyone in their way?

Brilliant piece of cinema history,with excellent acting from it's young stars.If you want to know more about each character,especially Hiroko who isn't really explored well enough in the film,hunt down the book or read the very graphic Tokyo Pop manga books(15 in all).

Oldboy

This movie has to be credited with the fact that it brought many western eyes to Korean Cinema.Like many Korean movies,Oldboy is sadistic and bleak telling the tale of a man imprisoned in a room who sees the murder of his wife on the news and is forcibly kept alive.Determined to find out who is behind it all,he gets out and goes in search.Oldboy boasts many memorable scene,probably the most famous being a brutal barrage of attacks on a gang using a claw hammer as Oldboy's choice of weapon.A truly shocking storyline,fantastic direction and perfect acting,especially from Choi Min Sook as Oldboy make this a landmark film that must be seen to be believed.

Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon

The film that showed us flying martial arts and superb cinematography .With a breathtaking storyline and amazing fight scenes,Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon brought Martial Arts movies back into the limelight and changed the way they would be filmed forever.

Introducing the world to Zhang Ziyi who was already a major star in Asia after her success in the beautiful tale'The Road Home'.Starring an array of famous faces including Shaw Brothers favourite Cheng Pei-Pei as Ziyi's evil mentor.

Other films that must be seen is in my opinion the better film 'House of Flying Daggers' and the classic tale of the man called nameless,'Hero' in which we see the long awaited duel of two martial arts masters,Donnie Yen and Jet Li.

Taegukgi(brotherhood)

My personal favourite (as anyone who has bought from me knows).Taegukgi takes the tired genre of war pictures and instead of concentrating on the actual conflict,it focuses on the emotional story of two brothers who are forced to fight in a war that nobody desired.The amazing thing about Taegukgi is that it stayed away from propaganda and showed good and bad on both sides of the fence.

Taegukgi is an emotional,action packed and superbly acted film that has been hailed by critics as an eye opening to the Korean War that is known as the forgotten war.After seeing this movie you will never ever forget the tragic consequences left behind after an agreement was made and families were split apart by the 38th parallel.

Thankyou for taking the time to read my reviews.I hope to do more soon featuring personal favourites and obscure films that have yet to get a release worldwide but can be bought on region 0 discs.