along with the continuation of us vs them mentality that makes one wonder why there's such deep seated hatred between the Koreans and Japanese
Late to the conversation here, but I just thought I'd point out that Koreans generally have a LOT of good reasons to still be resentful of the Japanese, particularly in light of how the Japanese TO THIS DAY downplay their pre-1945 behaviour in school textbooks and the like. Most of the world knows they do it, but its funny how little effect all the complaining has had. Admittedly and arguably, the only people treated worse than the Koreans were the Chinese, but there was never any plan to
assimilate the Chinese the way there was with the Koreans. What size balls does it take to think you could simply
squeeze out a rich, centuries-old culture by forcing it's best minds to live in Japan, annihilating hundreds of thousands of others "inferiors," making everyone adopt Japanese names, destroying landmarks and temples and historic treasures and not leave some residual bitterness for AT LEAST the next 50 years?
LOST MEMORIES may "suffer" from patriotism that is "excessive" in the eyes of some viewers, but judging from the reviews I've read online (as compared to more informed magazine and newspaper reviews), a lot of viewers don't seem to think the Koreans have put up with much from a historical perspective.
While I found loopholes in the sci-fi aspects a little troublesome, overall I thought this to be the best Korean action movie of its time in terms of production value, action design, acting and the rather ambitious scope of its screenplay. SHIRI, another personal favourite with Korea-centric political overtones is probably far more indebted to Hollywood for it's style, but were it not for that film, we likely wouldn't have LOST MEMORIES, YESTERDAY, BLUE, TUBE, and all the other shiny action flicks Korean filmmakers have churned out over the past few years.
Those who can't take Korean-style patriotism, histrionics and melodrama might be better served elsewhere. It's a small country with a very strongly defined collective psyche. Much has been written about the distinctly Korean ability to take an outside influence (Confucianism, Buddhism, Communism, Christianity, Conservatism, Liberalism, Shamanism) and take it to it's logical (and sometimes illogical) extreme. This, then, is often reflected and delineated in any number of ways in the popular culture of books, comics, movies, television dramas, traditional music and other forms where a sort of humble, noble suffering nearly always permeates the atmosphere. It's just
there and all the comments in the world about how "nauseating" or "sickening" it is won't change anything. Personally, I'm getting quite used to it, and the more I read on the Korean culture (latest book: Michael Breen's "The Koreans: Who They Are, What They Want and Where Their Future Lies" - great point of entry by the way), the more all the melodrama and "Korean-ness" makes absolute sense.
Just my thoughts (in case anyone is still reading).