Do you want to know what love is? Well, whether you do or don’t, you will understand it a lot better after watching this film. Sorry for being cryptic, I will be direct from now on. So let’s get to it by starting at the end.
Rating: Guns and Talks gets a 7 out of 10 from me.
Check one point for creating having a good first 15 min where there’s enough eyepopping action to keep you interested. Explosions, high speed car chase, a man gets shot, another breathes noxious gas and dies. An obnoxious criminal is also thrown in the mix. Ok, I’m in.
Add two points [half for each character] for the four professional killers behind all this mayhem, Sang-yun [the cool leader], Jung-woo [the bad tempered bomb expert], Jae-young [the crack shot] and Ha-yun [the tag-along little brother of Sang Yun or if pushed, the computer whiz of the gang]. They look cool as all professional killers would, smart suits and cool weapons to accessorise. The leader even looks like the Asian version of Sean Penn, fact!
They are appealing but sometimes as thick as planks. That wins two points from me because it produced some hard laughs. They watch the news, in the morning, in a dopey daze because they idolise the newsreader. They get intimidated by a high school girl and can’t decipher a simple English sentence.
Another point earned for the engrossing central story. The gang murders a key police informant at the start and hence triggers the law to be hot on their heels, in the shape of tenacious and conniving Inspector Cho. A cat and mouse caper ensues with interesting results.
My complaint about Guns and Talks is that it tries to do too much. Subplot overkill warning! It feels like every idea that popped into the writers’ head was thrown into the film. Hence the film is too long and there are too many inconsistent threads to follow, detracting from the impact of the central story.
Other not so good points are unsuitable fancy camerawork [split screens anyone?] and just the sheer implausibility of certain situations [I’m not buying that!]
The eagle-eyed mathematicians amongst you would have noted that I’ve only given it 6 points. Aha… the last point is thrown in because I’m being generous. Hah!
No it scores another point because overall it’s a pretty slick and snappy comic/action movie. Don’t take it too seriously and you’re in for a good time. There’s plenty to keep you amused.