Dreadfully Boring

The movie is wonderful and true, an act of love in all its contradictions and complexity

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

Fighter in the Wind is a Corea-produced martial arts biopic about Masutatsu Oyama (born Choi Baedal), the ethnically Corean founder of Kyokushin karate. I actually went into this film bracing for the worst kind of nationalism that I often expect from Corean film when dealing with Japan, but was pleasantly surprised at how subdued it was. In addition to some limited, but kinetic fight sequences, Fighter in the Wind ends up being a mostly satisfying, if limited, portrait of a prominent figure of the martial arts world.The fictionalized story covers the early portion of Oyama's life in Japan. While history shows that Oyama had actually trained in two schools of karate before developing his own technique, I imagine that much of the actual of events of his life were elided for both running time as well as nationalistic purposes, in re-centering Oyama as a Corean (perhaps to appeal to the Corean movie-going populace). In addition to watching Baedal/Oyama get beat up, beat people up and become a total badass, we also watch him make friends with another ethnic Corean (the vice-ridden best friend), develop a relationship with a Japanese woman, get schooled by a Zainichi karate instructor/circus troupe guard, and spend a chunk of time brutally training in solitude in the mountains.The film follows a rather unsurprising approach that you can find in many martial arts films, following the hero's journey as he starts from a scrapping fighter, who gets beaten, learns and trains with a master and learned to use his skills for good and not selfish ambition, is forced to fight to protect someone, beats the big bad in the end. Yeah, totally formulaic since this film mostly fits the basic formula, but like many films before it, it works. You see the growth of Baedal/Oyama's character, you see his victory from rather rough beginnings and how he changes the lives of those around him. Basic biopic/hero-film stuff. But it's pretty well executed, so although it's nothing that's going to amaze you, at the same time, the character remains interesting enough to keep your attention, like any biopic. Unfortunately, most of the Japanese villains are painted with a rather broad near-mustache-twirling brush, so if you're looking for complexity in your story-telling, you won't find it here.The fight scenes, while not plentiful, are kinetic and hard hitting, especially the montage as Oyama takes on school after school of Japan's elite fighters. It's fun to watch the different martial arts interact and it's hard not to root for Oyama's practical underdog style. Photography is pretty good, adapting to the different dramatic material well, while still seeming cohesive and the film doesn't tank in terms of sonic presentation. The acting was overall good, although sometimes I felt like Yang Donggun, who played Oyama, had a rather limited character to work with, but he still seemed to embody that rather simple determination with his posture, even if I had a hard time believing that his body was one of a brutally effective fighter.I still have some issues with the probably nationalistically motivated fictionalizations to Oyama's life and the rather obvious bad-guy characterizations of the antagonists, but in terms of an engaging biopic, Fighter in the Wind actually manages to make it out okay--if you like martial arts. It's no visionary work of art, but a rather modestly put together biopic that tells the story of a man whose determination and courage led to greatness. These things work for a reason and Fighter didn't screw it up, even if it did nothing astounding. Good for martial arts fans and probably passable for everyone else. 7/10.

One major problems I had with this movie is the almost utter lack of character development. The protagonist has very little conversation that reveals his thoughts. Instead the director focuses on his determination, which is shown soley through actions, rather than words that might provoke a deeper understanding of the character. To sum up my knowledge of the characters: Baedal wants to be the best fighter, his best friend is a goof, and the bad guy is harsh and hates Baedal. Thats about as deep as it gets. Slight exagerration, but you see what I mean (and I do mean SLIGHT).The second shortcoming was Baedal's transformation to a great fighter. For the most part is was glossed over and unrewarding. We get a glimpse of the brutal training he endured, and then miraculously he is like a whole different fighter. When this movie is about the transformation from an average fighter to the "best" in Japan, I expect a little more than that.Lastly I have to knock it down a point for the style of the film. It seems like during some fights they decided to arbitrarily add in special effects. These detract from the movie, especially because the rest of the movie is not stylized in that manner (Kill Bill for example). Also, some of the sets and characters/costumes seemed a little cheesy, making me think it was a relatively low budget film. Not what I would expect for a movie from 2004.The disappointing part of this movie is really that they could have done a lot better. The story itself has plenty of interesting aspects that are great for a movie. However, the way they chose to present was just plain dull, largely due to the reasons I have expressed above. While I was watching, it gave me the attitude, "Oh, hes gonna fight this guy, maybe it will be cool", "Okay, this is boring, when is the next fight?." And its not at all because I'm obsessed with fighting, its because the scenes between fights were really lacking.If you want to see a great coming of age/martial arts movie about determination and deep characters, I recommend "Once Upon A Time in High School". It has everything that this movie lacked.

yeah I love this movie first for its great and powerful acting by the main actor playing Choi, and as well it makes me think that Choi is a real person and everything you see in that movie is all true and actually happened around WW2. The Story is very serious, and isn't like most martial arts movies mainly because its based on a true story, which gives it its serious feel. the fighting scenes in it are so different from other martial arts movies which i find good in this movie, i think if you're karate practitioner like me, u'll get a better understanding of the different fight system in this movie as some people didn't favour it because they looked at the movie as an actually fictional martial arts story, wen its actually based on a real man and real events, a man who could eliminate him opponent in one punch and karate chop a bulls horn off. The actual man (Choi Baedel) or as his Japanese name which is Masutastu Oyama, Went through hard intense training on a mountain away from the public, all by himself for 4 years, but only stayed there for 18 months, going back to the public he fought the worlds greatest fighters some only defeating them in one single punch after there was no human opponent who could match up to his amazing fighting power, he started fighting bulls mainly defeating them by karate chopping the bulls horns, if I can remember Masutatsu Oyama fought 55 bulls in his life time, killing 11 of them and knocking the rest out. Because of his powerful karate chop/strike he was named the "God Hand" as well as the USA called him "The most toughest man in the word" This movie portrays his first part of success as the worlds toughest fighter greatest martial artist ever lived. I Say read about this man first then watch the movie to give You more more of an idea of what he has been through.

To be quite honest, I didn't know anything about this film before I had purchased it. In fact, I had only bought it for two reasons. The first was that I knew it was a martial arts film and two, because it featured Masayo Kato, who appears in a few movies that I happen to like. However, by the time I had finished watching the movie, I had to admit that it exceeded my expectations for a few reasons. For instance, it had some drama, which most martial arts films tend to lack; the picture quality was superb; and above all, it was an autobiographical sketch based on a real life martial arts master.I won't go over the story, as I'm sure that a few other people had already given it away anyway. But to those who have criticized the film on the basis that it was "boring" just because the fights were too quick and not very well choreographed, I think it's important for them to acknowledge the fact that this was based on a true story. Most fights really did end relatively quick because of Choi Bae-dal's lethal blows. In fact, it was said that most fights between him and his opponents did not last more than three minutes, while other matches ended with only single blows coming from one of Bae-dal's kicks or punches.Needless to say, I did enjoy the film as I've already emphasized above and was glad that I saw it for another reason: because I would not have embraced Bae-dal's depicted character with the same respect that I currently have for the other great martial arts legends, the likes of which include Musashi, Bruce lee, Wong Fei Hong, et al.8 out of 10