This Movie Can Only Be Described With One Word.

Good concept, poorly executed.

Better Late Then Never

It's not great by any means, but it's a pretty good movie that didn't leave me filled with regret for investing time in it.

"No Blood No Tears" was a movie that I was really looking forward to watching. Why? Well because it was a Third Windows Film, and they usually have really good (and often quite remarkable) Asian movies out on the market. Plus "No Blood No Tears" also had Do-yeon Jeon on the cast list (and she was amazing in "The Harmonium in my Memory").Now having seen this movie, I must admit that I feel somewhat disillusioned, because this movie was nowhere as interesting or exciting as I had hoped. It was like director, Seung-wan Ryoo, wanted to accomplish a lot of things all at once, but didn't fully manage to juggle all the balls he had put up in the air. The movie was trying to tell too many tales at the same time, and it ended up being a rather confusing, stupid and irritating mess of a story. Sure, "No Blood No Tears" had its moments, but in general there was just not enough of a red thread throughout the story to hang on to.The acting in the movie was actually quite good, and I think that goes for everyone in the movie, because the actors and actresses portrayed their characters quite well and came off as believable characters on the screen.It was a shame that there was too much going on in the movie at the same time and that the movie was jumping back and forth trying to tie together all the various story lines and characters. It just didn't work out as the director had intended. And that is the reason why I give the movie only a mediocre grade. "No Blood No Tears" could have been a much better movie, had the director not trying to throw so many different elements into one project. Would have been better to focus on a couple of the story lines and tie them together in a more constructed way.But still, Do-yeon Jeon (playing Su-ji) and Hye-yeong Lee (playing Kyeong-seon) - the two main characters - actually made the movie worth enough to sit through till the end.

Mix several parts "Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels," a dash of "Go," a smidgen of "True Romance," and fights as brutal as "Fight Club" (but with women giving and taking beatings as much or moreso than the men) -- put it all through the filter of a Korean gangster film and you have "No Blood, No Tears," a tour de force by hot young director Seung-wan Ryoo ("Die Bad"; "Crying Fist").The plot is complex. But not so that you can't follow what is going on as it happens. Don't plan on being two jumps ahead, however. Just let the movie come to you and you will be rewarded.The whole issue of the heist and most of the fights (which are pretty brutal) don't really come into play until the second half of the film, but there is plenty of good stuff in the first half to get you there.The story is centered around two good female leads. Hye-yeong Lee plays Kyeong-seon, who owes the local neighborhood loan shark a lot of money. She's got a certain past and tends to solve problems by a beer bottle across the head or a kick to the gut. Then we have Su-ji (played by Do-yeon Jeon)--the frequently smacked around moll of a low-level gangster. A chance encounter puts them together and gets the wheels turning on how they can make off with a whole lot of the high-level gangster's money.There are double crosses, triple crosses, and lots of surprises along the way. A multitude of other characters play important roles. Inept police detectives; idiotic street punks who switch back and forth from being informants for the police and trying to get in on the goods themselves; loan collectors who don't know if they should start taking off fingers or sit down and eat lunch with the debtor. Perhaps most impressive is a gangster tough (credited as "Silent Man") played by famed martial arts action director Doo-hong Jung. He has a great fight scene where he really gets to strut his stuff.If you are tired of the same old Hollywood plots, fights, and chases, do yourself a favor and seek this film out.

This film does actually have a slice of pretty much all action staples. The problem is that none of them are done well at all. There's no originality or freshness or even energy to many of the things that happen in this film. The car chase for instance has un-fancy, domestic cars (No problem with that) driving at a furious 50 MPH or so (There's our first problem) on a deserted, spacious dock (another problem, where's the sense of danger?), where they drive through barrels of water (Oh, thrilling!).Get this, our main protagonists are...women! No one's ever done that before, or at least this film seems to think so as it provides us no other reason for the audience to care about them. The model's boyfriend hit her (awww) and the taxi driver's sick of her job (awww), but together, for no real reason they're gonna steal some money and live life to the fullest. Hell yeah.NBNT even features your favourite been there, done that talking points of recent years: Briefcase you never see inside of, Car crash out of nowhere~! Dog fighting (bound to be controversial and get your movie some attention), A man who says nothing but kicks ass, A gang of goofy friends with big dreams who directly reference other movies, Flashy editing.This might sounds like it all adds up to a good film, but every aspect is executed horribly to the point where it's hard to care about anything. This could even be forgivable if there was even one likable line or scene or stunt or fight or shot in the entire 114 minutes, but there isn't. At all. The world would be a better place if half-hearted efforts like this never saw a release.

Dok-bul is a gangster who runs dog fights. He abuses his girlfriend, Su-ji, and so she decides to steal a bag full of money from him. She gets the help of Kyeong-seon (Hye-yeong Lee), a taxi driver who used to be a safe cracker and has been trying to go straight. The other significant character is Kim Geum-bok, who is generally referred to as "KGB."While the plot has been compared to "Bound," with the two women leads ganging up on the boyfriend, this film is far less coherent than that film. Basically, everyone is after the money, and the film revolves around a number of very well done Hong Kong-style fight scenes, complete with slow motion with water and/or dirt in the air, wire work, and some swirling camera moves. If you can forgive the simplistic story, these scenes plus the performance of Hye-yeong Lee make the film worth seeing.Seen on 11/6/2002 at the 2002 Hawaii International Film Festival.