I'll tell you why so serious

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Yes, this is it - a tear-jerking, utterly sentimental, simplified family drama of Korean war and beyond, with all the imaginable clichés and predictable steps added - you want a war - you get it, you want a family torn apart - bingo. You want some factory tragedy and long weeping scenes - voila. You want even some battle scenes and mandatory heroism feats - get'em out now. We saw it all many times before and we know it all does not work. Period. THe only good and as always, even in poorest Korean flicks - breathtakingly beautiful nature. Apart from that, not more to ponder on or worth coming back to.

One of the best Korean film I seen so far besides Sunny. Rich with emotions while watching and make you fall in love with every character. Korean cinema under CJ entertainment, are the best feature films to watch as filmmakers. The details of each character, plot, scene, location just so amazing to view and Ode to My Father gives the viewers a sense of pride, joy, sadness, etc. I do find this film almost alike to Forrest Gump, but just with different languages and settings but overall so great. As a filmmaker, I usually watch international/independent film as inspiration on project or ideas. The best films are always the ones that impact you.

This is a high context movie. Therefore, if you are not Koreans who lived in Korea in the past decades, you will certainly miss so many hidden cultural and historical cues. So, you need to be more forgiving to it. For example, there is a very short scene where a guy appears who says a short phrase about the future. The boys who cleaned his shoes in the movie did not know who he was. He is the founder of Hyyndai corporation. There 10s of such short high context cues.So, this is really for Korean people. The story is a fused story of omnibus short stories of Koreans who survived not only the war, but the harsh lives of 1950~2000. Artistically, it is average. It is well done and tells the story well enough. Obviously there are exaggerations and mistakes. However, this is not a documentary at all. It is a movie. I see many people pointing out some errs in historical context. I challenge that it is extremely accurate in its overall depiction of Koreans. It is one of the most dramatic stories based on a person/family's journey to present. It shows many aspects of Korean society with moving and great and miserable bits and pieces.It is worth watching even if you are not Koreans.

Ode to My Father is a story for most Korean-Americans who came to the US as children with their parents. I always thought my Uncle Thomas was such a brave and entrepreneurial individual for going to Saigon during the war to sell pizza to the US soldiers but after watching the film, I realized these opportunities were presented to the masses after the Korean War. I never knew about the German coal mines recruiting laborers from Korea and that definitely gave me pause to reflect upon the scene where the Korean high schoolers were discriminating against the Pakistani couple at Starbucks. South Korea was once 3rd world too.My dad always lamented on why the conflict between super powers was fought on Korean land instead of Japan. And why Korea was divided and not Japan. Germany was divided after WWI, why wasn't Japan? Japan shared all its medical learnings from the wartime POW science experiments and gave unconditional surrender to the US to do its will and was spared. He resigned that the 2 atomic bombs were punishment enough.Ode to My Father is an attempt at epic film-making spanning 4 decades like Forrest Gump. The biggest issue I have with this film in attempting depiction of such a span of time is the lack of period transport for the film watcher. The film Taegukki was much better at cinematography showing life after the liberation from Japanese colonialism. You feel like you are there with the brothers. In Ode to My Father, the breathtaking scene of the refugees amassed at the port was eye-opening to say the least but the rest of the film showed contemporary thoughts and actions from its main characters rather than the unworldly views possessed by most Koreans living at the time. Duk-soo and Dal-gu's friendship is exemplary of the many friendships forged during that time. My father is still good friends with his buddies from middle school and high school. They never share stories or reminisce about the past because it is just too painful. But if my father saw this film, he would definitely be in tears at his ripe old age of 82.