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Korea has exceptional dental care, but beware of aggressive treatments that are primarily cosmetic. While fillings are covered under health insurance plans, root canals and crowns are not, and unscrupulous dentists often perform unnecessary procedures on unwitting patients. I'm publishing a letter I sent to my dentist back home a couple of years ago after I... Continue Reading →
When I moved to Korea five years ago, I was impressed not only with how convenient everything was, I was also struck by how inexpensive everything - from food to transportation to medical expenses and the postal service were. What I didn’t realize at the time was that the cost of living in Busan is... Continue Reading →
I've been a huge fan of Ulrich Seidl ever since seeing the Austrian director's Import/Export, so when I learned that Paradise: Love will be competing at Cannes, my little heart started to race. Here's the synopsis: On the beaches of Kenya they're known as Sugar Mamas: European women to whom black beach boys offer sex... Continue Reading →
I found the first of my letters chronicling my initial impressions of Korea. I have to cringe when I read it now. October 26, 2007 Hello everybody! At last, here's a brief report of everything that's happened to me since arriving in this fair country. Read on. THE JOURNEY The flight to Tokyo was the... Continue Reading →
Xavier Dolan’s eagerly anticipated third film, Laurence Anyways, has not even been released yet (it hits theaters on May 18th), but the brilliant young Canadian director has already announced his decision to adapt a play by Michel Marc Bouchard, Tom à la ferme. This marks the first time the director will adapt a script not... Continue Reading →
Xavier Dolan’s eagerly anticipated third film, Laurence Anyways, has not even been released yet (it hits theaters on May 18th), but the brilliant young Canadian director has already announced his decision to adapt a play by Michel Marc Bouchard, Tom à la ferme. This marks the first time the director will adapt a script not... Continue Reading →
The amazingly gifted Canadian filmmaker Xavier Dolan's Laurence Anyways has been invited to Cannes, to be screened in the Un Certain Regard selection. The director expressed disappointment his film won't be in competition, but how many 23-year-olds can boast of walking the Croisette three times in a row? The movie takes place in 1989. At... Continue Reading →
I've decided to publish the seven or so letters I wrote documenting my experiences in Busan, where I lived for three years before coming to Daejeon. The very first letter appears to be lost. 20 November, 2007 It's already been one month that I've been living and working in Korea. The weather is becoming chilly... Continue Reading →
I created a program to take student volunteers with me twice a week to assist at an orphanage here in Daejeon, about a 30-minute walk from the SolGeo international dormitories. We meet on Tuesdays and Thursdays to play games, watch movies, do arts and crafts and learn a little English. In today's class, the children... Continue Reading →
A few months and over a thousand shots later, I can say that the Panasonic TM900 is not only one of the most satisfactory electronics purchases I've ever made, it also appears to be virtually incapable of taking a single unusable shot. As I said in a previous post, in the main menu under picture... Continue Reading →
The Busan International Film Festival just announced their poster for the 17th edition of Asia's biggest movie fest. Have you ever set eyes on anything this ugly?
I read that Apple has invested millions designing a pair of unibody earbuds. What difference it will make remains to be seen, as the current set offered with their iPods are notoriously bad. A friend of mine showed me the new cans he'd picked up over the weekend - a pair of Bose AE2 headphones.... Continue Reading →
I love actor Shin Ha-gyun and just about every film he's ever acted in, including the TV drama Brain. By the way, the entire drama has been subtitled and posted on YouTube, so I have some catching up to do! Anyhow, Korean film critic Jeong Seong-Il's debut film Café Noir (2009), which only got a domestic... Continue Reading →
I finally went ahead and picked up the Panasonic TM900. I think it’s pretty obvious from the clips that if you shoot a lot of video, a camcorder is the way to go. When I first saw the camera, I was somewhat disappointed in its appearance - glossy black and silver plastic with tacky-looking decals... Continue Reading →
Most of the photos here were taken in Can Tho, Saigon, and Hoi An, using my Canon Powershot S95. The quality of the photographs is much better than the video, but then again, that's what it was designed to do.
When I went to Vietnam in February 2011, I brought along my trusty iPod. For the first time in years, I was inspired to take photos again. The streets of Saigon were so vibrant and full of color, it was almost impossible not to take photographs. Belatedly, I discovered that my iPod also took video... Continue Reading →
Sachiko (Nakagawa Mao), a young woman frustrated with her life of dull routine, and seeking stimulation outside the deadening monotony of housework and catering to her needy husband, befriends Kobayashi (Yûji Tajiri), a neighbor whose wife has been carrying on an affair right under his very nose. Learning of her unfaithfulness, Sachiko’s husband (Takeshi Ito,... Continue Reading →
There hasn’t been much discussion concerning ‘roman porno’ and ‘pink’ films emanating from Japan as of late. I’m curious to know myself exactly what readers think of these types of films - whether they’ve watched any, and what their thoughts are, especially in relation to mainstream and arthouse films. So this post is basically a... Continue Reading →
Synopsis Chosun dynasty, ca. 1504. Two itinerant street performers, Jang-sang and Gong-gil, having fled to Seoul, face an even more onerous fate when a bawdy farce lands them in prison to await certain death. An opportunity to redeem themselves arises, and a rather lackluster show succeeds nonetheless in pleasing the King and purchasing the troupe’s... Continue Reading →
On the occasion of its 10th anniversary, the Jeonju International Film Festival has released a handsomely packaged compilation of 27 shorts by filmmakers from Asia, Africa and Europe. For the past decade, JIFF has been commissioning films from three directors a year, awarding them each 50 million won (USD 38,000) to produce a digital film... Continue Reading →
The Daejeon Chronicles 