Derrived from bongkersz Friday’s Blues post :

Few movies take critical beatings as bad as the thumping handed out to South Korean director Shim Hyung-rae’s “D-War,” a dragons-do-battle fantasy that transports a Korean legend to 21st century Los Angeles.

A fiasco of a plot, the critics said. Preposterous dialogue. Risible acting.

South Korean audiences loved it. Two months after its release, the Korean made for Hollywood flick captured about 8 million viewers making it not just a box-office hit but a national success story, a way of channeling Korean pride.

The movie has made $53 million in South Korea, the country’s fifth-largest-grossing film. But what makes “D-War” special is the $10 million it has copped since its mid-September release in North America where, with its mostly American cast, mostly English dialogue and the new name “Dragon Wars,” it enjoyed the widest release for a Korean film.

Now, we talk about a bad movie, when I say bad it was really really bad. The CGI, I have no comments on it but the plots, dialogue? Unbelievably crap! The seemingly positive reaction from the Korean population, as indicated by the movie’s box office success in Korea, was widely attributed to the film’s appeal to Korean nationalism; a logical impression drawn from Shim’s message at the end of the Korean version of this film, “D-War and I will succeed in the world market without fail,” accompanied by the Korean folk anthem, “Arirang”. However, despite box office success, D-Wars was far from critically acclaimed by either Korean critics or Korea’s general public. Korean film critic Kim Bong-sok said, “They want it to be successful in the U.S. because it’s Korean, not because it’s good,” and called the film “immature and poorly made.” Other reactions from Korean critics have been similar.

Now why am I reminded of the bolehnauts? Yup, the so much hyped about first Malaysian teh tarik maker and gasing spinner in space. How cool is that? Cool my farking arse. A lot of Malaysians are proud of it because it’s Malaysian in space, not because he’s good. I felt like borrowing that line and the trip is “immature and poorly made”.

Like the Koreans, Malaysians are also dreamers. It’s good to dream big. There must be the dreamers and visionaries too, but they should not extend beyond the ostentatious and self-indulgence.

“Koreans like dreamers, and Shim is a dreamer,” says Chin Jung-kwon, a prominent South Korean cultural critic who trashed the movie on national TV and was quickly pegged the most villainous dissenter. “The Korean media turned Shim’s going to Hollywood into this great patriotic success story. So if you criticize him, it makes you a public enemy.”

Again, to all the people that think it’s a waste of money, like me, we’ll be the public enemy. It’s the same thing here. You criticised, pointed out what you think is not right, you’ll be a black sheep. Well, ta hell with that. I am not proud. Like I said before, if he uses his own money like that Russian billionaire go on a space trip I’m okay and if the bolehnauts going up there doing scientific research or whatever shit that is, I’m ok but if you just go up there and play gasing and promote Malaysian food – Like does that justifies the price tag you go up there? Okay, I know it’s not your fault. You were sent there – I’m lost for words. It has been on the blogosphere for quite some times for now, so I guess I don’t have to say much.

But I’d like to share with you a quote from Chin ;

This era of blind patriotism must die out

To think about it, D-War might be a flop globally but at least they earned $53 million by producing a crap movie. The Bolehnauts project? You know, I know.