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Tomie
TOMIE is a film based on the super popular manga by the same name written by Junji Ito, and just from hearing what the awesome manga contain you'd think it would be one helluva film... well unfortunately, like so many times before, the movie does not even compare to the book. The flick came out in 1999, one year after the brilliant RINGU, and has spawned a number of sequels to date. All of you reading this and who are used to watching Asian horror knows that Asian films often have a tendency to "take their time" before delivering the goods. And that's of course fine just as long as we do get the goods at the end, and that's the major problem with TOMIE; we get nothing except for...
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Movie Review: Vampire Cop Ricky

Story
A mosquito bites Dracula in Transylvania, then makes it all the way to South Korea, and there it infect a corrupt cop named Na Do-yeol. The cop starts to notice the changes gradually and can at first not believe what's happening. It seems that he only turns into a vampire every time he's sexually aroused. Na Do-yeol has to deal with what he's becoming but will also try and stay human to reform his illegal ways.

Comments
With a title like that it's hard not to expect a dumb and silly movie, and while it is both dumb and silly at times, it also has a tendency to turn completely serious every now and then. And that's was actually a big problem here, I mean you expect a comedy and it has all this humorous scenes but once in a while everything that's funny disappears and it turns into more of a drama. There are a lot of Korean flicks out there that do the same thing, just see My Sassy Girl and Windstruck for instance. Although it worked much better in those movies, but here it just feels weird.

Some scenes have this really low kind of humour which actually works quite well, only that it never stays that way. It jumps between being completely silly, to being all serious and back to being silly, and it's pretty hard to get into it. It starts off pretty cool and funny with a vampyric Transylvanian scenery and we get to see a mosquito making its way in to Dracula's castle and bites the man. It was a great start and it looked like it could be a fun ride.

Vampire Cop Ricky Vampire Cop Ricky

Later on, that same mosquito has made its way to South Korea and bites a corrupt cop named Na. Na soon starts to notice that he's changing and especially when there are hot girls around. That was also a really fun thing here, that he turns when he gets sexually aroused, and the movie has a few humorous scenes featuring that. He also has a craving for blood, but has to hide his new identity at first for the other police officers. Soon they figure out that he has taken money from a gambling place illegally and so he's on the run and has to try and make things right.

The guy who's starring as Na is a little over-the-top at times, sometimes it's funny but sometimes it's just too much. There are many scenes where he's imitating Bruce Lee and while that might be fun for a few seconds it's gets old very quickly. The ending is like a bad Batman rip-off, and it looks like something taken out of a crappy superhero flick (that visually looks great). Na of course takes the righteous path and uses a mask to hide his real identity and fights criminals with his newfound superpowers.

But the movie changes too much, during its playing time it jumps between being a slapstick comedy to suddenly becoming a drama and that was quite irritating. You laugh at some silly thing and get into that mood, but all of sudden the movie turns dark and serious and now you're supposed to switch into that kind of mood...impossible. There are some hilarious scenes, but in the end they are ruined by the fact that the movie takes itself a bit too seriously at times. Too bad, it could've been a fun ride all the way.

Final Comments
A comedy that has a few really funny moments, a few moments that are way over-the-top and not HK over-the-top funny but just way over-the-top, and some moments that are too serious for the movies own good. I really like some parts of it but some parts are not very good. The ending might be a bit fun in one way but personally I thought it was quite lame. Also 110 minutes are a bit too long.

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Vampire Cop Ricky

ALTERNATIVE TITLE: Vampire Detective Na Do-Yeol
MOVIE YEAR: 2006
DIRECTOR: Lee Si-Myeong
WRITING CREDITS: Kim Se-Gyeom, Jeon Sun-Wuk, Namgung Kyun
GENRE: Action, Comedy, Horror
CAST: Kim Su-Ro, Son Byeong-ho, Jo Yeo-Jeong
COUNTRY: South Korea
RUNTIME: 110 min

RATING: 5/10

Vampire Cop Ricky Website/IMDB Click here
Vampire Cop Ricky Trailer Click here

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