"The Man From Nowhere" Blu-Ray Review - Written by Anthony T

The Man From Nowhere
Year: 2011
Director: Lee Jeong-Beom
Stars: Won Bin, Kim Sea-Ron
Studio: Well-Go USA
MPAA Rating: Not Rated
Running Time: 119 Mins

Plot Synopsis:

“The Man From Nowhere” is the latest Asian action film to be released stateside. The film follows an ex special agent (Won Bin), who has nothing going for him expect for a connection that he has with a little girl (Kim Sea-Ron). Then one day, a drug trafficking kingpin kidnaps the little girl along with her mother because her mother was stealing from him. With no other purpose, the ex-agent in drawn back into the underworld to find the little girl. In doing so, his hidden past is catching up with him. Now the police is after him, as they think that he is connected somehow with the abduction. Now with them and the drug kingpin on his trail, he must find little girl before it’s too late.

Film Review:

Going into “The Man From Nowhere”, I wasn’t expecting much from this film.. To me, this film looked like it was going to be your average thriller. Good Scenes with some great action sequence to go along with the action. Never did I think it would be as suspenseful, as the film was.

Writer/director Lee Jeong-Beom does a very good job making this film suspenseful. What I liked about this film, he does a good job making everything work with his direction. This film starts off very slow, as it takes a while for the action sequences to come in. I liked that, because it allows Jeong-Beom to focus in on the performances. By doing that, it makes the characters interesting and your not sitting there waiting for the action sequences. Speaking of the action sequences, I thought, they were handled very well. They were creative and had energy to them. When your sitting there waiting for those scenes in the film, you want those scenes to be effective. They were definitely effective here. Jeong-Beom effectively times those sequences to the certain points of the film. He does that, by building tension to some of the scene that lead to the action. It makes the sequences more effective, when there’s a good build up to them.

Jeong-Beom also creates a very good screenplay that is suspenseful and keeps you on the edge of your seat. This screenplay does a good job providing moments that make you think one way and the opposite happens. This screenplay does that, especially when your led into thinking that one thing has happen and you find out the opposite happened. I like it, when there are twists that keeps you off guard. I also liked, how Jeong-Beom developing everything from the characters in the film to the build up of the action sequences. It keeps you interested with the main, as he franticly tries to find the little girl, before the villains kill her. It makes the action suspenseful, as your caught up with the action.

Extras Review:

On the extras side of things, it was a different story. First, there is a seventeen minute making of featurette. This felt like your average behind the scenes that you would see for a low-budget film for the first ten minutes, where it shows the on set happenings. It’s good to looking at some of those scenes, but I would want to see interviews with the cast to get some stories to with these images. The last seven minutes were solely interviews with the crew and cast. That part of the featurette was okay, but it felt disjointed. If the seven minutes were sprinkled in with the rest of the featurette, then it might been a little more interest than it was.

After that, there isn’t much on this blu-ray. There is a five minute highlight package that highlights some of the key points in the film. It’s like watching the film in five mintues. Wrapping up the disc is the teaser and official trailer for the film. Overall, not much in the way in extras.

Summary:

Overall, I had a good time with “The Man From Nowhere”, as the film work effective well for those who love Asian Cinema. The blu-ray package was a different story, as it was lacking in special features.

Film Rating: 3.5 stars

Extras: 1.5 stars