The Outlaws (2017)

Saw this in theaters, it was a pretty decent gangster movie. The kind where both sides show a little shades and good and bad. Mainly Ma Dong Seok is a detective and also kind of shady (not a spoiler, shown in the beginning of the movie). He's working in a squad that aims to get rid of the gangs in the city. Gang violence has deescalated, but then this new crew shows up and starts causing all kinds of trouble for the existing gangs in the city and the detectives. The characters were fun, but the outline of the story is pretty typical. The movie just was a ride through a different story with seemingly a familiar background. Was executed pretty well. I enjoy detective/cop stories so my rating may be a little higher than normal.

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Adequately entertaining to watch

Gang wars in the middle of Seoul with police intervention that involves gritty chasing and action scenes is nothing new. Additional elements added is that this movie is based on a real-life mop op operation on a Chinese-Korean gang. Will this add flavor to an otherwise common plot?

As usual with police films, a cause is needed for them to take action. It was slow at first, and at times, quite hard to follow due to the overlapping of the gang members and their turf, but once the cause was determined, it became procedural in terms of pacing and the direction. Basically, the outcome was already predictable. The journey towards said outcome should be presented well, and I think for this movie, it was done satisfactorily. But at the same time, I was bothered for the small amount of tactical scheming present here, and the scenes that they were scheming on how to catch the criminals were not as entertaining as I hoped it would be. It may be due to the lack of a shocking plot twist, that I'm not sure. On the other hand, there were slapstick comedy scattered and I also had chuckles here and there.

Police captain Ma Seok-do (Ma Dong-seok) was definitely this movie's highlight. His ability to play a strong and harsh yet dependable cop together with his magnetic presence in the screen really stood out here. Based on his previous roles, it may now be somewhat obvious that he is being typecasted to play the same macho yet reliable good guy roles, but in this case, no one else could've the role better than him.

The antagonist, Jang Chen (Yoon Kye-sang) was for the most part, able to reach the same amount of energy as Seok-do. It would've been better had the two main characters had a longer confrontation action scene, but still it was good that he (YKS) was able to deviate from his usual good guy roles. The long hair though, was not it. Did just not fit him.

As what you may have noticed in this review is that I put more emphasis on the actors rather than the story itself. In fact, there were quite many repetitive aspects and cliches on action police flicks present here.

To answer the question earlier, at some extent it did add some flavor to the movie itself but that is mainly due to the presence and acting of the main leads. The journey however, was already procedural, and the outcome being already predictable, but was still adequately entertaining to watch.

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Full Action Packed Gangsta Film

Why is the villain scary? Because he stays calm. There are very few instances where Jang Chen lost his cool, but the truth is that he collected that anger and exerted that anger while killing his foes.
The film feels even better when we get to know it's a real life story about the gangs back in 2002–03 and how police somehow arrested these vicious MFs. The world building was good and Villain came with nothing but a desire to expand as quickly as possible.
The film's climax was good, action keeps getting better and the final battle just keep you on the edge of the seats.

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Muy buen thriller policíaco de acción.

Tras aumentar tremendamente su popularidad gracias a la estupenda "Train to Busan", Ma Dong-seok protagonizó en 2017 esta película policíaca con el leit motiv de la guerra de bandas de fondo, hecha al servicio de esta especie de Bud Spencer a la coreana.


Es una cinta que deja cierta huella sobre todo por sus estupendas escenas de acción, los impactantes métodos que emplea la banda china con tal de alcanzar sus objetivos, y el buen enemigo principal interpretado brillantemente por Yoon Kyesang, que es sin duda lo mejor de una cinta especialmente recomendada para los que busquen acción sin complicaciones.

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Well, its not that outstanding but the acting and the pace goes smoothly so its a movie you will be able to finish if you watched it on a pretty good day. As for me, I like the actors playing as leads here especially Yoon Kye Sang. I decided to watch the movie because I mainly wanna see him in an action flick with a badass character. To add to that excitement is his long hair here. Ma Dong Seok is great as always. The story since they based it on a crime that has happened years ago, its quite simple, a story that feels like you've seen and heard a couple of times. If you like the artists, these movie will somehow enjoy you, if not then I don't quite recommend this. 7.5-8/10 for me.

P.S. Yoon Kye Sang is hot especially in those shirtless scenes, lol

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I' m sure plenty of you are familiar with Ma Dongseok. If not from Train to Busan, from which I fell in love with him in or Bad guys, which I'm yet to see. I ended up watching Outlaws for two reasons (1) The charismatic acting of DongSeok and (2) EXO's Baekhyun cosplaying as the movie's antagonist. I'm not the hugest fan or action or gang related movies but I appreciate quality content and this isn't one. The acting was average. The lead two did a wonderful job however the plot didn't leave room for development. Though all the supporting cast are familiar, you wouldn't remember who played what. The plot was typical and far from impactful. I kept waiting for that background stories that would tuck on my heart string or fight scenes that would raise my heart rate up but non were apparent here. There seems to be content that is based on real events and perhaps people who witnessed them would appreciate the movie better but I hadn't much. I find this very sad if only because I did love the cast and to an extent the filming and was cheering alot for the movie.

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