Tuesday, July 24, 2018

Movie Review: The Swindlers (2017)


  • Movie: The Swindlers (English title)
  • Revised romanization: Ggoon
  • Hangul:
  • Director: Jang Chang-Won
  • Writer: Jang Chang-Won
  • Producer: Sung Chang-Yeon, Oh Seung-Hyun
  • Cinematographer: Lee Tae-Yoon
  • Release Date: November 22, 2017
  • Runtime: 117 min.
  • Genre: Crime
  • Country: South Korea
  • Plot Synopsis by AsianWiki: Ji-Sung (Hyun-Bin) is an intelligent swindler who only deceives fellow swindlers. To catch Jang Doo-Chil, he forms a plan. He first recruits Prosecutor Hee-Soo (Yoo Ji-Tae) and then other swindlers Suk-Dong (Bae Sung-Woo), Choon-Ja (Nana) and Chief Kim (An Se-Ha). They throw bait at Jang Doo-Chil's right-hand man Seung-Gun (Park Sung-Woong).
My rating: 3.8/5 stars (★)

The thing about watching a movie about con-men is that, you'll never know what is the actual truth. That is how I felt through the entire time watching The Swindlers. It is a story about a man that only cons swindlers, and forming a team through him to take down one of the top swindlers in South Korea. I find that the plot is rather interesting, because what's better than conning another con-man?

The story unfolds with a little bit of how everything started. From the moment the undefeated swindler started his scams, to how Ji-Sung started becoming a swindler himself too. It was a movie full of twists and turns, and you'll find yourself wracking your brains to figure out what was actually going on. The moment you start to believe that a person is the trustworthy one, you'll end up questioning him the next minute. 

I think the characters are good, but some of them are lacking personality. The characters are not too strong, and most of them, we don't even know where they came from. Audience are given a brief history of Ji-Sung and even Prosecutor Hee-Soo, but the rest seemed to fall a bit flat. You never get to know how Prosecutor Hee-Soo recruited Suk-Dong, Choon-Ja and Chief Kim. I barely even find out Chief Kim's name. Even though they are not playing the main roles, their presence are still huge in the story. It would have been a lot better for the audience to know how they end up being put together, what crimes they did in the past. I'm questioning Choon-Ja's character the most. She's the only female in the team, and apart from her "aegyo" seducing skills, I don't see any strong traits in her. How did she end up being in a secret team formed by a prosecutor? I guess we'll never know.

I originally gave The Swindlers a four star, but decided to lower my ratings a bit when I realise just how little I know about most of the characters. But the plot is still a wow-factor to me. The ending was rather unexpected, but what was I expecting from a group of swindlers? It was a great movie, I was fooled till the end. In a rather good way, of course.


Till next time ♡ Love, Aishah Humaira'

2 comments

  1. genre macam ni kuranh favour unless the hero tu faveret..

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    Replies
    1. Jarang jugak tengok genre ni, tapi plot macam interesting so I end up watching it. Plus, a friend of mine pun recommend :)

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