The Man from Nowhere (Lee Jeong-beom, 2010 - Korean action)
 

Just caught the film The Man from Nowhere (literal title is actually "This Man") which is already assured to be the biggest Korean hit of 2010.

The action/drama film is a great mixture of Leon & Man on Fire with incredible action scenes, featuring one of the best knife fights I've seen in recent years. Starring Korean heartthrob Won Bin (last seen as the mentally-challenged son in "Mother" and known for playing the young brother in the war film "Brotherhood") whose character is Cha Tae-sik, a lonely pawnshop owner that befriends a young girl mired in poverty. When the little girl is kidnapped due to her mother getting mixed up in the drug trade, Cha Tae-sik goes into ballistic mode to rescue her with the stakes getting higher as she becomes the gang's candidate in harvesting her organs. Just so happens Tae-sik is no ordinary guy but a former special forces soldier with a sordid past.

There is absolutely no originality in the plot and some people may find the film too sentimental in some parts. But The Man from Nowhere is all about thrilling action, and it has a lot of it. Film also does a great job in making you hope for the ultimate demise of its villains, knowing every bit of their suffering is well-deserved. Unlike Man on Fire where Denzel Washington's character is more methodical in killing and rooting out the conspirators, here Tae-sik comes in as an absolute lethal weapon using all his martial arts skills and disposing the gangsters like a sharp blade.

Predictable, brutally violent but immensely entertaining, I highly recommend The Man from Nowhere as it is a top rate action film without too much of the dark, nihilistic conclusions that some of the recent (yet well-loved) Korean films.

Re: The Man from Nowhere (Korean action)
 

this on dvd anywhere? checked yesasia and hkflix and found nothing

Re: The Man from Nowhere (Korean action)
 

Thanks for the heads up.

I'll be checking this out.

Re: The Man from Nowhere (Korean action)
 

Caught it during the film festival and also know it's playing in select US cities. A poster from another forum stated that it would be hopefully released in Korean Blu-ray (Region A) sometime during the winter.