Seven Days (2007)

This Movie Can Only Be Described With One Word.

Some things I liked some I did not.

A Brilliant Conflict

The film was still a fun one that will make you laugh and have you leaving the theater feeling like you just stole something valuable and got away with it.

Seven Days stars Yunjin Kim from the critically acclaimed T.V. show "Lost". It's about the fight for justice in the midst of corruption and I can definitely say is absolutely satisfying. The way the events play out and the way the film keeps the audience engrossed is a treat. The Filmmaker does manage to bring some of the best traits from Hollywood into Korean Cinema. The production values are slick, with a gritty look and style which help to set up the mood and tone of the film. Violence has always been a problem with Korean films and here there is some but never to shock, more to elevate the story. The characters are believable and the film truly has some heartbreaking scenes. One last thing : The twists keep coming and turning which will keep you on the edge of the seat. It's an interesting case unraveled.Final note - Seven Days succeeds in combining the courtroom drama/criminal investigation with the kidnapping thriller sub-genre. It delivers two hours of solid entertainment and what more could you want?

Seven Days is South Korean crime thriller about a successful lawyer who, in order to save her daughter, is pressured into defending the innocence of a man slated to receive the death penalty.It stars Kim Yunjin of the LOST fame together with Kim Mi-Suk and Park Hee-Soon.The movie was written by Yoon Jae-Koo and directed by Won Shin-Yeon.In Seven Days,Ji-yeon is a successful lawyer and single mother to a seven-year-old girl. On her daughter's field day, Ji-yeon competes with other parents in a running race and almost comes in the first place. However, nowhere could she find the girl who's been watching and rooting for her mother to win. Later that day, Ji-yeon's receives a phone call from an anonymous man, who tells her he has her daughter in custody and proposes a deal. To see her daughter alive, Ji-yeon needs to prove a convicted murderer not guilty on his second trial, only within a week. Ji-yeon tries to convince herself the murderer should be innocent, but the encounter with the victim's mother makes her understand what drove crime-to-crime. Seven Days presents an amazing story the has a great mix of drama,action,murder mystery,crime thriller and court drama.There was tension all throughout the film as Ji-yeon tries her best to prove Jung Chul-Jin or CJ's innocence to save her daughter's life.Aside from that elements mentioned,it also has some unpredictable and unexpected twists and turns that would truly elevate this among one of the best Korean crime/thrillers and would truly define a new benchmark for the Korean movies of its genre.The acting was commendable.Inspite of the jerky camera movements and "fast and furious" editing that may somehow minimize the emotions portrayed by the characters and the clues left to explain the plot,I still consider one of the best Asian films ever made.

The main, if not the only to be honest, reason I watched this film is that it stars the beautiful, expressive, athletic Korean actress Yunjin Kim, who has of course become an international star thanks to her regular role as Sun in the TV series "Lost". She does not disappoint - she gives a terrific performance here. The story, a mix of kidnapping thriller, whodunit and courtroom drama, is VERY complex, loaded with red herrings and engaging for the most part, until a final twist that's a bit far-fetched. Let's just say that you probably WON'T guess the identity of the kidnapper until the end, but only because his / her motivations and the lengths that he / she goes to for the sake of his / her plan are a bit hard to swallow. But the main problem with "Seven Days" is the too-often gimmicky, frantic direction. While it has its inventive moments (Kim "watching" her kidnapped child), it usually just makes scenes hard to watch. At 130 minutes, the film is too long, but the cast and most of the story are strong enough to earn it a mild recommendation. **1/2 out of 4.

I was eagerly anticipating the return of Kim Yoon-jin to Korean movies after her long absence due to the 'Lost' TV show. What I didn't anticipate what a tired, confused and ludicrous thriller she'd end up starring in; granted she was parachuted into the production at short notice but didn't she read the script first? Re-tread the well-worn elements of the CSI franchise, stretch them out to a painfully overwrought 2 hours, toss in so many nonsensical plot twists so as to induce migraine and you're pretty much there with 'Seven Days'. The movie starts off running, which is no bad thing (given how many kidnapping movies we'll all seen) but then proceeds to twist and turn like the coherence of a headless chicken. Single-dimension characters with 'plot function' written on their foreheads do not make for an engaging thriller and the less said about the incongruous opening title sequence that shamelessly apes 'Se7en' the better.Korean movies can be big-scale (Taegukgi), they can be thrilling (Memories Of Murder), they can be bleak (Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance) and still be excellent. 'Seven Days' is none of these; it's a nasty, crudely executed, schizophrenically edited and cack-handedly directed piece that wastes your time and the talents of Kim Yoon-jin.