The Huntresses (2014)

Country: South-Korea
Format: movie
Genre: action, comedy
Cast: Ha Ji Won, Son Ga In, Gang Ye Won, Song Sae Byeok, Joo Sang Wook, Ko Chang Seok, Choi Seung Min, Jin Ji Hee, Chae Sang Woo
Synopsis: Jin Ok, Hong Dan, Ga Bi are bounty hunters in Joseon times. They receive a job offer to find a man, who in action dies and girls are made into killers. While they try to find the real killers, then understand that problems go much deeper and way back in years than they could think of it.
Rating: 3/5
Despite that Yanne's opinion on it was "lousy story and built-up on action scenes", I really enjoyed watching it. Of course, after all these weeks of watching "low-quality" horror movies, it was delightful to watch something not depressing.

The main character out of three women is Jin Ok, who is maybe mentally the strongest. But at the same time she big childhood trauma that makes her lose control over herself. I like that even though she seems to be person who would give everyone a second chance, then in reality she can have really cold heart. In addition, I find it interesting to see how you can never predict what life will bring you. In childhood everything seems so easy and it seems to stay like this until something happens and you turn into different person. This is exactly what is with Jin Ok - she could have had life where she would never even hold something as dangerous as a gun and we are not even going to mention knowing how to shoot with one hand. Of course Ha Ji Won has had movies that are with higher quality, but who ever likes to see Ha Ji Won in crazy action scenes then this is one movie to see. After "King2Hearts", Ha Ji Won is acting her stunts herself.

Compared to others Hong Dan does not have any big trauma. Her parents are in dept, she is married to a man who likes cooking and her mother-in-law looks down on her, not to mention that non of them knows about Hong Dan's bounty hunter skills. She is one bad-ass woman, but as soon as things get too dangerous she  prefers to run from the scene to somewhere safer. Despite it, she cares a lot about other girls and wishes that she could help them more as "older sister". She can be a total air-head from time to time, making everyone lose more time than they should. Even though she spends a lot of time working, she is still supportive wife who allows her husband to do what he loves and still stick with him. In a way her husband is mama'ś boy who is afraid to talk back to his mom. Gang Ye Won was the only actress out of three who I did not know before. I think she was the only actress who had to make and did more than one face expression. Ha Ji Won and Son Ga In mostly had only one mask put on their face that had to show all emotions, but it was more due to character build-up.

Ga Bi is the youngest from all girls, but she also seems to be the most fierce with being good at all kind of bombs, fighting, strategic etc. She is the one who would most likely to punch everybody who piss her off so usually she is left to make the dirty work if needed. That's why it is funny to see that actually she can have a really sweet side while she discovers new things in life. I was surprised from Son Ga In performance. I hope most of you know that she is singer from Brown Eyed Girls (for people who do not know her so well, then she was in PSY "Gentleman" video). The only acting role that I have seen from her before was in "Love Forecast" that was just a cameo performance for few seconds. So it was really awesome for me to see how great she actually is here. She has rather different scenes in the movie and if I remember correctly then the only one having a kiss-scene in it. Guess younger actresses are stealing the scenes.

Maybe I should also mention some other characters. There is Moo Myung who like a boss to the girls, but really often girls walk over of him. Especially Hong Dan who gets really angry when Moo Myung tries to put big amount ofmoney into his pocket without sharing it. He is good at strategy, but he himself in action is a bit like a joke. There is also Sa Hyeon, who is Jin Ok's childhood "friend", but after not seeing each other for 10 years Sa Hyeon has become different person who does not even recognize her. In addition, he works for man who Jin Ok despise the most - Kim Ja Heon.  Kim Ja Heon is a man who is only reaching for more money and power. He is willing to let innocent people die and betray the country just for belief that the partner will actually keep the promise. He is also the kind of person who is bastard until he has the control, but as soon as the control is lost he is ready to get on his knees and beg for his life.

The movie has overall rather light-feeling. Of course maybe they should have made it more deep with Jin Ok story etc, but I think they would have ended up making a whole drama-series of it. I actually liked that they did not touch this story so much and let it be more of a comedy-like movie that is just good to watch. In short words, it was not their intention to make it into really big movie that makes you wonder for a long time - their intention seemed to be on comedy. Maybe from things that kind of made me grin in a bad way was that some wire stunts were way too obvious that it hurt my eyes. You can see that it was rather low-budget movie. It was also the first movie that management company Wellmade STARM has made.
Anyway, I liked the movie because it was great comedy scenes and characters are funny and nice. I think it is worth to watch when you just want to spend the time, but if you are waiting for a movie that will make you weak from the knees, then rather check some other movie :)