Chil-in Kwon	...	(Director)
Park Hye-Ryeon, Hyeon-su Kim	...	(Writer)
Mi-suk Lee	...	Kim Yeong-mi
Min-hie Kim	...	Kim Ah-mi
So-hee Ahn	...	Kim Kang-ae
Eun-Seong	...	Kang-ae's cosmetic staff
Eun-ji Jo	...
Heung-su Kim	...	Nah Won-seok
Seong-su Kim	...	Oh Seung-won
Hee-seok Yun	...	Choi Kyeong-soo
Yeong-gyu Jo	...	Cinematographer

Comments: What an outstanding surprise this turned out to be. I couldn't get past the poster for the longest time. It's dumb and makes it look like a film I wouldn't want to see.

I recently watched An Affair (Jung sa), and although I didn't like the film at all I really liked the performance by Lee Mi-Suk and wanted to see more of her. So this was it, a film about three stages of womanhood (high-school, twenty-something, just over-the-hill) and the angst of relationships.

The film owes most of its success to brilliant casting. The film's first casting coup, Lee Mi-Suk, turns in a solid performance as a forty-one year old (she's several years older than that in real life) stage designer confronted with 'early onset' menopause. As a result, or in conscious reaction to this news, she runs hot and cold in intelligent and honest ways with an actor working on the same production as her who's twelve years her junior. The guy is a bit of a playboy but seems earnest in his intentions and the fact that Lee is extremely beautiful and clearly still has the hot factor makes it a thoroughly believable relationship.

The film's second casting coup was landing Ahn So-hee of the immensely popular K-pop group, the Wonder Girls, to play Lee's teen-aged daughter. She's both precocious and naive and wants nothing more than to land a first kiss from her boyfriend of three years who seems more interested in motor bikes and video games than her. Many of the film's more bitingly humorous moments originate in the interactions she has with her mom and her aunt (played by Kim Min-hie, more on her later). The three women live together but it's Ahn who seems the mature one, suffering the emotional vicissitudes of her elders with aplomb. In her personal life, not sure how to get what she wants, she's helped along by the charmingly too young to be that sexy, Brazilian born and exotic Jo Eun-ji. Their youth lends itself to a credible confusion between love and friendship, creating a relationship that's touching without being the least bit melodramatic.

Finally, the biggest and most welcome surprise is the performance of Twiggy model Kim Min-hie who anchors and narrates the film. She's a twenty-seven year old screenwriter, and younger sister to Lee, who ends up torn between pursuing her career (and her self, really), living the bohemian life with her never gonna make it dead-beat musician boyfriend, and marrying a successful, good-looking guy who seems to really love her. Her performance is shockingly genuine, pulling off the nearly impossible: acting drunk and shrill without losing any of her charm. She won't appeal to everyone, but for context let me state that I seldom, if ever ... in fact I almost always hate when actors play drunk, but Kim's performance worked for me. She's not drunk all the time. It's only a few scenes, but under normal circumstances this is enough to ruin a role, if not a film, for me.

Kim Min-hie burst into the limelight at a very young age with a very low body fat ratio as a model and fashionista. Her first few attempts at acting were met with chuckles and derision. She took six years off to study the craft of acting, including voice control and breathing techniques and, if her performance in Hellcats is any indication, it worked wonders. What's remarkable is that she doesn't seem to be acting at all, even in the drunk parts. She's just being filmed, being herself. I think that's the best kind of acting. She is also blessed with a facial structure (and I'm aware I'm being subjective here) that allows all kinds of different personalities to emerge, depending on camera angle, hair style, and internal motivation. I'll quit with the hyperbole now and just say she is a joy to watch in this film.

Hellcats isn't high brow art fluff nor mumblecore indie bullshit. It's an intelligent, mainstream feminist comedy. The male characters may not be much more than stereotypes but they aren't needed to be. They aren't belittled for being men and they are given enough substance to engage us, but this is a film about the women. Director Kwon Chil-in had success in 2003 with the hit Singles, which explored similar territory, and this is a worthy follow-up if you follow this kind of thing. I really should give it five stars but I don't think many would believe it, so ....


Summary: 27 year old screenwriter Ami (Kim Min-Hie) hasn’t completed her first script in over a year. On her birthday she gets scolded by her older sister Young-Mi (Lee Mi-Suk)and her niece Kang-Ae (Ahn So-Hie). To seek consolation she turns to her boyfriend Eun-sook, who she knows is a deadbeat and headed in the wrong direction.

Because of this, she relunctunctly goes on a blind date and meets Soong-Won. He’s a confident accountant and seems to be the better choice for her, but woefully lacks a sense of humor. She is kind of attracted to him, but is this love? Should she think about marriage or keep working herself to death?

Her older sister, Young-Mi, is 41 years old, an interior designer, and a single mother. She seems to enjoy her life and her work. Young-Mi then meets a younger guy while working on an assignment and they have a one night stand. She kind of likes him, but also wants to be professional at work. The couple pretends not to know each other by day. Young-Mi also notices sudden mood swings which her doctor attributes to the menopause. She notices that she gets easily annoyed by Keung-Su. Is this the oncoming stages of menopause?

Young-Mi’s daughter, Kang-Ae, is a high school student who’s usually kept busy looking after her mom and her frustrated aunt. In her own personal life she has a boyfriend named Ho-Jae. They’ve been dating for three years, but still stuck in the first stages of a relationship. To her annoyance, he seems more interested in games and motorcycles than her. Young-Mi’s friend than pushes her to have sex with Kang-Ae.