Intcatinfo
A Masterpiece!
ThedevilChoose
When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.
Abbigail Bush
what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.
Portia Hilton
Blistering performances.
Tolga H. Dur
Most reviews here reduced "Go" to a simple love story with great acting and a critique of the racist, Japanese society. I disagree, and rather think that the movie focuses on what it means and feels like to be of foreign descent in any country really. First, the love story does not take place for about the first half of the movie. Rather, the daily life of the protagonist who visits a North Korean high school and has a violent, communist father is shown. It is made clear that both sides, Japanese and Korean tell him that he is different than the ethnically Japanese. For instance, everyone who speaks a word of Japanese gets beaten up by the teacher, which, some might not believe it, is not normal or legal in Japan. From the Japanese side, a constant fear is shown. The peak of this is when a Japanese high school student kills the protagonist's old, classmate out of reaction. It gets very clear that the boy did not have any intention but rather felt afraid and intimidated by the "evil North Korean". Even the protagonist's communist father is aware of the difficulties that this stark difference brings and thus suggests him to change nationalities when having the opportunity to. The love story, which everybody seems to focus on, really takes place in the second part of the movie. It is rather another tool the director chooses to convey the feeling of being of foreign descent. It is not the object of the director to make a Bollywood-like love story, as some suggested here. To make this point clear, just think of the protagonist as ethnically Japanese. Critical scenes which made me like the movie, would not take place. The couple would not have stopped their attempt to have sex for the first time because the protagonist confessed that he is a Zainichi (Japanese. for being of Korean descent). She would not have told him that her father used to say that Chinese and Korean have "dirty" blood. He would not have to face an awkward family dinner in which the girls' father, who thought that he is Japanese), talked about how great and virtuous Japan is and how lucky they all are to be of this ethnicity.But why use a love story in the first place and not show daily microaggressions such as the American counterparts do, you may ask? The answer is because there are hardly any. The Japanese culture is very much formed by the concept of Honne and Tatamae. A person would never show his or her true face (Honne) to a stranger. You have to get very close to a person for him or her to say what is really on their mind. In addition, the protagonist puts an effort to seem as Japanese as possible. He hardly tells someone his Korean first name and instead introduces himself with his Japanese last name. As a German of European descent whose ex-girlfriend was Korean American, I can confirm with great confidence that this does not just take place in "evil, racist" Japan. I heard numerous times why I speak German so well and that I do not look Turkish because of the way I dress. I have even felt great improvements in my dating game after dying my hair brown/blondish for fun. At the end, my personal relation is maybe the reason why I liked this film so much. I, too am a Zainichi, who is not Muslim and does not agree or relate to Turkish or Muslim culture at all. Yet I am the first person who is asked to explain actions of the ISIS and the Turkish president, I know nothing about. The movie ends with a scene where the protagonist screams: "Where am I from? Why are you all afraid of me?!". I would recommend everyone to watch the movie and think of it of more than "just a love story with a critique of Japanese society".
kwongers
I liked this movie, although I didn't love it. The film centers on the prejudice experienced by a Korean teenager living in Japan; he doesn't fit in with Koreans or the Japanese. But he utters many times in the film, "This is my love story," and while he does have a love interest, it is a rather small part. I liked how this film looked at the different tensions of race, life, and love.The acting was pretty great. The lead actor was very convincing as the teenager who is conflicted between two identities. He overacted the last scene, but there is this one very beautiful scene where he just sits and talks to a police officer. It's pretty awesome: very simple and beautiful. Kou Shibasaki as his love interest is pretty good as well, and she won the Japanese equivalent of the Oscar for her role in this. She makes the most of the relatively short amount of screen time she has, and we can see why the main character would fall in love with her.Not the best Japanese movie I've ever seen, but still pretty good. Worth your while. 7/10
zeilmann.a
Go was a surprise at Berlin FilmFest. A wild - at times bloody - story about a guy from the North Korean community in Japan, who tries to find out what his roots are and where he belongs to. Sugihara speaks Japanese, he looks like an ordinary Japanese punk and has Japanese friends - but he is different. He feels alienated from his parents and his background, he hates the rigid rules at the North Korean college he is attenting (chanting, marching and being beaten up by a strictly communist teacher included), but he's got no clue how to meddle into Japanese society. So he does best provocating others much to the anger of his father a former boxer, who has very special methods of education. What most people don't know, there are strong reservations in Japan against the Koreans in the country, so in the course of the events Sugihara hits some walls, especially when he fells in love with a Japanese girl, and doesn't dare to tell her the truth. A strong example for "New Japanese Cinema". Watch out for this director!
matt-559
i saw this film at the berlin film festival where it was part of the 'panorama' showings (not in the actual competition itself). it was perhaps unhelpfully billed as a film about the 'taboo of relationships between japanese and koreans'. i wouldn't say that it was particularly about that at all - more like a teenager's struggle for identity.i found it to be an excellent film. funny, touching and well-played. it deserves some international success.