The Gingko Bed

Rating:
Summary: A Romantic Ghost Story
Review: I first saw this film while teaching English in Korea. It was of course in Korean without any English subtitles. Even though I do not speak much Korean, I could follow the story and enjoyed this movie.

When I returned to the states I rented it with English subtitles and it was still a good movie.

Su-hyun is an art teacher with a doctor girl friend. He has been drawing a woman who seems to obssess him. When his girl friend demands that he buy a bed instead of them sleeping on his couch, he buys a bed he has seen in his dreams.

What he does not know is that the bed holds the spirit of Princess Mi-dan. She saves him from the spirit of General Hwang after taking some of the engergy of a young man. Su-hyun slowly starts to remember his past life as a court musican.

His girl friend gets into trouble at work because the man who the princess stole energy from was pronounced dead and when he comes back to life with his eyes having been donated, his family wants to sue the hospital. The man himself is surprisinly calm about it and tells the doctor that he was actually dead.

The only thing I really disliked about this movie was one of the beggining scenes. It shows a young woman being raped in a dark alley. A man dressed all in black attacks the rapist and pulls his heart out of his chest. It is the general, but it seems he is already solid and has no need to take someone's energy.

This is violence without purpose. It becomes obvious that this man is the villian, is this opening scene just supposed to show how violent he is? In my opinion, it could have been left out of the movie.

Rating:
Summary: A Romantic Ghost Story
Review: I first saw this film while teaching English in Korea. It was of course in Korean without any English subtitles. Even though I do not speak much Korean, I could follow the story and enjoyed this movie.

When I returned to the states I rented it with English subtitles and it was still a good movie.

Su-hyun is an art teacher with a doctor girl friend. He has been drawing a woman who seems to obssess him. When his girl friend demands that he buy a bed instead of them sleeping on his couch, he buys a bed he has seen in his dreams.

What he does not know is that the bed holds the spirit of Princess Mi-dan. She saves him from the spirit of General Hwang after taking some of the engergy of a young man. Su-hyun slowly starts to remember his past life as a court musican.

His girl friend gets into trouble at work because the man who the princess stole energy from was pronounced dead and when he comes back to life with his eyes having been donated, his family wants to sue the hospital. The man himself is surprisinly calm about it and tells the doctor that he was actually dead.

The only thing I really disliked about this movie was one of the beggining scenes. It shows a young woman being raped in a dark alley. A man dressed all in black attacks the rapist and pulls his heart out of his chest. It is the general, but it seems he is already solid and has no need to take someone's energy.

This is violence without purpose. It becomes obvious that this man is the villian, is this opening scene just supposed to show how violent he is? In my opinion, it could have been left out of the movie.

Rating:
Summary: Inconsistent, yet sometimes moving love story
Review: The Gingko Bed represents a directoral debut film for Jacky Kang, who later went onto direct Shiri to a major commerical success in Korea and Asia. This movie is about a love triangle involving two ghosts (General Hwang and Princess Mi-dan) and one present-day art teacher (Sun-young), who happens to have been Mi-dan's lover hundreds of years ago. Sun-young also has a physician girlfriend who loses her job because her patient is involved in a body-snatching incident where Mi-dan takes his body to save Sun-young from General Hwang, who is portrayed as a spurned, jealous lover. The patient loses his eyes (donated)while dead and then miraculously comes back to life in the middle of his funeral (no embalming in Korea?). After saving Sun-young, Mi-dan can no longer come in contact with Sun-young because the body-snatching incident angers the god of love... Anyway, you get the gist that the plot is rather convoluted.

Then Sun-young somehow runs into an old man, who seems to know everything about what happened between Sun-young and Mi-dan as if he had been there personally. To make a long story short, Mi-dan begs General Hwang to see Sun-young one last time before she becomes his forever. General Hwang conveniently uses the doctor's body to fulfill Mi-dan's wish while threatening Sun-young that the doctor will be in a coma forever if he doesn't let Mi-dan leave before the end of a lunar eclipse. Of course, their reunion lasts a bit longer, leading to the final scene that is both moving and beyond logic.

The whole plot appears contrived as if the director was trying to squeeze in too many scenes that are supposed to be loosely connected. There are many elements in this movie that just defy logic, but after all, this is a ghost story.

In summary, this is a nice film with heart-warming romance, but the story appears convoluted and forced.

Rating:
Summary: Sad but beautiful
Review: This is a very sad but very beautiful movie.

A successful artist finds an old gingko bed and discovers that the ghost of Princess Mi-Dan, his lover from past life is trapped within it. Enters General Hwang who killed the artist (who was a court musician at the time) a thousand years ago because he wanted Mi-Dan for himself.

The plot summary doesn't do the film justice. The film is rather complex. It should appeal to those who liked the Matrix. This film was made three years before the Matrix. It does not emphasize the special effects that much. But it really focuses on the different realities. An extremely intelligent and original film (fans of Hong Kong cinema may find it reminiscent of Stanley Kwan's (1987) ROUGE.

Rating:
Summary: Great Ghost Movie
Review: This is the tale of two Chinese yuppies, one (Su-Hyun) is an artist, who sidelines as a college professor. His girlfriend (Sun-Young)is a doctor, who works at the hectic City hospital.

When Su-Hyun purchases a massive Gingko bed for his art studio, he begins to hallucinate about seeing the Ghost of an ancient princess (Mi-Dan). Mi-Dan and her would-be suitor General Hwang, haunt the bed, due to an ancient curse. Mi-Dan has returned because Su-Hyun is the reincarnation of her ancient lover. Hwang has returned to protect Mi-Dan, and try and kill Su-Hyun.

I really liked Gingko bed. While the plot held nothing particularly new (Su-Hyun- and Mi-dan were stereotypically 'good' with no particular negative characteristics, and General Hwang was the evil obsessed anti-hero type), I liked it anyway. There were a couple scenes which remained unclear and seemed superfluous, for instance: the opening scene with Hwang attacking and killing the rapist, (this is supposed to be a bad guy? Seems pretty GOOD to me), The scene where Sun-Yuong leaves Su-Hyun's birthday cake on top of the car, and then this isn't even MENTIONED at his birthday party.... This makes me wonder whether some significant scenes might've been left on the cutting room floor.

Overall, though, despite these peccadillos, this was a great movie, well worth the time and money investment!