NATURAL CITY aka: Blade Runner 2 who see it!?

who see this hong kong korea movie called NATURAL CITY!? it is supposed to be unnoficial sequel to Blade Runner but i heard some bad reviews about it! although i saw some shots from the movie and it seems to have some beautiful scenery and such, but the story and characters are supposed to be very bad or something. like maybe it would be a good movie if it didnt rip from Blade Runner?

thx.

some still shot. it came out last year i guess:

http://www.nixflix.com/stills/naturalcity5.jpg
http://www.nixflix.com/stills/naturalcity2.jpg
http://www.nixflix.com/stills/naturalcity4.jpg
http://www.nixflix.com/stills/naturalcity6.jpg
http://www.nixflix.com/stills/naturalcity3.jpg

Never heard of it. And your pics are coming up red Xs on my side of teh Net. It be cool however, if the Jeter novel of "Edge of Human" got made into a sequel flick but I don't forsee that happening.

MERCENARY X99

ok i changed them to links maybe u can click on them now.

i never seen hk import movies before but i was looking for some good post apoc or cyber movies to get and i saw these. seems like us pays little attention to this genre because i cant seem to find a good selection of them that capture the right feel.

lately i tried to watch blade runner again to get into it and i watched dark city as well.

FeelGood said:

ok i changed them to links maybe u can click on them now.

i never seen hk import movies before but i was looking for some good post apoc or cyber movies to get and i saw these. seems like us pays little attention to this genre because i cant seem to find a good selection of them that capture the right feel.

lately i tried to watch blade runner again to get into it and i watched dark city as well.

Click to expand...

Well now all I'm getting is THIS when I click on those links
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Forbidden
You don't have permission to access /stills/naturalcity2.jpg on this server.

Additionally, a 404 Not Found error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.


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Apache/2.0.50 (Unix) Server at www.nixflix.com Port 80

I'm sure the film is pretty good though as as of lately Korean films seem to be rockin the house. Korea is what Hong Kong was during the 90's for pumping out some odd but ultra cool movies. I highly doubt its a sequel to BLADE RUNNER, but if production values were beyond decent and the script is solid it might actually be cool to have a rip off B.R.

MERCENARY X99

hmm maybe if u cut/paste the url to ur browser u can see them.

the reviews i read said they mention "blade runners" at several points in the movie and even though it takes place like 70 years after blade runner several plot simularities like deckard and cyborgs that expire else become deviants, etc. for example:

"Needless to say, the other big problem with "Natural City" is the existence of "Blade Runner". Without Scott's movie, "Natural City", although it wouldn't be a seminal work of sci-fi by any stretch, it would certainly have been a good entry. Alas, "Blade Runner" does exist, and so does Deckard and renegade cyborgs led by Roy Batty. As such, "Natural City" feels old and dated. Of course the fact that it features a hollow script that stacks one inexplicable plot point on top of another doesn't help matters. Why is R obsessed with saving Ria? Why is Noma obsessed with saving R? Your guess is as good as mine, because "Natural City" offers no explanations whatsoever."

and...

"R is seeking to save his beloved dancing cyborg, which is scheduled to "expire" in a few days. Once expired, she must be recycled or else be labeled a "deviant". It is the job of R and his fellow MPs, led by Noma, to track down and kill these deviant cyborgs."

Well, those are incredibly beautiful backdrops.
I'll probably end up checking it out.

EDIT:
Did some searching. This is a South Korea only effort, not HK.
General consensus seems to say that it's a crappy film but a fine cinema.
Bring your popcorn, and don't take it for anything more than you see.

IVE BEEN DOING SOME RESEARCH AND IT SEEMS I HAVE GOOD TIMING OR SOMETHING:

Optimum Asia have announced the UK Region 2 DVD release of Natural City for 23rd August 2004 priced at £19.99. A Korean sci-fi drama, the film tells the futuristic tale of a human and an android. Natural City will screen at this year’s Edinburgh International Film Festival.

Features include:

Making of Natural City
Location tour with director Byung-Chun Min
Deleted Scenes
Trailer

Click to expand...

NEW UK DVD BOX

I THINK MAYBE I WILL TRY IT OUT.

i have it its an ok flick with jin roh like police officers
an it HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE FIRST BLADE RUNNER
its a completely diffrent kind of movie only watch it if your a cg special effects hore
\

Let's see, we've got flying cars, cyborg clones, Jin-Roh battle armored cops, cool special effects and lots of blood. So what is really missing from Natural City? A good script for one. What it lacks in story, Natural City makes up for with the hyper-action-Matrix-syndrome slo-mo shootouts and cool special effects. The story is very confusing and hard to follow and the director jumps in and out of flashbacks and cut scenes. The love triangle between R, Ria and the girl is never really fulfilled and there are even some mindless scenes that lead to no where (the rape scene, what the hell?). The acting by lead actor Yoo Ji Tae is not that great either. He tries too hard to be cool. The scenes are actually stolen by Koma, R's friend, who kicks some major cyborg butt. Speaking of action, that's what Natural City ultimately offers and makes up for its crap story line and lame cut scenes.

It's been boasted that Natural City is the most expensive Korean film ever made. Sure, we've heard of tons of those, but they still turn out to be crap. Natural City would be a lot better if it actually uses some of that budget towards a more well established actor and a better script. Not to say that it's a bad film. Heck, it's on our Featured Titles list so all of us enjoyed it. Take it for what it's worth, but Natural City is a popcorn movie made to fill seats at a theater or a friend's house for some Saturday night action. The action scenes are great and the special effects, cool weapons and armor, digital landscapes and flying cars are nothing but pure eye candy. Just enjoy it for what it is and you'll have no problems.
http://aznfilms.com/advanced_search_result.php?keywords=natural+city&x=6&y=11

bleh im anti cg so i dunno i prolly think its shit. im over slo mo bullet time and matrix should have copyright it or something so we dont have to see that shit in every action movie since.

since you have it how good are the backdrops and does it draw you in or do they all look like shit cg blue screen nightmares? the still shots seem like they capture a pretty unique setting.

oh yeah and u say it has NOTHING to do with blade runner? deckard and other characters are never mentioned in it? the review i quoted said they were and even the "back story" built off of blade runner. they describe a war that destroyed the previous city which forced them to build the new one on an island or something. replicants still terminate after a set amount of years, etc.

maybe the reviewer was mistaken.

FeelGood said:

bleh im anti cg so i dunno i prolly think its shit. im over slo mo bullet time and matrix should have copyright it or something so we dont have to see that shit in every action movie since.

since you have it how good are the backdrops and does it draw you in or do they all look like shit cg blue screen nightmares? the still shots seem like they capture a pretty unique setting.

oh yeah and u say it has NOTHING to do with blade runner? deckard and other characters are never mentioned in it? the review i quoted said they were and even the "back story" built off of blade runner. they describe a war that destroyed the previous city which forced them to build the new one on an island or something. replicants still terminate after a set amount of years, etc.

maybe the reviewer was mistaken.

Click to expand...

its the best backdrops ive seen in a long time
the technology they use is awsome. just see it for the art an design that went on to it dont expect a gripping story.

hmm thats what i figured after reading some review but its sad that it cant do better. this movie seems the equivalent of UNDERWORLD - style over content.

is korea bigger cg whore than america!?

It's no blade runner. Style over substance.
More like equilibrium.

While every shot of blade runner is densely packed with information/signage, Natural City takes the austere and ultimately boring route ala The Matrix, or as mentioned, Equilibrium.

Mmmmm, diet dystopia.

The problem with this new austere approach is the general laziness with which directors/set designers/artists approach it. Architecture, for example, may strike you as "futuristic" and "cool" just because its so simplistic at FIRST...but over time, you're left with a building that's so simple and boring, it becomes more of an aesthetic chore than anything beautiful.

Good examples of simplistic architectural design include Peter Chung's AEON FLUX and Bungie's Halo. Clean but beautifully striking alien structures that still seem to allude to a human touch without ever giving away the big secret.

wtf u thought equilibrium = style over substance? matrix 1 wasnt exactly boring either. equilibrium = great movie better than matrix but had some wierd ideas and kind of overplayed the rather unbelievable (but suprisingly (too?) simple) thought of "not thinking".

FeelGood said:

wtf u thought equilibrium = style over substance? matrix 1 wasnt exactly boring either. equilibrium = great movie better than matrix but had some wierd ideas and kind of overplayed the rather unbelievable (but suprisingly (too?) simple) thought of "not thinking".

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There's nothing wrong with either of those movies---unless you're going to compare them to Blade Runner. And I did.

The Matrix is actually one of the smartest movies I've ever seen. There are levels to it I'm sure 1 out of every 100,000 people are aware of. The sequels, however, abandoned all of the strikingly subtle [heh] social theory of the first...sacrificing depth for FX and a cohesive story for a jumbled, cryptic mess.

i think the only thing blade runner has going for it is the world it created and presented to the audience. i have a hard time accepting the movie as a whole mainly because i never relate to 90% of the characters, undoubtedly because the movie seems rushed and never takes the time to develope individual personalities and relationships. i mean before you can fully appreciate the plight the repicants are in you are witnessing the final shodown between deckard and the bot. i thought by watching the movie multiple times i could come to appreciate the aesthetics and the films' ability to capture your imagination but in the end the mechanical plotline and rushed circumstances seemed to outweigh the good. the entire movie was spent advancing the plot and ignoring the human aspects of the film. it is a simple case of a story, script and characters being too complex for a 90 minute stretch of storytelling. this kept me from fully appreciating the movie.

it is far far from a bad movie, but i fail to see it as the end all be all for cyber punk fans. the sad part is even though i dont consider it the holy grail it may well be one of the greatest cyber movies of all time not due to its merits but because of the utter lack of exceptionally true cyber punk movies to be found.

in any case i dont think the movie overshadows the likes of equilibrium or matrix 1. it simply provides a much much much more desireable cyber punk world for me, which is enough to make me consider it amongst the other two films i guess.

You think Blade Runner seems rushed?
What relationships/personalities does the film do a poor job of developing?
Rick Deckard is one of the most complex characters you could ever hope to analyze in the history of cinema---and you don't even know if he's human or not.

Ridley Scott just takes a different approach to laying his characters out for you. There's more of Deckard to analyze in a single, synth-soaked, speechless scene of blade runner than most other movies could offer after a good hour of [boring] dialogue with their stereotypical characters.

The entire movie is one of the largest outlets for post-modern social theory anywhere. Read up on some Baudrillard and his theories on the Hyperreal...or the blurring lines of what is real and what is 'simulation' in the information-soaked world of the 21st century.

FeelGood you really need to hunt down the two novels by K.W. Jeter of Blade Runner 2: Edge of Human and Replicant Night. While I never finished the second book {but the third in the stories} I can say that #2 "Edge of Human" fleshes out a bit more of the "Whys" and the "Why Nots" that the film DID NOT focus as much on as you stated. Funny thing is I always hear people complain {like my wife} that Blade Runner is too slow, so to hear that it was rushed seems a bit odd to me. K.W. Jeter does a good job returning to the future noir/cyberpunk future that Ridley Scott brought to life indeed. Check online with

http://www.abebooks.com and you should be able to find both books, or just head to your nearest BORDERS or Barnes & Noble as they books are in "Mass Media Paperback" though I own the Hard Covers.

MERCENARY X99

Natural City is okay at best....some badass visuals and ideas...but the pacing sucks and the story is "meh"

isnt the true identity of deckard the only "depth" he has? and this uncertaintity was attained through one or two scenes? and this (from what i read, im not sure if ive seen the original cut of the movie in its entirety) ambiguity was only present in the director's cut?

pardon me for not going googoo over how much or how often the story gets analyzed but if there is one thing the net has taught me it's that ANYTHING can be analyzed add infinitum. i mean hell the MGS II story is debated and analyzed to death in the same fashion, i think you can take classes on the subject. does this some how make sense of that travesty? naw, it still blows.

i must say that i am not entirely sure why i cannot connect with the movie. especially since i thouroughly enjoy such works as SNATCHER, rise of the dragon, equilibrium, matrix 1, various CP novels. so its not a matter of a boring genre for me. the reasons above seem like the easy answer to me but there may be more, or it may be something entirely different i'm not sure. it pisses me off though especially because i want to enjoy a holy grail of cyber punk too.

thx merc i go tomorrow to check those out it never occured to me to check out blade runner novels even though the whole replicant/hunter theme is about as good as it gets in my book.

Just think of the progression of Deckard's character alone.

He went from

Hating replicants---including having a job that required him to hunt them...

to

Falling in love with a replicant---and then spending the rest of his life as her BODYGUARD...

Fucking irony. Genius.

Kid Aphex said:

Rick Deckard is one of the most complex characters you could ever hope to analyze in the history of cinema---and you don't even know if he's human or not.

Click to expand...

While I agree with the rest, I can't agree with this statement. Fred C Dobbs (Treasure of Sierra Madre), Vito Corleone (Godfather), Charles Foster Kane (Citizen Kane), Shukichi Hirayama (Tokyo Story), Joan of Arc (The Passion of Joan of Arc), Norman Bates (Psycho) and John Ferguson (Vertigo) I would say are all more complex, interesting and realistic characters. They do things unexpected but not out of character, the hardest thing to write well. I also suppose it depends on what you look for in "complex" characters.

I would also say that Colonel Nicholson in Bridge of the River Kwai suffers a subtler, yet at the same time more powerful, ironic end.

But that's me.

On topic, I heard Natural City wasn't all that good.

Kid Aphex said:

Just think of the progression of Deckard's character alone.

He went from

Hating replicants---including having a job that required him to hunt them...

to

Falling in love with a replicant---and then spending the rest of his life as her BODYGUARD...

Fucking irony. Genius.

Click to expand...

-->Deckard was a replicant himself :Z

Late said:

-->Deckard was a replicant himself :Z

Click to expand...

1. I was aware of this.

2. Despite Scott's recent "admittance" to Deckards true identity as a replicant...there is ample proof for both cases.