A professional Go player is asked by his brother to help him win a rigged, high-stakes underground match and things go bad quickly.Sent to prison (I'm still not quite sure why), the humble Go player uses his skills to win favours from the gambling warden, and he soon uses those favours in exchange for fight training, so that he can become an absolute killing machine when he gets out! Yeah, it all sounds pretty dumb but it's a film, so carry on...Having served his time, our Go master - now a kung fu-fighting master to boot - doesn't waste time in tracking down the men who killed his brother and swiftly exacts revenge on one... it's then that the tone of the film changes, taking a potential 8 star flick down a couple of notches.See, so far the tone had been very dark and gritty, but the Go player opts to put a team together, woo the hot chick who plays secretly for the gangsters and the realism really goes out of the window. Had it either been somewhat lighter from the beginning or stayed bleak, this could have been really great, but with the tone hovering from this point onwards between the white-toothed smiles and happy endings of Hollywood-type films, and classic, gritty revenge thrillers, I was never quite sure what I was watching... but that doesn't mean to say it's a bad film, as I did enjoy it (it just could have been a lot better).I'll admit though: I've never played Go and dismissed it as just an Asian version of draughts (checkers, to Americans), but the love for the game is clear in this film and might just change a few people's preconceptions. That said, please do NOT read this as being a sports film, because Go is just the unique backdrop that this unbalanced thriller has to separate it from the pack.

I thought I was going to really enjoy this movie. At least more than "Tazza: The Hidden Card", but it didn't come close to meeting my expectation. And "Tazza: The Hidden Card" is simply a more entertaining movie compared to this. The story starts out like it's going to lead up to something really cool. But the movie just seem to get blander and blander as it progressed. The is a revenge story that has the board game "Baduk", not the other way around. I must say everything about this movie is just straight up predictable. If you guess what direction this movie is going to go the chances are that you are right on the money. The cinematography is good and Ahn Sung-ki's acting was impressinve and he still has that genuine charisma going. There is certain elements that are added into this movie that just doesn't go anywhere. And it just seemed uncessary for the movie as a whole. At least in "Tazza" most of the characters had significance, I can't say the same for this movie.6.2/10

This is a must-see movie. There's never been any other movie like this before.The main line through this movie is the board game Go (also known as igo in Japan, weiqi in China or baduk in Korea). Go is a mind game and it may come to a surprise that this movie is so violent. However that's exactly what makes this movie so brilliant.You can feel that the person who wrote the script of this movie is somebody who loves the game of Go. The movie perfectly respects the spirit of the game: the aggression, creativity, scheming, ...As for people who are not interested in the board game at all. You will not be disappointed neither. Top actors, an exciting script, humor and blood. What more could you possibly want ?

Could've been another title, though I did watch it under "Divine Move" at a Festival. While I have no clue how to play (or better the rules of) Baduk, the movie was still very appealing. It also achieves to make the game interesting many times. We have a lot of games that have to be covered over the duration of the movie and each one of them is shot differently and shown in a different light, depending on where the story and characters are at the moment.But it's not a "sports" movie about a board game. It's also an action movie and those scenes are more than well choreographed! The movie is action packed and it has moments in it, that you might not expect. Not sure how the ending will go down with some, but I like the movie for not going the easy way ...