Wordiezett So much average

Matialth Good concept, poorly executed.

TrueHello Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

Fleur Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

hongkong666 What a weird movie. First thing to notice is, that the visual of the film looks pretty ok. Some decent camera work was definetely one of the stronger sides of Tidal Wave aka Haeundae. Being a Korean disaster movie I already had some worries due to experiences in the past with movies coming from Asia. And I didn't have to wait long. Immediately those horrible nonsense dialogues came up, causing that you won't like any of the characters at all. Basically everybody without a high degree of any sort falls into this category and all the interactions and relations don't matter anymore. You just want the wave erase 95% of the cast right from the spot and show us epic slow motion shots of how entires cities get washed away. Romantic aspects, and there were quite a few which were forced upon us all fall flat and appear unrealistic. The funny thing is, they are not! Living in Asia myself I can tell first hand that romantic issues are handled a lot more different, very indirect and seemingly naive. It may be authentic to a certain point, but it is definetely painful to watch. Another aspect of the 101 of Asian film making (of course there are exceptions to the rule) is at least one goofy character who always has to be the clown, no matter how serious the topic of the movie may be. As if there is a Comedy quota that has to be reached by any means. And yes, Tidal Wave deals with all of these flaws excessively. And this makes most of these films nearly unwatchable. The only good aspects of this movie are indeed the disaster elements themself, even though they rely on extreme usage of CGI as far as the eye can see. Some of these shots were really epic and fun to watch. But what does this help if you have suffer through this gruesome acting? Sad to say, but this movie would have been beeter if they wouldn't have even bothered in building up characters or relations of any kind and instead simply go nuts on epic destruction. 10 to 15 good minutes won't erase over one hour of uselessness.

Paul Magne Haakonsen I found this movie to be a good attempt at a disaster genre movie to come out of Korea.The movie had a good story, and had enough interesting side stories to keep you compelled. It is good to have several story lines that work well to come together for a good wholesome story.The characters in the movie were good and believable, though some of the dialogue were cheezy at times.The effects of the movie were adequate, but of course you can see it is not a multi-million dollar Hollywood CGI fest going on. But with that in mind, they made the effects work well enough.This movie is a good alternative to the usual comedies and horrors movie that mostly come out of Korea. It also takes up some real life issues about tsunamies.In overall I think this movie is a good choice if you like disaster movies, and if you are tired of big Hollywood movies with superstar cast listings.

DICK STEEL I suppose most are now acutely aware of how increasingly devastating natural disasters have been in recent years, starting from the 2004 Asian Tsunami which swallowed thousands of unfortunate souls. Then there are the recent destruction caused by typhoons and earthquakes, the latter which we're more acquainted with given the tremors which we feel as a result of neighbouring incidents, a phenomenon not experienced until the last few years.There are numerous accounts of heroics and tragedy following every disaster, and it's not a surprise that they have become fodder for mass entertainment. We had 252: Signal of Life as the Japanese offering to the disaster genre earlier this year, and the Koreans too have decided to match that with Haeundae: The Deadly Tsunami. With 252 it was the disaster hitting hard and fast first, followed by the shoving of human melodrama down your throat, and thankfully though Haeundae is quite the opposite, having the human drama established first without feeling forced, before the special effects extravaganza took over.So if you belong to Camp Impatient, then you're likely to feel bored as the film sought to introduce the ensemble characters, each with their respective back-stories and selfish reasons why they go about doing what they are doing, of course with repercussions all nicely built in as well for some karmic response. There's the fisherman and the romance with the daughter of a man whom he had caused the death of, and this provided most of the emotional anchor for the film. Then there are others like the opposites attract with the coast guard and the free-spirited girl from Seoul, a seemingly scheming politician who's in some kind of en-bloc mess with the folks of the coastal village, a much maligned scientist and his estranged wife and daughter, and enough overbearing mothers.All these provided some 60 minutes worth of dramatic run time before it's time for Nature to hit back with its tidal waves, where quick response to an actual event will save lives, which stemmed from complacency creeping in when early warning signals went uncalled for. The filmmakers here had realistically created the phenomenon of the massive tidal waves with the receding waters and such, and the effects here were nothing short of eye-popping. Fear-inducing even, though there was one quick scene which seemed lifted from Hollywood's Deep Impact upon reconciliation of 2 characters in the face of impending doom.But of course budget dictated that the effects could only sustain the movie for a short while, and anything more than 2 wave cycles would probably either be cost-prohibitive, or just plain dragging out the misery of the characters in their preservation of lives. Some fade-to-black-at-opportune-moments also came to the rescue of the film, and cheesiness reined comical supreme needlessly as well, though no efforts were spared in others especially the one involving the little girl left in the hotel room, providing that edge-of-your-seat thrills in what would be a literal roller-coaster ride in the last half hour.Haeundae served more as a disaster film without any preachy overtones regarding the preservation of the environment. In earnest, I thought the release of this film was more like serving up an appetizer to the bigger budgeted extravaganza come November with 2012. That, I want to see.

darkmax Wow... I've seen quite a few disaster movies, and this one was disastrous.It began as a comedy and ended up a sorrowful one... Please set the mood right. The pacing of the movie was relatively even, and yes, the coming tsunami was... underwhelming.The main actors are all pretty convincing, but the supporting ones are just that.... supporting ones. Their acting could only be called flaky, at best.Let me get this out of my system. Japanese have one of the most advanced earthquake/tsunami early warning systems in the world. the Korean scientists made their Japanese counterparts sound like they were extremely I thought the ending was also too drawn out and long-winded. This movie would only be good when you are left with nothing better to watch.