Woochi The Demon Slayer: Blu-ray Review
The Movie:
Jeon Woo-chi is a Taoist who is a bit of a troublemaker at times who basically marches to the beat to his own drum. He’s imprisoned in an ancient scroll by a group of wizards but when evil arises he’s released in the year 2009. He’s sent on a mission to retrieve a magical instrument from an evil force known as Hwadam who has diabolical intentions. It’s up to Woochi to stop Hwadam and save the world from impending doom.
It’s has been a while since I’ve seen a traditional martial arts film like this. I know what you’re going to say, “What about Man With The Iron Fists?”. To me that was an homage to the genre and not exactly traditional. This however, really takes me back to how I remember watching Asian cinema except with way better effects. From the start of the film to the end I can legitimately say that the films’ visuals are a thing of beauty. The settings of certain scenes looked so gorgeous and the colors so crisp. The CG effects were something I didn’t expect at all. They looked so great and the detail and design of the creatures in the film we’re something I haven’t seen in an American film in quite some time. The story felt like it was a bit tough to keep track of but the action and fight choreography made me not really think too much about it. I’ve seen plenty of martial arts films and many of them make use of wire work and this one was no different but there was something about the wire work in this film that seemed a lot cleaner. It was smoother than I’ve ever seen. If it wasn’t for some of the extreme movements and maneuvers then I would’ve been fooled into thinking that it was all natural. Even if you’re not a huge fan of martial arts films I think the different layers that this film has (including LOTS of humor), has made it very entertaining and will keep your eyes to screen.
Special Features:
The Newest Korean Style Hero Movie – This takes a brief look at some of the cast and a lot of the action scenes that took place to make this movie extraordinary.
Deleted Scenes – About 14 minutes worth of scenes that (with the exception of one or two) I’m glad they cut. It would’ve slowed the film down in those areas.
Making Of – Not the most interesting Behind The Scenes feature I’ve seen. A lot of it is just BTS footage lumped together with no voiceovers or cast talking about the process. It’s all a bit too quiet.
Interview Gallery – Plenty of cast and crew interviews that go on to discuss the film. (NOTE: They probably should’ve edited these into the “Making Of” feature)
Production Featurettes – These show the technical aspects of the film and all that went into the stunts and fight choreography.
The Magic Of Computer Graphics – Shows pre-visualization work and how it compares to the completed CG scenes and the CG crew discusses how they always need to try to stay one step ahead of the game.
Woochi The Demon Slayer is available NOW on Blu-ray and DVD from Shout! Factory
