Movie Review: The Tattooist

The Tattooist
Director: Michael Wong
Writer: Michael Wong
Stars: Yanhu Wang, Li Lu, Myra Mala

Rated: 3.5 stars
Review by Astilbe

Behind the acclaimed work of a renowned tattoo studio lurks an unimaginable evil.

I’ve seen many horror films before, but nothing quite like this before!

To be honest with you, at first I thought this was a trailer for a full-length movie. Just like in “The Story of 90 Coins,” the pacing of this tale was incredibly quick. The audience was given the exact amount of information we needed to know what was going on and nothing more.

Mr. Wong is a director I’ve discovered pretty recently, and I’ve become a big fan of the way he weaves scenes together. He expects his audience to pay attention and do a little bit of work putting the pieces of the plot together. Those are both good things in my opinion, and I’m looking forward to seeing what he might come up with next.

The background music was surprisingly cheerful and the exact opposite of what I would generally expect to hear while watching this genre. It provided a nice contrast to the truly frightening things happening to the characters, especially since the audience was given so much leeway in coming up with our own theories about why such happy music was chosen for this tale.

I should warn you that this is a dark and gory story. Don’t be fooled by the short run time. Every single second is important, and many of those moments contain images of people being seriously harmed. This is only something I’d recommend for mature viewers, but it is definitely something worth checking out if you’re an adult who loves horror.

Movie Review: The Story of 90 Coins

The Story of 90 Coins
Director: Michael Wong
Writer: Bai Xuedan
Stars: Dongjun Han, Zhuang Zhiqi, Jose Acosta

Rated: 4 stars
Review by Astilbe

How much is a promise worth these days? An aspiring fashion designer finds out when she has to choose between fulfilling her promise and realizing her dream.

Young love is beautiful, but it can also be unstable.

The Story of 90 Coins explored the lives of Chen Wen and Wang Yu Yang, the man who wanted to marry her. At the beginning of this short film, Wang convinced Chen to continue dating him for ninety more days after hearing how hesitant she was to get engaged to him. He agreed to give her one coin every day. At the end of the trial period, they’d either use those coins to pay for a marriage license or buy drinks together and then part ways forever.

Their relationship was trimmed down to the bare essentials of what we needed to know which was a great choice for this film. It was interesting to see these highlights and fill in the gaps with my own theories about what might have happened between scenes.

The audience did see these characters going on creative dates, cuddling, and doing other ordinary but quite sweet things together. I loved seeing them interact. Even though we knew almost nothing about their backstories, they both seemed to be gentle, wholesome people who were well-suited for each other.

There wasn’t a lot of time to go into why Chen was unsure about his proposal because the run time for everything was less than ten minutes. This was one of the few things I would have changed about it. Wang was handsome, kind, and empathetic. Honestly, he seemed like the perfect boyfriend to me, so I struggled to come up with any rational reasons why she’d turn him down other than the fact that they both seemed to be pretty young.

With that being said, I loved the romance. These characters really sold me on the idea that they were a good match for each other, and I couldn’t help but to root for them even when life circumstances seemed to be tearing them apart.

Do be sure to pay close attention to the English subtitles for this film if you don’t speak Chinese. There were a couple of important plot points that happened so quickly I would have missed them if I’d glanced away from the screen.

I’m glad I watched The Story of 90 Coins, and I’d recommend it to anyone who enjoys the romance genre.