Wu Xia Audience Round Up

Wu Xia was great. If it plays near you, go see it. And I say that even without having a clue what anyone was talking about the whole time. It looked like Shane meets Rashomon meets Sherlock Holmes meets Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and if you squint you can totally see how all that could work together. (Hero does something heroic, which makes cold emotionless detective curious how such a thing could be possible, which uncovers hero’s buried past as villain, which leads to hero’s villainous former associates tracking him down, which leads to kung fu.)

Anyway here’s the breakdown of who else watches wuxia movies in Korea that aren’t advertised for except on the internet and play only on one screen three times a day in a small city.

• Two other male-female couples.
•  Old dude in factory work clothes (navy blue cap and overalls). He resembled the type of guy who says shit to my wife and I when we walk down the street together, but that’s me pigeonholing. He could possibly be a secret martial arts master or at least a pretty decent guy.
• Young guy on leave from the army with his dad.
• Older dude we saw earlier in the bookstore down the street asking if they had the current issue of some Socialist periodical. After the film he stood outside the theater shouting into his cell phone because his son had failed to meet him outside.
• Five well-dressed young guys who later mimed martial arts moves at each other while waiting for the elevator. Local university students? Film geeks? Martial arts geeks? Geek geeks?