Love and Leashes is a sexy, fresh and delightful movie! I didn’t know what to expect from this movie since it seems to have mixed reviews, but I ended up really loving this. This is actually a great movie to watch for introduction to BDSM… so do yourself a favor and watch this instead of the terrible 50 Shades of Grey. Love and Leashes actually tells how important consent is, about the HEALTHY way of BDSM, not the unhealthy way. I was surprised that Korea made such a daring, progressive and controversional movie, since as far I understand Korea is a conservative country. And also surprising is that this actually potrayed BDSM in a healthy way, since this might be the first BDSM korean movie or one of the first (feel free to correct me if I’m wrong). And the third surprising thing is that the female lead and male lead is acted by a idols, Seo Hyun from Girls' Generation and Lee Jun Young from U-KISS! That’s very brave of both of them. The fourth surprising thing is that it’s the woman who is the dominatrix/master, especially since this is Korea’s first (or one of the first) BDSM movie. It feels feminist, like it breaks stereotypes about men and women, it tells that men doesn’t have to be macho/dominant, and that women doesn’t have to be sumbissive.

This is generally a lighthearted and comedy movie, sometimes even silly, but deals with serious and disturbing subjects too… Anyways, this movie despite the theme is not very explicit, but still manages to be sexy! If you are looking for something explicit / almost p*rnish, then you might be dissapointed. The chemistry between Seo Hyun and Lee Jun Young is good. I like the fact that Ji Woo does lots of research about BDSM, which is not always the case when it comes to BDSM movies, and how respectful Ji Hoo is towards Ji Woo, he doesn’t force or nag at her when it comes to BDSM, he is not pushing her into anything… and I like the fact that Ji Woo actually likes to experience new things and is so open minded. She doesn’t judge people for their perferences.

It also deals with other people’s judgement when it comes to BDSM and How they think its just perverted and sick, and the movie wants to tackle those prejudices and tell there is nothing wrong with BDSM - as long as both parties wants it. I won’t lie, this movie is a bit predictable, sometimes I could tell what would happen. Also, the acting is okay but not the best… but other than that, everything was great, it also tacklas sexism at work, and movie wants to lift up How problematic it is. Ji Woo is a strong a character, she doesn’t take crap and is a very modern, liberal woman. Ji Hoo is a nice man who hides his kinky side, afraid to be looked down on, especially because of what happened in the past. The relationship between Ji Woo and Ji Hoo is of course not the typical kind of relationship, it’s pretty unique, of course. And of course they develop feelings for each other.

Some say this movie is very tame, but not for me. Sure there are BDSM movies out there that are a LOT more explicit, but I thought this is definitely not tame since Ji Hoo actually likes pain and we see his wounds after BDSM with Ji Woo, and some scenes are actually very darn sexy, and tastefully so… While not a very deep movie , its definitely not shallow. I give this 8.5/10 whips! 😉