Story
It was not the best storyline I've seen and I was a little confusing in places. The
general theme seemed to be based around Shakespeare's play, Romeo and Juliet, which you can definitely see elements of near the end of the film.
The main issue I had with this film is that it never really seemed to develop much and I wasn't entirely sure which guy she was meant to end up on.
But even with all these flaws, it had is cute moments which made it worth watching. The way the different guys try to win her heart made it cute and interesting. The fight scenes where also quite good and well rehearsed, boosting the score up to

Acting/Cast
To be honest, I got the feeling that one someone had said their given line they just awkwardly stood there. Actions seemed over the top or unprepared in places, which made the movie seem amateur.
The boys were cute and had good chemistry with the love interest, but most of the other actors weren't amazingly brilliant, this dragged the score down to above average at a 6.

Music
The music was quite good. It probably helped that 6 out of 7 of the main actors were all in a boy band, so their singing and playing music scenes were quite good. I liked the songs and background instrumentals as they were probably the best part in the movie. I gave the music an 7.5 because it was above average but not amazingly jaw dropping!

Overall it was a feel good movie which made you smile. In the end the only reason I finished it was because the boys were cute and I was curious to see which boy she ended up with.
It's unlikely that I will watch it again because it wasn't fascinatingly interesting, but it seems like an okay movie to watch if I get bored.

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This is a beautifully filmed movie, the cinematography is perfect, the settings are gorgeous, the music is touching and the actors play their parts well. I expected this movie to be well done when I started this, after watching the trailers and gaining high expectations, but this was beyond my imagination.
From reading the synopsis I thought that this film would be about a travelling magician who joins the princesses’ bridal party and does magic for them on the journey and they fall in love blah blah blah. Instead, we have a famous magician named Hwan Hee who works as a performer in the red light district. He bumps into the princess one night when she gets lost in the forest. After coming to one of his shows disguised as a handmaiden the two start to secretly meet at night and fall in love. It’s a beautiful love story complete with gorgeous magic shows and tricks. I’m going to lie, but magicians are one of my favourite kinds of profession. If a guy would woo me with magic tricks like Hwan Hee did the princesses, I think my life would be complete. My favourite trick was probably the first trick he does for the princess with the fireflies. It’s touching and gorgeous, and made me extremely jealous, not something you’d want to miss.

The cinematography is very well done. If that’s your kind of thing, then this is defiantly a movie which should go on your list. There is a lot of imagery and suggestion in a lot of the scenes, leaving things to the audience to presume, instead of strictly saying what happens. For example in the first couple of scenes we have someone approaches a lady with a weapon and then in the next scene a handmaiden is picking up a shoe floating in the river. I love who ever directed this movie because they did an excellent job.

The actors are great and have captured the essence of their characters, in addition the costume and makeup were on peak. I put these two together as they are two of the aspects which identify a character. Unlike a lot of historical dramas I’ve seen, the poor magician who lives in a dirty part of a Qing Dynasty city - or Joseon Dynasty city I’m not sure which, I got confused – he doesn’t have perfectly clean hair. It’s greasy, messy and obviously hasn’t been washed in a while. Compare it to the dramas were a man who has been living in the slums for 18 years, looks like he just walked out of a Herbal Essences advert. That sounds like a really strange thing to pick up on, but it just adds that little bit of reality to such a made up story.
I like how the antagonist doesn’t really come into play that much until the end, excluding his role in the unfortunate back-story of our handsome protagonist and his blind gisaeng friend. We’re never explicitly told what happened in a lot of his back-story, leaving it up to the audience to guess why, what and how. I think this is a good item in the directing and writing of this movie as it leaves things to the imagination of the audience whilst allowing more screen time for the relationship between the princesses and the magician to deepen. Man do I love this story.
The two leads play their parts well; it is obvious that the princess is struggling with her identity and what she wants in life. The turmoil between being the princess who was sold by her family, the princess who will rule the country and the commoner that the magician thinks she is, can all been seen through the actors expressions and speech. The actor and the writers did an excellent job.
With a small addition to this list, the blind gisaeng friend of the magicians is amazing! I would have thought she was actually blind. Very often with actors who a re acting blind, they will blink or react, but she doesn’t. Props to her cause I felt like she needed a shout out.

There is no outstanding music which I can remember, or at least nothing which made me look up the OST on Youtube, however I think all of the music is instrumental. Which by no means is a bad thing. The music was absolutely beautiful, it made me happy. But that being said there isn’t much I can talk about with the music apart from the simple fact that it was very well written and performed.

Would I recommend this movie? Yes. If you are a fan of magicians, adorable love stories or beautiful cinematography this is a good movie to watch. It gets rather violent in parts, as old magic didn’t have very many human rights or rules against murder, but on most other occasions it’s a beautiful movie. From what I can tell our protagonist magician doesn’t kill people, it’s the magic by the other magicians which is nasty. Thought I should probably warn you in advance.

I hope you watch this and enjoy it as much as I did! Have fun ^^

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I watched this movie under the recommendation of Zhaoul's Weekend Movies, because it sounded like a pretty sick movie. And in all honesty it was pretty awesome.

Firstly, I liked the actors, I've seen the main leads in a few other movies but not many. I agree with Jeaniessi, in that I loved the intensity that both Ji Sub and Ji Hwan put into their acting and characters. I liked that even to the end his character didn't completely throw away the gangster life, but yet still showed enough character development that the audience could notice him caring. My only complaint would be the ending.. I loved that he stayed gangster but.. it was a bit strange. I kind of wanted it to carry on and show what happened after the movie but it kind of just ends. It keeps Ji Subs character as a cold-hearted asshole, but still, it left me a little bit dissapointed; dragging my overall score from a 9 to an 8.
The other thing I didn't like about this movie was that there wasn't really a message. Instead of gaining something from this like a normal movie, it gave of more just the feeling of 'this happened deal with it', due to the minimal changes in a few characters. I suppose you could delve deeper and say that it is a movie showing how two separate people can be similar and still hold contrasting ideals. Or that the pain of betrayal leads men in different directions. I don't know. It's mainly just the fact that the film finished so abruptly that I just sat there and said "Huh?". I waited for the credits to end as I was convinced that there would be a short after story or something, but there was none.

Now don't get me wrong, this is a pretty bad ass movie. If you like fight scenes, violence or sassy gangsters then this is the movie for you. And in a few places it made me laugh, or at the very least smirk.
The actual presentation of the film was ingenious. The play on contrasting characters, with the black vs white clothing. The way the authors repeated pieces of monologue in the film within the actual film that the characters were involved in. The way they showed that Kang Pae wasn't completely heartless and then proceeded to tear down that any joy you might of felt for him. The fact that So Ji Sub's name is Kang Pae, which means gangster, and Kang Ji Hwan's name is Su Ta, which means star. It's those tiny pieces of detailed which really perfected this film and makes it so good.

I did really enjoy watching this film, despite the abrupt ending. If you're looking for something exciting to watch at the weekend this is a very good recommendation. From reading reviews and comments I feel that it's a film you should interpret on your own, because like most indie-like films there a variety of opinions speculated around it. Watch it because it's not half bad :3

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