Why So Blu?

Commitment (Blu-ray Review)

After his father s botched espionage mission, North Korean Myung-hoon (CHOI Seung-hyun, aka T.O.P) and his young sister Hye-in (HAN Ye-ri) are sent to a labor prison camp. In order to save his sisters life, Myung-hoon volunteers to become a spy and infiltrates the South as a teenage defector. While attending high school in the South, he meets another girl named Hye-in (KIM Yoo-jeong) and rescues her when she is attacked. South Korean Intelligence soon discovers the plot and begins closing in on Myung-hoon, while his own government sends a vicious assassin to eliminate him. 

 

Film 

Commitment is the story of Myung-hoon, whose father was killed via a botched espionage mission. Myung-hoon and his sister Hye-in are taken prisoners and locked away in North Korea. The only way to ensure Hye-in’s survival is if Myung-hoon agrees to become a super secret agent killing machine for the North. Let the games begin! Commitment flashes backward but only in the beginning and just to set up Myung-hoon’s character as opposed to giving him a full on origin. That does not happen. Once he makes his deal we flash forward a bit and he still looks the same but the added skill set of being able to kill anyone with swift speed and brutality. The fact that Myung-hoon also has a baby face may be a tad disconcerting too.

Myung-hoon travels to the South and is embedded into a private highs school where he is to await further orders. While there he is known by his other name: Kang Dae-ho. It’s a bit of a split personality, because while he’s in school he is to not show off his skill set for whatever reason. This leads to some really cool and musing scenes of him trying to keep it on the down low and it not always working. During his stay at the school he meets a young lady also named Hye-in, who reminds him of sister back home. This Hye-in is very shy and is constantly being bullied by her classmates. Myung-hoon and Hye-in soon become friends, though.

As all of this is happening, the South has gathered intelligence on Myung-hoon’s operation and has organized a task force to try and take him down. See, Myung-hoon is a highly trained killer and is “activated” and begins his mission(s) of taking out targets. He does this knowing that if he continues to do what he’s being told to do he will be reunited with sister. We’ve seen many movies with that same plot point and that’s never the case. When the North realizes that Myung-hoon might actually finish all of his missions and actually want to quit the organization and come back for a family reunion – assassins are quickly dispatched to take him out.

Now Myung-hoon has enemies from all sides and countries. The North wants him dead and The South wants him dead or alive. He also has to look out for both Hye-in’s and make sure that nothing happens to the both of them. Commitment was a surprise, because the promotional materials that I had seen for the film didn’t blow me away. The one trailer I saw (it’s included on this Blu-ray) was pretty awful and the cover art did not elicit an enthusiastic response at first glance. Once the film started it was on! Apparently Choi-Seung-hyun is a Korean rapper known as T.O.P. I’ve never heard of him and you know what tends to happen when rappers cross over into film. It does end well. It certainly does Mr. T.O.P., because he’s an absolute badass and can actually pull off the performance aspect of the film AND the martial arts/stunt work without missing, pardon the pun, a beat. His baritone voice, however, would be a dead a giveaway that he’s much older, but it doesn’t matter.

Commitment has plenty of brutal non-stop action set pieces that will satisfy action fans and it also has equal parts drama that will satisfy those who are more dramatically inclined. Let us continue with this review and see how the tech-specs of the Blu-ray fare out.

Video 

Encoding: AVC-MPEG4

Resolution: 1080p

Aspect Ratio: 2.40:1

Clarity/Detail: Clarity and detail are above average, with only a few instances of haze and contrast fluctuations. I believe those were added for artistic flair.

Depth: Commitment had lots of depth and scale – the Blu-ray made me feel as if I was in the middle of it all.  

Black Levels: Black levels are deep and don’t crush.

Color Reproduction: Colors can be bold and beautiful but depending on the tonal shift of the film can also be a bit on the drab side. This is not a fault of the Blu-ray since it does reproduce the color palette as intended.

Flesh Tones: Flesh tones looked very natural. Complexions looked clean and I never detected any hints of reddish or over saturation.

Noise/Artifacts: I did not detect any instances of heavy dirt (or light dirt for that matter). Artifacts were also not a problem.

 

Audio  

Audio Formats: Korean DTS-HD MA 5.1, Korean Dolby Digital 2.0

Subtitles: English

Dynamics: Commitment is an action-drama-spy thriller wrapped up into one, so the sound design had to be on point. There’s a gentle stillness when no one is getting attacked or killed but once the action begins its beyond high-octane and the Blu-ray representation of that is stellar.

Low Frequency Extension: The film features many action set pieces and the subwoofer channel handled those scenes amazingly!

Surround Sound Presentation: Bullets, speeding cars, explosions, oh my! The rear channels won’t get any rest from Commitment’s near-reference presentation. The surround sound channels are very active and pull you right into the action.

Dialogue Reproduction: Dialogue was crisp, clean, and clear.

 

Extras 

Commitment lacks commitment in the extras department, unfortunately. We are treated to a standard making-of featurette and the theatrical trailer. There also previews for other Well Go USA flicks.

• Making Of (SD, 10:30) – This featurette is a combination interview and making of the film. It’s standard stuff as the actors talk about the characters they are playing and then switches to the “fly on the wall” portion as we see them performing their scenes.
• Trailer (HD, 1:11) – A very unremarkable trailer that will make most think the movie will suck. Don’t let this trailer fool you. The movie rocks!
• Previews (HD) – The Suspect, Special ID, Confession of Murder 

 

 

Summary 

Commitment can almost be described as a junior Bourne film and Choi Seung-hyun carries enough charm and pent up sensibility to make it all seem plausible. The dramatic scenes are effective and the action totally rocks. The Blu-ray has great video and sound but the extras are subpar. If you’re interested in some action with purpose than this is one commitment you’ll want to make!

 

 

Order Commitment on Blu-ray!