The Aggressives (Taepungtaeyang/태풍태양-2005)

Starring:
Jong-hak Baek ... Commercial Director
Jeong-myeong Cheon ... So-yo
Yi-jin Jo
Kang-woo Kim ... Moggy
Cheon-hee Lee ... Gap-ba
Ju-wan On
Yu-jeong Lee

The Aggressives centers on Soyo (Cheon Jeong Myeong), a seemingly quiet, unassuming teenager whose ordinary humdrum life soon changes when he discovers the thrill of inline skating. His love for the sport eventually causes him to meet up with a group of skater boys that include Moggy (Kim Kang Woo), a kid whose awesome board skills immediately capture Soyo's attention. Moggy's girlfriend, Hanju (Jo Yi Jin), asks Soyo to join them and with his parents out of the picture, Soyo quickly immerses himself in this new subculture, eventually bunking with the team. His friendship with Moggy and Hanju soon takes off, and his loyalty to the team's leader Gabpa (Lee Cheon Hee) soon results in an exciting new development in the romance department.

But when Moggy is forced to shoot a commercial to score a plane ticket to the world inline skating championships, he snaps and deliberately causes an accident. Moggy's act puts the whole gang into debt, forcing the team to scramble for money to recoup the loss. A rift soon develops among the team members: Moggy stops skating, Hanju and Gapba want to leave as well, and even the once-eager Soyo starts to lose interest. Can the team pull it together or is their friendship doomed to failure?


This movie, even though Kim Kang Woo and Cheon Jeong Myeong were credited for awards for best new actors, was quite tame and a bit boring to me.

I do realize that the relationships of the boys and the actions they took paralleled So-yo's life and how his parents dealt with him. The movie didn't delve into why So-yo's parents were in debt but leaving there son behind, they did, to escape creditors. Alone, So-yo immerses himself into inline skating.

The harsh realities of being alone, responsibilities, and friendships takes there toll on So-yo.

The move, to me, could have been a little bit more of something. I felt there wasn't enough time to execute what needed to be said but instead the creators of the movie were more into shooting skating scenes (which were cool) but left the story dangling.

This movie could have been great. Instead it was just an "okay".

Cheong Jeong Myeong


Lee Cheon Hee


Kim Kang Woo