Month: August 2026

In 2019, the black comedy film Parasite broke through language barriers to elevate the global footprint of South Korean cinema. The film amassed unprecedented viewership, grossing over $263 million worldwide. It made history by becoming the first foreign-language film to win an Academy Award for Best Picture.

However, South Korea has been producing elite quality film even before Parasite‘s groundbreaking success. In 2016, director Kim Jee-Woon created a spy thriller that is now considered one of the best in its genre.

The Age of Shadows is set in 1920’s Korea during the Japanese occupation. The plot follows Lee Jung-chool (played by Song Kang-ho), a Korean-born Japanese police officer. He is tasked to hunt down the leader of the Korean resistance fighters, Kim Woo-jin (played by Gong Yoo), as they smuggle explosives to help their cause.

Lee and Kim engage in an intense game of cat-and-mouse, which climaxes in a ruthless battle during a train ride to Seoul.

The Age of Shadows Named the ‘Best Spy Movie’ by Rotten Tomatoes

The Age of Shadows reigns supreme in Rotten Tomatoes’ list of the best spy movies ever made. It is ranked No. 1, topping the likes of 007: Goldfinger and Mission: Impossible– Fallout, which are second and third, respectively.

The Age of Shadows is the only film on the list that earned a perfect 100% Tomatometer score on the renowned movie review wesbite.

“The Age of Shadows justifies its imposing length with a richly detailed period drama whose sprawling size is matched by strong acting, impressive craft, and narrative depth,” the Critics’ Consensus read.

Related: 2009 War Epic Named One of the Most ‘Perfectly Directed’ Action Films

One of the greatest crime movies of all time changed how Hollywood operated forever.

The idea for 1967’s Bonnie and Clyde began in the early 1960s when two Esquire writers, Robert Benton and David Newman, came across a book called “The Dillinger Days” by John Toland. After completing their draft of the script, Benton and Newman tried unsuccessfully to land legendary French director Francois Truffaut, who turned down the film due to prior commitments.

He sent the script to Jean-Luc Godard, who also turned down the film before Truffaut was later attached to direct. Turner Classic Movies claimed “no Hollywood studio was interested in funding an American gangster film directed by a Frenchman who could barely speak English.”

Eventually, Warren Beaty got his hands on the script and produced and starred in the film while taking just a $200,000 salary – but a 40% cut of the film’s box office. Following the surprise success of the film, Hollywood production companies tightened the reigns on contracts.

‘Bonnie and Clyde’ Ranked Among Greatest Crime Movies of All Time

Collider ranked Bonnie and Clyde as the No. 10 crime movie of all time.

“The American film industry started to get more radical in the 1960s (an undeniably great decade for cinema, it has to be said), with the movement away from the Hays Code and towards auteur filmmaking ultimately giving birth to the New Hollywood movement in the 1970s. And one film that’s always mentioned as being instrumental in ushering in that era is 1967’s Bonnie and Clyde,” Collider wrote.

“Bonnie and Clyde is a stylish depiction of its titular duo’s exploits during the Great Depression, with the two falling in love and pursuing a restless life of crime, mainly through various bank robberies. For its time, Bonnie and Clyde was a shockingly violent and jarringly edited movie, but it helped redefine what the American film industry was capable of producing, and helped audiences get acclimated to a higher level of violence and more morally complex characters.”

Bonnie and Clyde also ranked No. 42 on the American Films Institutes list of the 100 greatest films of all time. It owns a strong 91% from critics on Rotten Tomatoes while audiences give the film an 88%.

The film was nominated for 10 Academy Awards and won for Best Supporting Actress (Estelle Parsons) and Best Cinematography (Burnett Guffey).

Related: 1972 Robert Redford Classic, Turned Down by Clint Eastwood, Named One of the Greatest Westerns of All Time