Korean Mart Chronicles is a film about four single guys who are roommates, living together in the same apartment. It takes it's title from the fact that the grocery / convenience stores closest to their home are run by Koreans, and they've dubbed them the "Korean Marts", what you and I might call the convenience store or the small corner grocer, but with an ethnic twist.

Early on we learn that one of the guys has been fired from his job, another is always looking for someone to play tennis with, yet another seems to be kind of a "party animal, alpha dog" type and last but not least a large guy with a bent toward comedy, but who we seriously doubt would ever be any competition for John Candy, even were he still alive.

Korean Mart Chronicles is less a coherent feature film than a series of skits revolving around the same four guys. There are quite a few skits (or scenes, depending on your point of view). Some of the highlights include: William almost shooting Darren (in a case of mistaken identity, of course) when Darren returns early from vacation; mixing "off-the-shelf foods" and Surge soda to make an LSD-type hallucinogenic drug, with all the accompanying chaos and madcap activity that occurs therewith - including one of the guys hallucinating that one of his buddies is a beautiful girl and the two of them making out momentarily... ; one where Darren turns out to be a "demigod" with special powers - it probably looked good on paper, but it doesn't come off very well in the film; and some scenes in Hawaii where, inexplicably, the filmmakers chose to turn the camera primarily on hotel signs and a few assorted beach screens and even hotel room interior shots rather than take advantage of the breathtaking natural beauty at their disposal...

Korean Mart Chronicles is letterboxed - for the most part. There are times when the letterboxing briefly disappears and you're never quite sure whether that was done on purpose for some reason? - but we doubt it. The sound is well done in some places, but barely audible in others. In fact, the best word to describe the sound is: uneven. I found myself frequently adjusting the volume. Now one might think that during critical "hard" and "soft" moments, the volume would of course rise and fall, but there seemed to be little or no rhyme or reason for these uneven sound levels... and how they got clearance for some of the incredible music included in the movie from megahit bands, I'll never know. A friend in the business?

There is quite a bit of real and imagined violence in this film, along with belching, cursing and a fair amount of gross-out style humor. If this film were rated it would get an "R" for the language, although some of it is partially "bleeped" out. I didn't understand the logic of partially bleeping out the F-word in some places and using it in others? I'm not being prudish about the language, but it didn't seem to serve any real purpose except in the "tennis scene" where Matthew is a cardboard cutout. There, it seemed to be used as some kind of adolescent humor, complete with bleeps, as if merely cursing long and loudly enough was supposed to be funny. I suppose it may have been -- for about five minutes in high school when you were stoned. It's not funny here - neither is the cardboard cutout bit. In short, lots of scenes that only an inebriated male college student - and maybe a headbanger or two - could love.

That's not to say that the film is wholly without merit. There is some good technical work in places. There is obviously an effort made toward some kind of setup and continuity, and a few of the scenes are actually entertaining: the "Pepsi I Love You" was pretty amusing and the spoof of sitcoms was interesting and entertaining in its way.

Perhaps a line from the trailer for this film says it best: "Of all the films that have ever been made, this is one of them - just barely."

Korean Mart Chronicles (1999, Adudathuda Studios) (out of 4)
written and directed by, and starring:
William Koenig, Darren T. Mangler, Matthew Senko, and Mike Walsh
featuring:
Shannon Muchow and Carolyn Miller

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