Movie · 2011 · Drama, Action, History, War · 2h 17m · R · Korean
Curator score: 0.3/10 (13.8K ratings)
They met as enemies, but fate brought them together.
Overview
During the invasion of Normandy the photograph of a slim Korean man in German uniform was found. It transpired that the man had served as a soldier in the Japanese, Russian and German armies. His incredible story inspired director Kang Je-Gyu to create this epic war drama.
Ratings
Curator score: 0.3/10
IMDb: 7.6/10
Rotten Tomatoes: 21%
Metacritic: 30
TMDB: 7.9/10
Director
Kang Je-kyu
Production
CJ Entertainment, Directors, SK Planet
Cast
Jang Dong-gun, Joe Odagiri, Fan Bingbing, Kim In-kwon, Lee Yeon-hee, Kim Hie-won, Oh Tae-kyung, Kwak Jung-wook, Kim Si-hoo, Cheon Ho-jin, Taro Yamamoto, Manabu Hamada, Shingo Tsurumi, Isao Natsuyagi, Shiro Sano, Kumi Nakamura, Kim In-woo, Do Ji-han, Yūkichi Kobayashi, Go Ju-yeon
Where to watch
Amazon Prime Video, AsianCrush, Hi-YAH, Midnight Pulp, Amazon Prime Video with Ads
Curator Review
Verdict
A big, bruising war epic with strong spectacle, a compelling premise, and a memorable cross-national friendship/rivalry at its center. It can be emotionally effective and visually forceful, but the melodrama, uneven pacing, and heavy-handed style keep it from fully landing for everyone.
Best for
viewers who like large-scale war dramas
fans of brutal battlefield spectacle
audiences interested in lesser-told Asian WWII perspectives
people who enjoy melodramatic historical epics
Skip if
you want a tightly disciplined war film
you dislike heightened sentiment and broad emotional beats
you prefer historically exact storytelling
you are sensitive to graphic combat and POW abuse
Overview
My Way is an ambitious, often gripping war epic built around an extraordinary premise: a Korean man swept through multiple armies during World War II. That setup gives the film a fresh angle on the war genre, especially by shifting perspective away from the usual Western-centered battlefield narratives.
Worth noting
The movie works best when it leans into scale, chaos, and the grim absurdity of survival under shifting regimes. The running motif and the forced rivalry/friendship at its core give it a human spine, even if the film sometimes pushes too hard for emotional impact.
Bottom line
Its weaknesses are familiar to big historical melodramas: uneven pacing, overstatement, and a tendency to hammer home every feeling with maximum force. Still, for viewers open to a rough-edged, emotionally blunt war saga, it delivers enough intensity and invention to be worth a look.
Top Letterboxd reviews
Adrian Oli (4★) · 31 likes
Director Kang Je-kyu made three memorable korean war film one is Tae Guk Gi: The Brotherhood of War, another is Shiri and this one My Way. All of them prove his direction quality. My Way is an epic war film inspired by a true story regarding world war two and focused on an unconventional friendship story but im not sure how much of this is true. Especially Joe Odagiri's role as Japanese colonel felt a bit degraded toward the second… more Director Kang Je-kyu made three memorable korean war film one is Tae Guk Gi: The Brotherhood of War, another is Shiri and this one My Way. All of them prove his direction quality. My Way is an epic war film inspired by a true story regarding world war two and focused on an unconventional friendship story but im not sure how much of this is true. Especially Joe Odagiri's role as Japanese colonel felt a bit degraded toward the second… more
Geoffrey Broomer (3★) · 28 likes
The story of Yang Kyoungjong forms the loose bases for Kang Je-gyu's follow-up to his blockbuster Korean War hit, Taegukgi (2004). Childhood athletic rivals turned bitter enemies - one Korean (Jang Dong-gun) the other Japanese (Joe Odagiri) - find themselves forced into a series of armies during the second World War. The competitive running portion of the film is compelling but sadly used as bookends for the war. The bulk of My Way is POW degradation scenes and graphic combat,… more The story of Yang Kyoungjong forms the loose bases for Kang Je-gyu's follow-up to his blockbuster Korean War hit, Taegukgi (2004). Childhood athletic rivals turned bitter enemies - one Korean (Jang Dong-gun) the other Japanese (Joe Odagiri) - find themselves forced into a series of armies during the second World War. The competitive running portion of the film is compelling but sadly used as bookends for the war. The bulk of My Way is POW degradation scenes and graphic combat,… more
BilboBallin (5★) · 27 likes
a legendary war epic masterpiece
bar none one of the best films to come out of Korea in the 10s
seeing world war ii from the side opposite of the western victors is endlessly refreshing
beginning to end it's a thrilling, brutal, and robust story
Mr. DuLac (4.5★) · 20 likes
Think we can run home from here?-Tatsuo Hasegawa
I thought that Kang Je-kyu's 2004 Korean War film Tae Guk Gi was a major accomplishment and questioned why the director would follow that up with another war film. The simple answer I think, is that it's a story that demanded to be told so that the rest of the world might understand how Korea was involved in World War II and what some Koreans went through.
The story is "inspired… more