Words by Ren Zelen (@renzelen)
Yeogo Goedam/ Whispering Corridors (1998)
Directed by Ki-hyung Park
Whispering Corridors should be placed in the genre of films
encompassing the horrors of school, along with Suspiria and
Carrie (1976). School corridors are rife with rear and loathing,
often due to a teacher who insists on pupils treating each other as enemies
and competitors rather than allies. The Korean educational system is notorious
for its toughness, and this movie’s critique of bullying authoritarianism
touched a nerve with Korean audiences.
One of the films that prompted the late-'90s East Asian horror boom,
Whispering Corridors was a huge domestic success and spawned
several imitations such as Wishing Stairs (2003), which mixes
its story of backstage rivalry at a ballet school with a legend about a spirit
who grants wishes when invoked on the 29th step of a staircase, and
Voice (2005), about the ghost of a murdered singer.
Park’s Whispering Corridors however, benefits as much from his
focus on complex and psychologically plausible relationships between its
troubled teens as it does on delivering its gory set pieces and shocks.
Pon\ Phone (2002)
Directed by Byung-ki Ahn
Having received death threats after uncovering an underage sex scandal, Seoul
journalist Ji-won hides out in an empty house owned by her best friend Ho-jung
and her husband Chang-hoon. She has disposed of her old phone, but now begins
to receive indistinct but disturbing calls on her refurbished but as yet
unregistered, mobile phone.
Her friend Ho-jung’s five-year-old daughter Yung-yu, unwittingly answers one
of these calls, and begins to display oddly psychotic behaviour – flying into
uncontrollable rages and accosting her father like a petulant and flirtatious
woman. Ji-won discovers that her phone once belonged to a schoolgirl who
committed suicide.
With a female investigative journalist as the protagonist and a plot centering
on the effects of haunted technology, Ahn’s film has swift pacing and a
satisfying plotline involving infidelity, obsession, family relationships, sex
and murder. It also boasts good performances, particularly by the
extraordinary Seo-woo Eun as the possessed five-year-old Yung-yu.
Phone was supported by the Disney subsidiary Buena Vista Korea,
initiating a new alliance between eastern and western markets that has been
evident ever since.
Janghwa, Hongryeon\ A Tale of Two Sisters (2003)
Directed by Ji-woon Kim
From its eerie opening credits – indistinct ripples ebbing over green
wallpaper - to the plot twists and revelations at its climax,
A Tale of Two Sisters is worthy of admission to the ranks of the
best psychological horrors with greats such as The Innocents or
The Others.
The storytelling is masterful in its construction, and the family home where
the claustrophobic drama is played out is deeply atmospheric, with a kind of
creeping Gothicism that enables deep shadow to drain warmth and light from the
interiors, unnerving us with a dense assemblage of glass, wood, carpet and
dark, William Morris wallpaper.
Ji-woon Kim’s film combines fairy-tale elements (wicked stepmother, haunted
closet, old dark house) with incisive psychoanalytical insight into the human
tragedy of loss, guilt, loneliness and frailty.
There is no lack of well-orchestrated shocks to compound the viewer’s
disorientation, but the movie also contains aesthetically pleasing visuals
contrasted with an atmosphere profoundly foreboding, fulfilling Ji-woon Kim’s
asserted ambition of making a horror movie which is ‘both beautiful and
terrifying’.
Old Boy (2003)
Directed by Chan-wook Park
This movie probably needs the least introduction, as even movie fans who have
not yet dabbled in the dark worlds of Asian horror are aware of its
cult-classic status.
The great Min-sik Choi, a Korean star since the movie Shiri in
1999, plays Dae-su, an ordinary working man who is inexplicably abducted and
held prisoner for 15 years. He learns from the TV in his hotel-room prison
that his wife has been murdered and he is the lead suspect.
Just as inexplicably, he is suddenly released. He begins a relationship with a
young sushi chef, Mi-do, and gets a call from a man claiming responsibility
for his incarceration and telling him that he has five days to solve the
mystery or Mi-do will also be executed.
Dae–su finds the location of his erstwhile prison and exacts violent
retribution on his captors. As he begins to unravel the full extent of the
conundrum he discovers the terrible reality of his predicament, and is driven
to the brink of insanity and despair.
Min-sik Choi has made the leading role in Old Boy his own (as
demonstrated by the disastrous flop of the American remake starring Josh
Brolin). With his shock of frizzy hair, desolate countenance and wounded gaze,
Min-sik Choi was the embodiment of the existential pain at the core of Park’s
tragic horror-thriller. As with all of the protagonists in Chan-wook Park’s
infamous ‘Vengeance trilogy’ of films, Dae-su's obsessive quest leads him
further into darkness, but because of Choi’s extraordinary performance, we
never lose sight of the humanity in a character so mercilessly goaded into
violence.
Each of Park’s ‘Vengeance Trilogy’ movies is constructed in the style of a
Jacobean Tragedy in which violence, madness and death consume the antagonists.
Old Boy in particular, is told with tremendous cinematic style.
His flair for the grotesque is tempered by a striking sense of visual
composition and design. Park’s work has heavily influenced western directors
such as Quentin Tarantino, an ardent fan, but his particular touch allows for
the pathos of the human condition to emerge even in its darkest moments, and
we are sometimes encouraged to find ‘sympathy for the devil’.
Unmissable.
Gwoemul\ The Host (2006)
Directed by Joon-ho Bong
The Han River, which runs through Seoul, is polluted by toxic chemicals poured
in on the orders of a corrupt American scientist. Several years later, a
gigantic mutated monster emerges from the water and begins wreaking havoc. The
US military want to quarantine the public, believing there may be some kind of
virus present.
Gang-Du (played by Korean star Kang-ho Song), a slovenly kiosk attendant,
finds hidden resources of courage as he marshals together his odd family to
the rescue of his daughter, who has been taken by the creature and stored in
its lair. Meanwhile, mass demonstrations take place against US military plans
to release an anti-viral chemical called ‘Agent Yellow’.
The pleasure of The Host lies in its satisfying combination of
effects-driven destruction and carnage that one might expect from a monster
movie, married with a touching portrayal of a crazy and dysfunctional family
rallying together in the face of adversity. This is no syrupy celebration of
family values – the Park family’s constant bickering is played with a
slapstick sense of humour accompanied by a storyline which highlights danger,
self-sacrifice and the tragedy of loss.
Ultimately though, a monster movie stands or fails on the strength and
originality of its ‘creature’, and in this aspect, Joon-ho Bong’s film does
not disappoint.
Also recommended:
Acacia (2003) directed by Ki-hyung Park
Seam\ The Isle (2000) directed by Ki-duk Kim
Help support The Movie Waffler by sharing this post