If
Hollywood remakes this Korean thriller, there will be a temptation to call it “Habeas
Corpus.” In this case, the National Forensic Service had the body of
industrialist Yoon Seol-hee and then lost it. Basket case copper Woo Joong-sik
assumes someone stole it, but there are suggestions of something even more
sinister afoot in Lee Chang-hee’s The
Vanished (trailer
here),
which screened during the 2018 Fantasia International Film Festival.
Yoon’s
body disappeared during a brief blackout, when the night watchman was also
knocked out cold. The slovenly, booze-smelling Woo will lead the investigation.
That ought to be good news for the prime suspect, Park Jin-han, Yoon’s
prenupped, trophy husband, but Woo doesn’t have much left to lose. When he
starts uncovering circumstantial and physical evidence linking Park to his wife’s
murder, he defies orders from above to release his suspect.
In
fact, Park did indeed do it—or so he thought. He conspired with his lover
Hye-jin to kill Yoon with one of her company’s own experimental drugs. However,
the mysterious calls and texts they both start to receive makes him suspect
Yoon was playing him all along. Or maybe option C.
Strictly
speaking, Vanished is not a horror
movie, but Lee definitely serves up plenty of atmosphere and general foreboding,
along with a dark and stormy setting. Throughout most of the film, he plays it
coy regarding Yoon’s disappearance, but when the truth comes out, it is rather
sly.
Kim
Sang-kyung is an absolute fount of entertainment as the rumpled and grizzled
Woo, like a bitter, half-drunk Colombo. Kim Kang-woo is all kinds of despicable
as Park, but he makes viewers feel for him a little (in spite of ourselves),
when his world really starts to implode. Of course, he withers next to Kim
Hee-ae, who truly channels her inner Bette Davis as Yoon. As an added bonus,
Kim Ji-young lends the film some presence and authority as Dr. Cha of the
forensic agency.
