Yeon Sang-ho’s Colony

These are zombies for the age of wokeness, because they literally practice group think. Of course, just like the DSA, the hive mind is not truly based on equality. They have no free will, individual or collective, because they are being controlled by an evil genius. However, these zombies are also old school, in that they hang out in the mall. To get out of quarantine, Dr. Kwon Se-jeong must find the responsible mastermind in Yeon Sang-ho’s Colony, which opens today in theaters.

Dr. Kwon’s worrywart ex-husband Han Gyu-seong dragged her to a Chains Bio media event, so they (but primarily he) could beg for a job for her. While he lacks her passionate integrity, Han worries about her, so he wants to leave her in a secure position, before departing indefinitely for America. Then the zombie outbreak explodes.

It was all Seo Young-cheol’s fault, as he himself gloats to the 911-equivelant operator. The founder of Chains fired Seo for the increasing ethical sketchiness of his research, which took an even sketchier turn after his dismissal. As payback, Seo pumps his old boss full of zombie virus and himself full of the only existing vaccine. Consequently, Kwon and her ragtag group of survivors, including Choi Hyun-seok, a security guard in the Columbus Circle-like mall underneath Chain headquarters, and his wheelchair-employing IT-speecialiist sister Choi Hyun-hee, must capture Seo and hand him over to the police to escape zombie ground zero.

Frankly, Seo is creepier than the zombies, but that is not a bad thing. Although Yeon is best known for the Train to Busan trilogy, which started with the animated Seoul Station and concluded (at least for now) with Peninsula, these are very different zombies, rampaging in a completely separate narrative continuity. They are much more resourceful, because they are literally wired together into Seo’s head. However, the methods Kwon devises to foil their hive consciousness are consistently clever. Consequently, Colony could be the most satisfying zombie film since Anna and the Apocalypse.

Yeon fully capitalizes on the upscale mall setting (think Coach rather than JC Penney), without prompting unflattering comparisons to George Romero’s classic Dawn of the Dead. This is a punchy, fast-paced zombie thrill-ride that arguably better incorporates the hive and swarm themes than any previous insect horror movie, including Phase IV.

Ghost Train, on BluRay

It only seems logical that you should have have a “ghost train” to go with a “ghost station.” Now Well Go USA has both. Jeong Yong-ki’s The Ghost Station explicitly set its hauntings in notorious Oksu Station, which has become the epicenter of urban legends thanks to a hit web comic. This film takes place in Gwanglim Station, but it is clearly inspired by Oksu and Japan’s Kisaragi Station, the granddaddy of all haunted metro stops. Regardless, commuters would be better off taking the bus in Tak Se-woong’s Ghost Train, which releases today on BluRay.

Da-kyoung, a.k.a. “The Horror Queen” is n influencer without influence, who works for a sad Gawker-Vice-style YouTube network, trying to bring home the eyeballs. Unfortunately, clicks are down, so Gwanglim Station might be her last hurrah. However, premium booze has a knack for loosening the Station Master’s tongue. Thanks to his stories, her views start climbing. They also give the film an anthology vibe, because they seem relatively self-contained and thematically diverse. (It is also hard to see how he would know some of these things, but who wants to be pedantic, right?)

In any event, bad stuff happens down there. Eventually, an informant tells Da-kyoung the station was built on top of a cult church, where the members committed mass suicide to grant their leader immortality. That is creepy element that helps distinguish Train from Station.

Frankly, the two films are quite evenly matched in most ways. Joo Hyun-young’s performance as Da-kyoung is generally on par with everyone appearing in Ghost Station. However, Jeon Bae-soo eventually takes over the film, to its advantage, in a very strange and memorable way as the world-weary Station Master.

Omniscient Reader: The Prophecy

Real fans often wish they could re-write the endings for their favorite franchises, especially since Disney has acquired so many big-name properties (to promptly ruin). However, Kim Dok-ja can’t blame the Mouse House. They would never touch IP like his favorite web-novel, because its readership had diminished to a single follower: Kim. That certainly gives him the right to complain. When he sends angry feedback, the mysterious author challenges him to write his own ending. However, he must do so IRL, when reality starts to parallel the opening of the web-novel in Kim Byung-woo’s Omniscient Reader: The Prophecy, based on Sing Shong’s Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint web-novel, which releases today on VOD in the UK.

In Kim’s longtime favorite web-novel Three Ways to Survive the Apocalypse, an impish dokkaebi announces to the hero’s subway car, the Constellations are angry with humanity, so they decided to plunge Earth into planet-wide survival game to punish our wickedness. To survive the first challenge, everyone must take a life.

Knowing the secret behind each game, Kim devises a workaround killing ants in a boy’s ant farm. Of course, some of his commuters would rather earn their points the “honest way.” Nevertheless, many survivors quickly recognize Kim’s strategic advantage in the game, including his former work colleague, Yoo Sang-ah. Kim also tries to save several of his favorite characters, whom he believed died too soon in the web-novel, including righteous but guilt-ridden soldier Lee Hyun-sung, and Jung Hee-won, who was driven to punish predators who took advantage of the game’s chaos for their own sadistic pleasure.

The source web-novel ran for five multi-chapter volumes plus an extended epilogue that sounds like a separate volume in its own right, so not surprisingly, the first film never gets close to explaining why real-life is suddenly paralleling the apocalyptic events Kim Dok-ja already read about.

The concept is intriguing, but the quality of the CGI effects varies drastically. Yet, ironically, viewers unfamiliar with the source material might best enjoy the high campiness of the film’s cheesier indulgences. Kim Byung-woo takes big swings—that’s for sure.

Handsome Guys, on Delta

They might not look like it, but Kang Jae-pil and Park Sang-goo have cousins in West Virginia. Their names are Tucker and Dale, who once fought evil. Kang and Park are in for a similar bout of misunderstandings, but they must also battle a genuine demonic force in Nam Dong-hyup’s Handsome Guys, a Korean remake of Eli Craig’s Tucker & Dale vs. Evil, which is currently available on Delta’s in-flight entertainment system.

Kang and Park are shy, luckless losers, who have bought a remote cabin to enjoy the “rustic life.” Unfortunately, their new home was the scene of a half-successful exorcism sixty-six years and six months ago—so, obviously it is getting to be about that time again.

Unbeknownst to hard-working Kim Mi-na, her not-really-friend Bo-ra invited her on a weekend getaway just so her pro-golfer pal Lee Jung-bin could take advantage of her. Naturally, Lee and his entitled friends look upon Kang and Park like the backwoods boys in Deliverance. Consequently, when the “Handsome Guys” save Kim from drowning, they assume she was kidnapped. Ordinarily, Lee wouldn’t care, but Kim accidentally walked off with his phone, which is loaded with highly incriminating photos and video.

As Bo-ra and the cads try to “rescue” Kim, they meet a series of unlikely but fatal Final Destination-style mishaps. However, in Nam’s remake, death isn’t the end for them. As sacrifices to Baphomet, they become his demonic vessels.

The supernatural elements are entirely new to Handsome Guys. Even though they add a dumpster truckload of additional lunacy, the new material really makes the concept work better. Having a hidden hand behind all the fatal misadventures gives a greater degree of “logic,” to use that word extremely loosely. Arguably, there it also invests the film with a greater sense of morality.

The Villagers, Starring Don Lee

Yuk Ki-chul came to the provincial town to be a P.E. teacher, but he will end up teaching the adults a few lessons in ethics, civics, and criminal justice. He is also supposed to collect past due school fees, but actually helping missing students is supposedly outside his job description. Of course, Yuk does not see it that way in director-screenwriter Lim Jin-soon’s The Villagers (a.k.a. Ordinary People), which releases today on VOD.

Yuk is a big guy, but he often feels like a small fry. His new P.E. gig was the only job he could get, after getting blackballed for publicly calling out corruption in the youth judo league—and it still required a kickback. Regardless, everyone at school is quite nasty, except maybe Kang Yoo-jin. She is earnest kid, who is trying to get the police, or anyone else, to investigate the disappearance of her friend. However, she instinctively distrusts Yuk, because he is yet another adult.

In this film, the grownups really are a bad lot. The teachers and administrators only care about school fees, the local hostess club traffics young women, with the protection of the local political bigwig, Kim Ki-tae, and the cops are all corrupt and smell of booze. Yuk hopes that doesn’t also include his old friend, Kim Dong-soo, who is still just a timid, conflict-averse patrolman, under the best-case scenario.

Obviously, Don Lee (Ma Dong-seok) is a big guy, but he is surprisingly human in this early star-vehicle (from 2018) that is only now getting an American release. This time around, he bleeds like the rest of us and needs a realistic amount of time to bash his way through doors. In fact, he even shows vulnerability as sheepish Yuk. Yet, he always shows massive screen presence.

Lee also develops a nice halting rapport with former child-thesp sensation Kim Sae-ron, who broke out in the box-office hit, The Man from Nowhere, but died under tragic circumstances this year, before her 25^th birthday. She plays the imperiled teen with a melancholy that is quite effective—and rather haunting, in light of her sad fate.

Yeon Sang-ho’s The Ugly

If you thought your old nickname was bad, keep in mind Lim Dong-hwan’s late mother had it much worse. Her factory co-workers called her “Dung Ogre.” No, nothing was lost in the translation. Sadly, she disappeared while he was still an infant, so he never knew his mother. He had never even seen her, since she apparently left behind no pictures. Obviously, he cannot really blame his blind father Lim Yeong-gyu for not taking any. However, Kim understandably wonders if she truly deserved the cruel taunts and epithets she endured when her murdered body is finally discovered in Yeon Sang-ho’s The Ugly, which opens today in New York.

For as long as Lim can remember, his blind father took care of him, so now the son returns the favor. When he was little, his father was desperately poor, but they persevered. Now, the older Lim enjoys as small degree of fame, as the blind engraver, who produces such laser-sharp stamps. Nevertheless, he dd not even recognize Jung Young-hee’s name when the police call.

As it happens, a TV camera happens to be there when the younger Lim receives the news. Smelling a bigger story than her initial feel-good profile, the producer, Han Su-jin, arranges for him to meet several of his mother’s former co-workers incognito, to learn about her life and potentially identify suspects in her murder. The pattern of bullying is truly disturbing, as are the reports of sexual assault committed by her sleazy boss.

This is a painfully dark film that could leave a mark on your soul. In terms of themes and tone, it is much closer to Yeon’s moody animated films, like King of Pigs than his Train to Busan zombie films. In many ways, it is as spirit-crushing as Tetsuya Nakashima’s Memories of Matsuko. Frankly, both films should be banned from streaming platforms on Mother’s Days, because they could very easily drive vulnerable viewers to suicide.

Indeed, Yeon puts the audience through the wringer and he probably should have had on-set counseling for his cast. That might have been particularly true for Park Jeong-min, who goes to some very dark places as the increasingly outraged Lim son and his flawed father, Yeong-gyu, in his younger, flashback years.

The Hidden Face: The Korean Remake

Andres Baiz’s Spanish film, The Hidden Face, is starting to generate as many international remakes as Oirol Paulo’s The Invisible Guest. At least many of the subsequent Hidden Faces have tried to put their own spin on the dark psychological themes. That is particularly true of the new Korean remake. The love triangle relationship-dynamics get especially torturous in Kim Dae-woo’s The Hidden Face, which releases this Tuesday on digital.

Seong-jin might direct the orchestra, but his fiancée, cellist Soo-yeon, calls the shots, along with her mother, the executive director, Hye-yeon. Everyday brings new emasculations, until Soo-yeon impulsively flies off to Europe. At least that is what she told him in the video she left behind.

Weirdly, there has been no sign of her since then—no calls, no credit card usage. Despite her imperiousness, Hye-yeon starts to worry. Nevertheless, she agrees Seong-jin should find a temp replacement for her. Conveniently, Soo-yeon also left behind a recommendation for Mi-joo. Years ago, they both studied cello together in the very same house Soo-yeon just bought, to live with Seong-jin. At the time, Mi-joo and her were quite close.

It turns out she and Seong-jin are also quite compatible. They both share a fondness for the melancholy of Schubert (much like Martin Landau in Crimes and Misdemeanors). Pretty soon, Seong-jin commences something like an affair with Mi-joo, even though he still presumes Soo-yeon abandoned him. Instead, Mi-joo locked her in the secret bunker behind the walls, where she can see everything through the one-way mirrors, but she cannot be heard through the thick glass and steel.

The game-playing in this Hidden Face is even more morally bent than it sounds. Frankly, it is a sign of progress that the film has not provoked boycott-fury from the various professionally outraged alphabet groups for the way it depicts certain sexual identities. Happily, we can all just relax and enjoy its perverse, twisted soul. This is indeed a twisty and twisted film, but it will definitely surprise viewers, perhaps even those who have seen the previous Hidden Faces.

Scary Movies XIII: Noise

It is a lot easier to close your eyes than to close your ears. Ironically, in this case, Joo-young’s hearing aid finally represents an advantage. She has so much underdog cred (working a blue-collar factory job, with her hearing impairment), Joo-young looks like a natural “final girl” candidate. Regardless, finding her semi-estranged sister will be her primary goal in Kim Soo-jin’s Noise, which screens tonight as part of Scary Movies XIII.

Joo-young briefly lived with Joo-hee, but she tired of her sibling’s erratic behavior, so she moved out—right before things really got weird. According to the cops, Joo-hee has been missing for weeks. Yet, as soon as Joo-young moves back in, the crazy neighbor below complains of the constant noise coming from their empty apartment. This noise-rage taps into reportedly common Korean complaints, stemming from high population density and cheap concrete construction. Such inter-building noise is less of an issue here in New York. That’s why we love our “pre-war” buildings.

Indeed, the brutalist apartment complex is rife with weird, disconcerting noises. Even Joo-young can hear them when her hearing aid is turned on. Joo-hee’s boyfriend, Ki-hoon, does not have that option, but he doesn’t understand the degree of the audio distortion he will have to contend with when he offers to help Joo-young find her sister.

Rather cleverly, the FSLC paired Noise with the similarly audio-themed Rabbit Trap for their press screenings, but the public screenings fell on different days. Maybe that is just as well, because the two films together constitute an exhausting sensory overload. However, that also means both sound teams did some incredibly potent work.

Kim also cleverly capitalizes on Joo-young’s reliance on voice recognition apps and her on-and-off hearing aid to cleverly build suspense. Yet, despite a vibe and style clearly inspired by classic J-horror and K-horror, screenwriter Lee Je-hui maintains a coyness whether the film is supernatural horror, or a devious murder mystery of human origins and design. Either way, there are some deeply unnerving moments, thanks in large measure to the sinister sound.

The Old Woman with the Knife

She is the sort of greybeard you might work with at your company who knows where all the bodies are buried. In her case, it is because she killed them. It is all part of the job when you work for an assassination firm. The founder used to refer to their work as “pest control,” but the new management takes a more mercenary approach. Their clash of corporate cultures turns deadly in Min Kyu-dong’s The Old Woman and the Knife, which opens this Friday in theaters.

Ryu was a hired killer, but he had a keen sense of right and wrong. He and his wife took the woman he would dub “Nails,” which eventually evolved into “Hornclaw,” into their home when they found her near-dead on the street. He subsequently inducted her into his real business when—in self-defense—she shows an aptitude for it.

Over the years, Hornclaw became a folk legend among assassins, even after her mentor’s spectacularly bloody demise. She is still active, but the assignments aren’t what they used to be. From what she can see, the firm now mostly passes on the cases she and Ryu specialized in, opting for better paying but more ethically questionable gigs.

Unfortunately, Hornclaw’s age starts to catch up with her—almost fatally. Frankly, she would not have been a goner had Kang, a widower veterinarian, not taken the unconscious hit-lady back to his animal clinic for emergency treatment. In Hornclaw’s world, no good deed goes unpunished, especially if it leaves witnesses, but she is tired of compromising her principles. She is also already tired of “Bullfight” the reckless, borderline psychotic new assassin her boss recruited.

This is exactly the sort of nifty Korean thriller that Hollywood might option to remake, but would inevitably foul-up. Somehow, it manages to be simultaneously gritty and slick. Most of all, it is terrific showcase for veteran thesp Lee Hye-young as the Eastwoodesque Hornclaw. Her performance serves as a thoughtful contemplation on aging and all the bad karma that accrues over a lifetime.

Holy Night: Demon Hunters, Starring Don Lee

He is an exorcist who relies on his bare fists. When the devil needs a good butt-kicking, who you gonna call? Don Lee (Ma Dong-seok), that’s who. Technically, Bow’s associate Sharon does all the spiritual casting out of demons, but he is the one who holds off the hordes of satanic mortal followers. Frighteningly, business is brisk in Lim Dae-hee’s Holy Night: Demon Hunters, which opens Friday in theaters.

Ominously, the mortal “Worshippers” have recently sacrificed quite a few innocents under the direction of the shadowy “Archbishop.” Clearly, they are preparing something big. Bow fears it involves the unseen Joseph (seriously guys?), his fellow orphan, who was also “blessed” with elevated mojo, but gave himself over to the evil one.

Determined to avenge the nuns and orphans Joseph murdered, Bow dedicated his life to demon-fighting, with the help of his associates, Sharon and Kim Gun, two intended sacrifices he rescued. Sharon has the ability to operate on higher spiritual planes, but each exorcism takes a painful toll on her, physically and emotionally.

Young Eun-soo is an especially difficult case. She does not lack for good medical care, since her guardian older sister Jung-won is a neuro-psychiatrist. However, being a sensitive orphan makes Eun-soo particularly vulnerable to possession. In fact, the demon has dug in so deeply, Bow’s team must return to the scene of the crime, the sisters’ new home, where something very sinister is going on.

It could very well be that Lim and Lee learned an important lesson from Schwarzenegger’s only horror movie, End of Days. It is not a film that has a lot of haters, but by the same token, few really embraced it either. For his fans, it just doesn’t feel like a Schwarzenegger movie. In contrast, Holy Night is a Don Lee movie, through and through. We often see him hitting Worshippers so hard they literally fly through the air. He dishes out to the satanists like they are gangsters in his Beast Cop/Roundup franchise.

Yadang: The Snitch

Lee Kang-su is a broker who is about to go bust. He is not a M&A guy. He acts as a go-between negotiating cooperative agreements for criminals who agree to snitch. It turns out snitching is dangerous business, especially when you work with a ruthless opportunist like prosecutor Ku Gwan-hee. Conveniently, Ku has made other enemies who might help Lee take him down in Hwang Byeong-gug’s Yadang: The Snitch, which opens Friday in New York.

Initially, Lee was drugged by his passenger and left literally holding the bag (full of drugs). Ku could tell he was not a kingpin, so he recruited him to inform on the drug-trafficking gang operating out of his prison. It worked out so well, Ku convinces him to become a professional Yadang after his release. Lee is not a lawyer, but he can broker dodgy deals that might present ethical challenges for a halfway reputable attorney.

Of course, he always structures the deal so that Ku comes out on top. In the process, Ku regularly scoops up cases from honest Det. Oh Sang-jae (a.k.a. “The Jade Emperor”). That rarely serves the interests of justice, but it is great for Ku’s interests. When Jo Hun, the leading presidential candidate’s son is arrested during a major drug bust, Ku cuts lucrative deal to protect him, but he sacrifices Lee and Oh in the process. Unfortunately, that means Det. Oh cannot intercede on behalf of his source, Uhm Su-jin, a formerly rising starlet terrorized by Jo Hun.

During the subsequent months, Lee recovers from the serious injuries and meth dosing inflicted on him by Yeom, the drug lord they were supposed to bust. Oh defends himself in court against specious corruption charges, while Uhm’s career implodes. Consequently, they all want revenge against Ku, Yeom, and Jo Hun.

Evidently, Yadangs are a real thing in South Korea—a really sleazy thing. You could call The Wolf of Wall Street for Yadang “cooperation” brokers. It is also a cynical but consistently grabby payback thriller, thanks to the three co-lead performances. Kang Ha-neul is intriguingly slippery as Lee. It is a darkly complex portrayal that emphasizes his compromised nature, despite his innocent beginnings. Yoo Hae-jin (who often provides the schticky comic relief) gives one of his career-best performances as the calculating prosecutor. Park Hae-joon is also rock-solid as the driven Det. Oh.

In-Flight: Spring Garden

Chang-soo’s garden is nothing like the one Frances Hodgson Burnett described. Frankly, it really is not such a big plot point anyway. There is an evil influence that permeates the entire country house andsurrounding grounds So-hee inherited from her late husband. He secretly designed it to be her dream home, right down to the titular flower patch, but something went very wrong in Ku Born’s Korean horror film, Spring Garden, which is currently available on American Airlines international flights.

Tragically and inexplicably, Chang-soo committed suicide, with no apparent explanation. Naturally, his family blames So-hee, who was just as baffled. She is even more surprised to suddenly inherit her the fabulous country home he secretly designed for her, right down to the “Spring Garden.” However, bad things happen there, as viewers know from the prologue. Of course, the teenagers suffering from the terrible misadventure were also there with nasty intentions.

Eventually, So-hee starts connecting the dots between Chang-soo and the delinquents. However, In-kyeom is still way ahead of her. He is the creepy guy who always skulks around her house. He knows a lot about bad mojo. The question is whether he is fighting it or causing it—or maybe a little of both.

Admittedly, Spring Garden is a fairly convention K-horror film, but it has yet to have significant North American screenings, beyond its in-flight distribution (seriously, you never know what treasures you might find on American international flights). It was inspired by Neulbom Garden, which is allegedly one of Korea’s three most haunted locations (along with Gonjiam Asylum), but the circumstances of Baek Yool-seo’s narrative are very different than the reported Neulbom lore.

Devils Stay: A Really Dark Heart

There is no reason for this Korean horror movie to adversely affect organ donation. Donors face no risks (since they are dead already). Unfortunately, this recipient did not reject the heart from a demon-possessed girl. It turns out the invasive demon was transferred right along with it in Hyun Moon-sub’s Devils Stay, which releases tomorrow on VOD and home video.

Poor little Cha So-mi will be a nasty case of demon possession. Father Ban ought to know. He has experienced some bad ones, including his own. That is what motivated him to become an exorcist. He thought he had successfully cast out her demon, but just as the young girl started to calm, she suddenly died.

Her traditional three-day funeral will be particularly hard, because the demon still inside her body starts tormenting the mourners, especially her father, Cha Seung-do. He is also not inclined to accept anymore of Father Ban’s help, even though he is obviously in over his head. Even he will admit as much when he discovers he was set up by a mysterious satanic cultist, when he was cutting corners to arrange So-mi’s organ donor heart.

In fact, Devils Stay turns rather zeitgeisty when the shadowy satanist turns out to be Russian (in light of South Korea’s concern regarding North Korea supplying troops and arms to Russia, for their brutal war in Ukraine). The demonic particulars are also especially sinister.

Indeed, Devils Stay is an insidiously effective demonic horror film that bends (if not breaks) the template in several places. It is tense and scary—and good gosh, do we ever feel bad for the poor beleaguered Cha family.

Dark Nuns: from the World of “The Priests”

Catholic clergy are tough in general, but sometimes nuns are even fiercer than priests, as some Catholic school alumni’s knuckles might attest. In this case, Sister Giunia is far and away the most capable expeller of demons the Church currently has in Korea, but since she is not even ordained yet, she cannot perform exorcisms. Unfortunately, the priest currently treating a possessed little boy believes demonic control is a metaphor and possibly a sign of mental illness. Of course, he learns better through horrific experience in Kwon Hyeok-jae’s Dark Nuns, which releases this Friday in theaters.

Sister Giunia, originally known as Kang Sung-ae, learned all about exorcisms from Fathers Kim Bum-shin and Choi Joon-ho, the heroes of Jang Jae-hyun’s The Priests (and his short 12^th Assistant Deacon which it was expanded from). Consequently, she is considered kind of spooky, so some in the Church call her the “Dark Nun.” Regardless, two different priests completely botched the sanctioned exorcism of young Hee-joon. She stepped saving their necks (and most likely souls), but the demon retreated deep within the boy, biding its time, while imprisoning its host in a feverish, semi-conscious state.

Father Paolo, who is also a medical doctor, insists Hee-joon only needed aggressive drug therapy, but maybe it is too late, since the Church wasted so much time on hocus pocus. He points to Sister Michaela as an example of what he means, since he supposedly “cured” her of her visions when she was a teen. However, all the bad things that happen around the boy quickly convince Sister Michaela that Sister Guinia knows her demonic stuff.

Unfortunately, the Church refuses to sanction further exorcisms, so the nuns must turn to the Shamanistic community for back-up. Awkwardly, none of the fully trained shaman are available, because they have all been engaged to cleanse the karma of political candidates before the upcoming election. (It would be an understatement to describe Sister Giunia as unimpressed.)

Aside from the mixing of Catholic and shamanist forces, the plot points in Dark Nuns do not radically depart from many other demonic possession films. Nevertheless, the execution is tight, tense, and sometimes even terrifying. Arguably, the final twenty minutes or so constitute a masterclass in horror movie suspense.

Sister Giunia also emerges as quite a remarkable character, sort of like a cloistered Van Helsing, who happens to be doctrinally conservative yet spiritually flexible enough to wield tarot cards as a weapon and accept considerable elements of shamanism. She has seen horrors, that’s for sure, but Song Hye-kyo’s steely performance inspires considence.

Harbin: Anh Jung-geun’s Celebrated Mission

Harbin is the largest city in Northeastern China, but in the early 1900s, it was as Russian as Moscow. Back then, it was a major hub on the Russian-owned Chinese Eastern Railway, linking Vladivostok to Port Arthur. For the Korean resistance army, it was an advantageous area to operate, because the Imperial Japanese army had to respect the authority of the Russian government. For a future national hero in need of redemption, a Japanese state visit represents an opportunity to strike a blow for independence in Woo Min-ho’s Harbin, which opens Friday in theaters.

Anh Jung-geun fought and bled to liberate Korea. Unfortunately, as the film opens, he faces disgrace for allowing a potentially hard-fought victory to turn into a bitter defeat. The General learns the hard way that when your enemy offers to commit Seppuku, you ought to let him do so.   Instead, Anh showed Maj. Tatsuo Mori mercy, by disarming and releasing him under the current international laws of warfare. Mori repaid his kindness by wiping out Anh’s army with artillery.

Frankly, most of the resistance army’s ruling council consider Anh’s conduct foolish, bordering on outright treason. Yet, sufficient confidence remains in his loyalty to assign him a possibly game-changing mission that holds little chance of survival. Anh will lead a team tasked with assassinating Ito Hirobumi, the former Japanese Prime Minister and Resident General of Korea, who continues to act as the behind-the-scenes power broker, while he makes an official diplomatic visit to Harbin.

Yet, Anh’s misfortunes continue, when he is separated from traveling partners, Kim Sang-hyun (probably his staunchest defender) and Woo Deok-sun (his fiercest critic) on the train to Harbin. When they eventual reunite in the future Chinese Russian city, it will become clear one of them has been turned by Mori.

Compared to the similarly themed Assassination, Harbin is much more cerebral and considerably slower in pace. However, its intrigue definitely intrigues. In fact, Woo Min-ho and co-screenwriter Kim Min-seung address themes of mercy and redemption in a surprisingly thoughtful manner.

Still, Woo executes several warfighting scenes with brutal realism. In fact, the sight of Anh staggering along the Tumen River will likely become the defining image of Harbin, thanks to striking way cinematographer Hong Kyung-pyo frames these sequences. Nevertheless, Woo concentrates on recreating the paranoia and feelings of outraged impudence that tormented the underground resistance.

Hong Sang-soo’s A Traveler’s Needs

Hong Sang-soo’s films with French actress Isabelle Huppert have all arisen out of chance meetings and commenced without finished scripts. For their latest film, it really shows. Hong’s films are always lightweight, but this one could blow away with a gentle breeze. The film follows a French tutor, who like the director, somehow gets away with never preparing for her students in Hong’s A Traveler’s Needs, which just opened in additional cities.

Iris supposedly teaches French by prodding her students to rcall their deepest emotional memories and then translating them into French and recording them on audio cassettes for them to listen to. This way, their lessons will resonate for them, unlike that rote Dick-and-Jane stuff.

Okay, maybe. Not all of her clients are convinced, but her loyal student Isong buys in. She obediently discusses the thoughts that went through her head while playing piano (during which time, Iris boorishly steps outside for a smoke). Then, she refers her tutor to a married couple she knows.

Wonju clearly suspects Iris is a lazy scammer, but her husband Haesoon is impressed by her ability drink makgeolli without any signs of inebriation. Eventually, Wonju plays guitar, prompting a conversation almost identical to the one Iris had with Isong, which constitutes the film’s clearest manifestation of Hong’s regular doubling or repeating motif.

Then Iris returns home to spend time with her much younger roommate-slash-ambiguous boyfriend, Inguk, until his mother (who is about her age) pops in unexpectedly. Then, she is off like a rocket, leaving him to mother’s third-degree.

Honestly, Traveler’s Needs must be Hong’s dullest film to-date, which is saying something. Even by his generous standards, it is aimless in direction and decidedly sleight. Even Huppert, his buddy at Cannes, appears to struggle with her halting, minimalist dialogue. Hong’s regular player, Kwon Hae-hyo, just falls back on tried-and-true Hong-isms, mostly by drinking like a fish. There is simply no meat on his bony screenplay for them to sink their teeth into. Only Cho Yunhee successfully gets into any sort of rhythm as Inguk’s mom, who really is quite a formidable interrogator.

Sleep, Starring the Late Lee Sun-Kyun

Somnologists (sleep doctors) probably take issue with The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, but the silent German Expressionist classic launched a tradition of some pretty cool sleep-walking horror movies. With a baby on the way, Jung Soo-jin and her husband Hyun-soo could use all the rest they can get. Unfortunately, his sleepwalking grows so disruptive, he reluctantly agrees to consult a somnologist. Yet, she soon suspects something more supernatural in Jason Yu’s Sleep, which releases today in theaters and on VOD.

It starts with some cryptic words spoken in Hyun-soo’s sleep: “someone’s inside.” Then he wakes up bleeding from a bout of compulsive facial scratching. Before long, Soo-jin finds him sleepwalking through the apartment, often in ways that risk considerable harm to himself or others.

Suddenly, she realizes their annoying down-stairs neighbor’s noise complaints might be valid and relevant. She also stops dismissing her mother’s talk of sigils and shamans. In fact, Soo-jin starts researching supernatural causes in earnest. Not surprisingly, the combined pressure of recent motherhood and her deep dive into the occult takes its toll. Nevertheless, she remains committed to Hyun-soo.

In fact, Sleep is a rarity among horror films, which genuinely respects the for-better-or-for-worse vows. Indeed, the film is largely all about how two main characters act accordingly, under extreme conditions. As Soo-jin and Hyun-soo, Jung Yu-min and Lee Sun-kyun truly act like a couple who share considerable history together, as well as the in-jokes and shorthand references that come with it. The poignancy of their chemistry further elevates with the realization Sleep represents one of the final films of the late Lee, whom many friends and colleagues believe was recklessly hounded to his death by the police and the tabloid press.

The Story of Hong Gil-Dong, on OVID.tv

He is known as Korea’s Robin Hood, but for years, he was hiding in Japan. He appeared in the nation’s first animated feature, which was sufficiently popular to earn a sequel. Yet this 1967 film was long considered lost, until a print was recently discovered in a Japanese archive. Fully restored with the original Korean audio track and reconstructed Korean credits, Shin Dong-heon’s The Story of Hong Gil-Dong, premieres Thursday on OVID.tv.

Like most heroes Hong had greatest thrust upon him when his father, a wealthy official, heaved him out of his house. Unfortunately, Hong was not, strictly speaking, legitimate, since his mother was a maid. Despite his father’s affection, the lady of the house conspired against him. Then she ordered his murder, but her would-be assassin is no match for his strength and skills.

Next, Hong successfully frees an innocent man for a corrupt Magistrate’s army. However, by convincing the local peasantry to reclaim their unjustly appropriated property, he makes their lives even worse after he moves on. Of course, the villain immediately reverts to his evil ways. Alas, our hero is still a bit naïve and rather distracted when returning the tortured peasant to his pretty daughter, Gopdan.

Hong also picks up a sidekick, Chadol Bawi, a Dickensian orphan whose father was executed by the Magistrate. Despite his tragic circumstances, the young boy serves as the film’s comic relief. Nevertheless, they both seek the secrets of Master Baekwun, a reclusive mystical swordsman, anticipating their final showdown with the Magistrate.

In terms of themes and style, Hong Gil-Dong is not so very different from Isao Takahata’s Horus, Prince of the Sun, which rather makes sense, since they were produced in the same year. Visually, the Korean film is not quite as vividly rendered, but it is also very definitely a young hero’s journey. The Korean film might even be richer archetypally, incorporating a witch-fox spirit, a band of merry outlaws, and a tiger who repays a debt to Hong, after he rescues her cub. Eventually, Hong even rides into battle on a cloud, like Aladdin on his carpet.

Fantasia ’24: Mash Ville

They might be moonshining siblings, but Joo Je-song and his two half-brothers are no Dukes of Hazard. For one thing, there latest batch is legitimately lethal and racking up a body-count among their regular customers. They try to retrieve the bad brew, but that takes them to a small provincial town where a doomsday religious cult has its own homicidal ideas in Hwang Wook’s Mash Ville, which screened during the 2024 Fantasia International Film Festival.

The film’s early rhythms are somewhat unsteady, like the shambling of a stoner zombie. Eventually, all these odd characters will come together in a small town that is about to become a ghost town. Fortunately, Joo’s half-bro’s were drunk on someone else’s product when he walked in on them, but their now deceased friend was pounding their Moonlight Whiskey. Obviously, they need to recall their bad batch, so they carjack Ms. Jeong.

At least she had the good sense to decline the Moonlight Whiskey the bartender pushed on her, during her latest bout of binge drinking. She got so drunk she forgot to pick up a corpse dummy for her demanding producer. “Fortunately,” a random woman decided to climb into her trunk, where she apparently died. The producer is thrilled by the corpse’s lifelike qualities, but she is freaking out trying to figure out what to do with it next.

Joo and the Bros maybe solve her problem when they carjack her. They need to get to the small town where they shipped their deadly stock. Meanwhile, a pair of religious fanatics are killing townsfolk one by one, until they have a dozen corpses, but not just any twelve. They need to have one that was born in each calendar month of the year.

That is the over-simplified version. Hwang and co-screenwriter Lim Dong-min have a whole lot of weirdness going on in this film. A lot of it is amusing in a “huh, wha…” kind of way. However, there are also times when it is just a lot.

Fantasia ’24: Brave Citizen

Mooyoung High could use a substitute like Tom Berenger (or Treat Williams in the sequels). Instead, it gets So Si-min, a former contender in Olympic butt-kicking, as a probationary teacher. She might be enough to restore order and decency in Park Jin-pyo’s Brave Citizen, which screened at the 2024 Fantasia International Film Festival.

As a one-year “contract teacher,” So is constantly told to stay out of trouble if she wants to be hired as a permanent faculty member. That means looking the other way when Han Su-kang bullies his fellow students. As she quickly figures out, Han really runs the school, thanks to his powerful and litigious parents. Frankly, So only has her current position (ironically teaching ethics) because Han drove her predecessor to commit suicide.

So tries to look the other way, because she wants a permanent posting. She is deeply in debt due to her deadbeat father, So Young-taek, who was also her coach. However, she cannot ignore the savage bullying of Go Jin-hyung, who is told to take it and like it, or Han and his running mates will kill his street vendor grandmother. So refuses to stomach such injustice, so she dons a cat mask and starts anonymously administering frontier justice when Han tries to torment victims off-campus.

Brave Citizen could breakout in America if marketed correctly. If you believe the premise of a politically-connected bully wouldn’t resonate here, think again. Could Jewish students relate after enduring genocidal threats and harassment on campus, while university administrators did nothing to discipline the bullying “protesters?” How about the owners of small businesses that were looted during the 2020 riots, as the media cheered them on and big city DAs refused to prosecute? As a result, there are a lot of Americans who feel exactly like students at Mooyoung, who will applaud So.