After being wrongfully imprisoned for thirteen years and having her child taken away from her, a woman seeks revenge through increasingly cruel and brutal means.
A recently laid off factory worker kidnaps his former boss' friend's daughter, hoping to use the ransom money to pay for his sister's kidney transplant.
In the DMZ separating North and South Korea, two North Korean soldiers have been killed, supposedly by one South Korean soldier. But the 11 bullets found in the bodies, together with the 5 ... See full summary »
A girl who thinks she is a combat cyborg checks into a mental hospital, where she encounters other psychotics. Eventually, she falls for a man who thinks he can steal people's souls.
In a small Korean province in 1986, three detectives struggle with the case of multiple young women being found raped and murdered by an unknown culprit.
After a thirteen-year imprisonment for the kidnap and murder of a six-year-old boy, Guem-Ja Lee seeks vengeance on the man truly responsible for the boy's death. With the help of fellow inmates and reunited with her daughter, she gets closer and closer to her goal.Written by
Spekkie Big
The bakery that Geumja works in is called "Naruse", which is the name of the Japanese director Mikio Naruse. See more »
Goofs
[All goofs for this title are spoilers.]
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Quotes
Geum-ja Lee:
Listen carefully. Everyone make mistakes. But if you committed a sin, you have to make an atonement for that sin. Atonement, do you know what that means? Big Atonement for big sins. Small Atonement for small sins.
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Alternate Versions
There are two different versions of the film. One is full color. The other, called "Fade to Black Version", shifts from color to B&W over the course of the movie. Like Sin City, there are color highlighted, even in the B&W scenes. The second version is what the director intended, but he was not able to complete it properly until the Korean DVD (which includes both versions). See more »
Chan-Wook Park was already the Master of Dysfunction after Old Boy, now he can add the title of King of Pain (thanks Sting) to his CV.
The depth of feeling in the second half of this film is staggering, and comes in stark contrast to the startling apathy of the first half. The masterful cinematography is something we have come to expect but the director's ability to compose the most evocative of tableaux never ceases to amaze- the final shot of the movie being a case in point.
As the above reviewer says, one must be cryptic in commenting on this film but it must be said that its final act really transforms it from a beautifully crafted work into a masterpiece.
This is a film which shocks without ever descending into gratuity, while frequently forcing a guilty laugh with its darker-than-black's-shadow humour.
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Chan-Wook Park was already the Master of Dysfunction after Old Boy, now he can add the title of King of Pain (thanks Sting) to his CV.
The depth of feeling in the second half of this film is staggering, and comes in stark contrast to the startling apathy of the first half. The masterful cinematography is something we have come to expect but the director's ability to compose the most evocative of tableaux never ceases to amaze- the final shot of the movie being a case in point.
As the above reviewer says, one must be cryptic in commenting on this film but it must be said that its final act really transforms it from a beautifully crafted work into a masterpiece.
This is a film which shocks without ever descending into gratuity, while frequently forcing a guilty laugh with its darker-than-black's-shadow humour.