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Korean director Kim Ji-woon first garnered a reputation as an ace assimilator of outside styles, most notably for the ickily Freudian J-horror thriller A Tale of Two Sisters and the monumentally goofy spaghetti Western pastiche The Good, the Bad, the Weird. I Saw the Devil finds the filmmaker moving towards a style much closer to home--namely the Korean revenge thriller, best typified by movies such as Oldboy, Memories of Murder, and Nowhere to Hide--with results that vary between masterfully staged and punishingly gross. Beginning with an impeccably uneasy snowbound abduction scene, the story follows a dashing secret agent (Byung-hun Lee) sworn to track down the murderer of his pregnant fiancée. Upon finding the maniac (Oldboy's majestically disheveled Min-sik Choi), he implants him with a tracking device and proceeds to follow him across the country, swooping in to torture him at random intervals. Clocking in at 144 minutes, Ji-woon's film clearly believes in a more-is-more policy, with ideas about the futility of revenge and the dangers of staring into the abyss taken to their graphic extremes. Viewers with strong constitutions will find much to chew on. Anyone else, however, should be prepared to dive behind the couch at a moment's notice. --Andrew Wright
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Most helpful customer reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Chilling, brutal, and brilliant,
By
Ce commentaire est de: I Saw the Devil [Blu-ray] (Blu-ray)
I first saw 'I Saw the Devil' at TIFF '10 and was blown away. As a huge fan of 'A Bittersweet Life', Kim Jee-Woon's previous collaboration with Lee Byung-Hun, and actor Min-sik Choi, I was very excited to see this film. We were warned prior to the screening that this film is brutal and that was no lie. There is some graphic violence in this film. Totally cringe-worthy things are depicted. But unlike modern horror films and torture-porn, all of the violence serves a purpose. It's a revenge tale, an action film, and the story of losing one's self in vengeance. The acting is stupendous, featuring stand-out performances from the two leads. I loved this film so much. I laughed, I squirmed, I lost myself in the story. Definitely pick this Blu-ray up. It may be lacking the wealth of bonus features we're used to but the quality of the filmmaking makes up for it.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Try not to look away,
By
Ce commentaire est de: I Saw the Devil [Blu-ray] (Blu-ray)
North American fans of Korean cinema will no doubt compare this movie to Oldboy for a couple reasons: #1, it's a film about revenge, made in Korea (their directors seem to know what they're doing when it comes to this sub-genre of thrillers) and #2, it stars Min-sik Choi, who was the main protagonist (or antagonist depending on how you want to look at it) of Oldboy. However, that's where the similarities end.Minor Spoilers ahead: "I Saw the Devil" is about a man (Kim Soo-hyeon) whose fiance is murdered by a serial killer. The next 2 hours are spent with him hunting and attacking (over and over, in very creative and gruesome ways) the man who killed his fiance, Kyung-chul (played by the masterful Min-sik Choi). There's no real twist (like the big one in Oldboy that causes everyone I've ever known that watched it to say "holy ****!"), you're not trying to figure anything out, this is the plot and it's laid out for you very early on, though there are times throughout the film where you wonder who will wind up winning out in end as each man gains and loses the upper hand several times (and there is a clear winner). Critics of the film feel that the movie is excessive in the violence, and they feel the choices made by the characters are quite questionable (especially at the end), but essentially it delivers a similar message that other Korean revenge films have: Revenge isn't satisfying. If you're a fan of blood and creative violence in cinema however, you'll like this, but it will make even the most hardened of gore fans squirm (the Achilles tendon scene, the knife in the hand scene, the cab fight, etc). This is Korean cinema at its least subtle... violent with a touch of very dark humour, just the way I like it.
1.0 out of 5 stars
Great movie, bad blu ray,
Ce commentaire est de: I Saw the Devil [Blu-ray] (Blu-ray)
I was very disappointed in this product. I ordered and returned 2 copies of it because it would freeze in the first minute. I tried it on multiple bluray players. I really wanted it to work. Great movie. Unfortunately, bad bluray.
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