The second film I watched was "Lady Vengeance" Directed by Park Chan-wook, now one of my new favorite directors. It stars Lee Young Ae and Choi Min-sik in brilliant turns. This film is the last entry in a supposed trilogy which includes "Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance" and "Oldboy". His newest film "Thirst" is nothing short of a masterpiece. I may need to re-watch that. Anyway, Lady Vengeance is quite a particular film and to be honest when it first started, I was a little thrown off. There's a lot of scrambling of scenes in this film of random encounters that the protagonist has with the supporting characters. It sort of confuses you because you don't know if these are intentional subplots or not. At the same time it's utterly intriguing and you want to watch because what you are being shown is cinematic magic. As a matter of fact, it takes a good hour when you actually start seeing things clearly. The genius of this movie though is that no matter how confusing the first half of the film may be, you never come out of it confused. It's almost as if the random scenes are placed perfectly in your brain for future reference. I don't know how this film managed to achieve such a thing, but it does.
This is a revenge film sort of in the vein of Kill Bill but a totally different concept. A woman is locked up in prison for thirteen years because she confessed to the murder of a five year old boy. The kicker is, she actually didn't kill the boy, she was blackmailed to confess or else her daughter would be killed. She was 19 when all of this occurred so a significant part of her life was spent in prison. She serves time from 1991-2004 and is finally released hellbent on revenge after 13 years of planning it. The thing that I LOVED about the protagonist, Lee Geum-ja, is that she is so casual about the whole thing. She never breaks or has an emotional moment until the very end. There's one scene where's she talking to an old friend from prison and her friend asks her "Did you find that bastard yet?" She replies, "I did". Then her friend replies, "Did you kill him?" She replies "Not yet." Mind you, she's looking in a compact mirror and fixing her hair as if revenge is the last thing on her mind. Her friend replies back, "Why not?" She responds with "I've been busy" as she puts her compact back in her purse. YES!! I must've rewinded that one scene like five times. I love that! She was so nonchalant about it and it almost seems like she is having a very delayed reaction to the last thirteen years of her life. She wants revenge but she has other priorities and what makes her plan brilliant is that those other priorities are apart of the plan. Genius! The film can be very intense at times and doesn't rely on shock tactics to tell the story. It's an incredible character study of who this woman is and how she got to where she is now. I have to be honest, when I was watching the film, I was only mildly impressed. However, after a good night's sleep and giving it a chance to sink in, I realized how much of a masterpiece this film is. I will definitely give this one a second viewing.
This film deserves a medal in technical achievement. There's so many quirky tricks that they used to heighten certain scenes and I loved it. It's quite an imaginative film and it almost has an element of fantasy to it. The score is haunting and beautiful and compliments the film very well. The sound design is nothing short of spectacular as it includes a lossless audio track on the DVD giving you a film experience you won't soon forget. I loved this film and can't wait to revisit it again as well as the other two films in wook's trilogy. This is an example of a film done well and all you cinephiles should take note. Here's a story that's been treated with care and precision. Highest recommendation.
If you're allergic to subtitles or foreign film or even asian cinema, then I'm so sorry for you. You're missing out. I challenge you to watch it.
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