Into the Mirror

OK, I was a bit evil myself to put a comment titled like that, and the film was a good one. The problem with it is that is not really scary. It's a nice thriller and , as some other viewers have noticed, has a nice pace in the first half, but then gets sluggish. The lead actor doesn't show a lot of emotion in his acting and that also sets the feeling of the movie to a lower level. The ending is really unrealistic to the extreme (for a ghost movie, that is :) )

But the idea is nice. Another world may lie beyond a mirror and things that happened there might not mimic exactly what s happening here. Parts of people might get trapped in mirrors or exact revenge coming from there. Anything else, though, is pretty confusing. I am not Asian so a lot of the names in the movie sounded alike. Add to this that the dead girl had a twin sister and there were mirrors everywhere and you can understand why I felt confused.

As Asian horror movies go, I would rather see a cliché "bad hair wet ghost with spooky eyes" than this kind of thriller, but this film definitely has some good and original parts in it.

South Korean horror/thriller that was the basis for Kiefer Sutherland's 2008 movie Mirrors. I can see how they split the plot and spread it over Mirrors and its sequel, Mirrors 2. This version is slower than the remake, and has very little blood and gore. What it does have is a heightened eeriness throughout. We get reflections out of sync with their physical counterparts, shadowy figures half-glimpsed in backgrounds, and a sense of things being just slightly 'off'. Whilst the US Mirrors is unashamedly a horror film, this is more of a crime thriller/police procedural, with some supernatural elements. The camerawork is great (not least for how they manage to keep the crew from being caught in the reflections!). It's well directed and the cast are good. And it has a nice score. Although (unusually for me) I actually prefer the US remake, this is definitely worth a watch. 7/10.

INTO THE MIRROR is an intriguing mix of police procedural and supernatural horror, an unwieldy but effective combination that proved successful enough for Hollywood to attempt a remake (the Kiefer Sutherland-starrer MIRRORS, which upped the gore but lost something in translation in the process). The film's setting is a once-deserted shopping mall, always a choice location for the movies and one that doesn't disappoint here; in places it drips with an eerie, provocative atmosphere.

What I liked most about this movie was the mixing of genres. On one hand there's a serial killer aspect to the murders, which are inventive without being gruesome. Then there's the supernatural touch, which is handled subtly and effectively, particularly in that great twist ending. Finally, there's the police procedural side which dominates most of the running time, and that's interesting too because the cops are humanised.

Ji-tae Yu's former detective Woo, now working as chief of security at the mall, is by far the most interesting of the characters. Although he's saddled with one of those all-too-familiar back stories involving him making a fatal error, the script works well to make him sympathetic and an intriguingly balanced lead. Myung-min Kim's officious detective is well placed as Woo's antagonist and the story that develops is never less than enthralling. A good little movie, this one.

After the accidental death of his partner Young-ho in a hostage situation, the former detective of the Seoul Special Operations Force Woo Young-min (Ji-tae Yu) feels responsible for the tragedy and quit the police force joining the private security company SecuZone. His uncle and owner of the department store Dreampia, Jeon-il Sung (Ju-bong Gi), hires Woo to be the chief of the security of Dreampia, which was rebuilt after a fire where many employees died and is near the reopening in spite of the protest of the families of the victims that claim their indemnity. When an employee dies after hours in the store, Woo leads an internal investigation, while detective Ha Hyun-Su (Myeong-mim Kim) that blames Woo for the death of his friend Young-ho, and his assistant Park, come to the store to lead an official investigation. When other employees that worked in the same department are mysteriously killed in the store, Woo meets Lee Ji-hyun (Hye-na Kim), the twin sister of Lee Jeong-hyun, that convinces him that her sister has not died in the fire and is trapped in the mirrors, while Ha Hyun-Su believes that Lee Ji-hyun is the serial killer.

"Geoul Sokeuro" is another great South Korean horror movie. With a complex screenplay that discloses an intricate and intriguing supernatural plot, this film is supported by great direction and acting and excellent camera work, using mirrors in many unexpected scenes. The horror is not gore but psychological, and there is an important and complex explanation about the "mirror-world" that is basic to understand the end of the story. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Espelho" ("Mirror")

Well there is the case of the Remake, but I will criticize that, on it's own. Let's just say, that the remake never even comes close to the south Korean horror/thriller, that we've been served here. A movie, with a great visual style, a very good art direction and camera man. It's edited in a manner, that allows you to dig deep into the suspense story (if you let yourself do that, that is) and still remains complex enough to challenge your brain (something you can't say about the remake though).

The acting is pretty strong, for a movie that is declared a horror movie (although as I mentioned it walks a thin line between that and the mystery/suspense thriller element it also has ... almost like a detective story, with a touch of drama in it). Of course if you know that you can't handle Asian movies well, than you won't be able to like it as much as I (and others) did