The elaborate plot and the portentous South Korean setting prove vital in keeping this thriller thoroughly engaging. There's an undertone of horror right from the start of the movie but it's not overdone. What stops me from rating it higher are the convenient plot contrivances that pop up during the climax. It's a neat twist (after twist) at the end alright, but at times, it felt like two completely disjointed stories were being told.
Also, if you've seen your share of thrillers, the climax reveal wouldn't come across as a shocker either. The serial-killer element is what kept me wholly invested in the narrative - the trope, unfortunately, did not get the kind of layered treatment that I expected. Soo-Youn Lee unravels the twists in a slow-burn fashion, but the genre thrills are solidly placed. I'll admit it - it did work my brains for a good while, except for that ending. Why I keep mentioning the finale so much is because it made me feel like the writer initially took me on a mysteriously thrilling ride, then later took me on a completely different, less-thrilling one with an okay end-result. In other words, it felt very ready-made. Like, having to eat frozen food over freshly cooked.
Jin-Woong Cho delivers a chilling performance as the introverted doctor steadily losing control over what's happening around him. There are a few well-executed nightmare sequences that tease the director's interest in visual horror. There isn't a whole lot of violence (for a serial killer flick) but a decent amount of gore. If you are interested in a serial killer movie with umpteen psychological-thriller elements that need to be picked apart piece-by-piece, Bluebeard should be right up your alley.
