H

On the whole, I enjoyed this film. It starts out with a series of nice, gruesome post-mortem and death scenes, and carries the creepy ambiance most of the way through. Unfortunately, as the twists begin to unravel, so does the quality of the film.

For the sake of those who haven't seen the film, I won't spoil any of the myriad twists, but I will say that you better pay very close attention to this film or you'll miss some illuminating plot points, as I did.

Unfortunately, this has to do with the number of suspects/characters in the film, and the difficulty an American viewer will have keeping all the names separate. Characters are often referred to by name without being on screen (as is the nature of a police thriller), and I found myself, more often than not, seeing said names and thinking, "wait, which one is he?" Still, I doubt I'd have had the problem if the characters in question were more than just your standard serial murder movie cutouts. I watch a lot of Korean cinema, and this is the first time I've ever had this problem.

This speaks to the general quality of the film which, while engaging, is certainly not going to stun most viewers with its artistry. The acting is passable (at best), the writing is sparse and convoluted (though not devoid of entertainment value, to be sure), and the editing is flat-out terrible. That's not something that usually stands out for me in a film, but in this case it was a flagrant issue with the film. You'll find yourselves following the characters to a raid on a suspect's house only to forget why this guy was a suspect in the first place, and random cuts to side characters doing sweet F.A. don't do much to ease the difficulty of following the bouncing (murder)ball.

There are two kinds of "end of the movie twists" out there. There's the "Oh my god, I didn't see that coming, but I should've" twists, and then there are the "uh...what?" twists. Sadly, the final revelation of this film is one of the latter. I've seen debate on the message boards regarding the supposed "final, final twist," but I have to say that it's a pretty loose interpretation to call the final moments of the film yet another twist. It's more of a "book-end," and effective as such.

Where this film fails most is in the expectations it builds. It's an excellent concept for a serial murderer flick, and they spend a lot of time building an interesting emotional landscape that's inevitably forsaken for gimmicky plot devices that, while not wholly unbelievable (though highly improbable), are pretty much just plain silly. Had they stuck with the emotional and psychological themes and forsaken the twists, this would be an excellent film.

As it stands, it is not excellent, but it's certainly not terrible. If you're a fan of Asian thrillers, you could do worse than this one.

-J

Ten months after the imprisonment of serial killer Shin Hyun (Seung-woo Cho), who gave himself up to the police after brutally murdering six women, a copycat murderer begins to replicate his grisly crimes. Detectives Kim Mi Yun (Jung-ah Yum) and Kang Tae Hyun (Jin-hee Ji) are assigned to the case, and after interviewing Shin Hyun, begin to suspect that he has somehow masterminded the killings from behind bars.

Directed by Jong-hyuk Lee, Korean thriller H is, rather ironically, something of a copycat itself, being a little bit Silence of the Lambs and a little bit Seven, but nowhere near as good as either film: the plot is a little too convoluted and confusing at times, the pacing way too slow, and the inevitable twist nowhere near clever (or believable) enough. In an effort to make his film as stylish as those he is trying to emulate, director Lee throws in endless rain-drenched scenes and moody shots of his cops smoking, but even though his film looks good throughout, it fails thanks to its leaden storytelling, a lack of tension and originality, and an ending that beggars belief.

A bit less than a year ago a serial killer turned himself in. He had targeted mostly pregnant women and the police had no clue as to his whereabouts. But now he's in custody. The only problem being that a copycat killer has emerged. So detectives Kim (Yum Jung-ah) and Kang (Ji Jin-hee) are put on the case.

Korean films don't seem to believe in happy mediums. Either they're full-out acid trips of surrealism, or they're the greyest, most depressing dramafests you've ever seen. H falls into latter category. Granted, the actual killings are horrifically brutal and graphic in a way you just don't see in mainstream Western cinema, but aside from that the film is almost banal.

When it's not blatantly ripping off The Silence of the Lambs, that is. I mean, you have psychotic madball killer in prison, who's interrogated to help catch another criminal, while at the same time he's analyzing his interrogators. Subtle this movie is not. Throw in some Se7en as well for the events of the final third and you have yourself an unoriginal movie.

Though, it is shot nicely, the characters can be interesting and the gore is sure to be pleasing to those that gravitate towards that kind of thing. Not a complete loss, but not worth recommending either.

I could go on about the slow pace, bad acting, moodiness, implausibility, contrived and generally ridiculous plot line but suffice to say that I wish it was me getting a bullet in my head at the end of the movie.

The movie was dreadful. I'd recommend almost any other Korean movie over this. The sheer number of times I found myself scoffing at the actions of the characters, the plot "twists" or the character "dialogue" were too numerous to count.

Any deeper reading about the supposed message of the movie only serves to obscure the fact that this was one horrible flick.

The only positive comment I can make (as someone on the message boards noted) was some of the very interesting artwork; I quite liked it.

It was a decent movie. It handled the subject matter well and it was quite gritty. The biggest drawback for me is that i didn't connect emotionally with any characters and wasn't fully invested in the story. So the movie became a little dull for me at times.

Starring yum jung ah, Ji Jin-hee and Cho Seung-woo. Directed by Lee Jong-hyeok. This is a korean movie. The movie was released in 2002. It was remade in telugu as amaravathi.

How do you write an review of 600 characters unless you are a paid critic. It is impossible for an average movie fan. Remove this dumb 600 character limit for reviews on imdb. Imdb do something!