Telmisseomding

TELL ME SOMETHING: I'm truely surprised that the Korean cinema hasn't caught on here in America. From what I've seen from them, I've never been let down. First, there was SHIRI, a big budget terrorists vs the government Hollywood style movie. Then the spectacular MUSA, and well, you know my feelings on that one. It was just fantastic. One of my favorite movies of all time. Next was BICHUNMOO, a grand martial arts Kung Fu Theatre epic. Then NO. 3 (aka NUMBER 3 KILLER), a quirky gangster PULP FICTION type of film. And now we have CHANG YOON HYUN's TELL ME SOMETHING, a very good serial killer murder mystery flick. It's also what I call a "Sunday afternoon movie". You know, it's 6 or 7 pm and there's nothing on television to watch so you nab a nice thought provoking drama or crime/suspense flick from the video store and you kick back and watch it. Director DAVID FINCHER's movies like THE GAME and SE7EN are good examples. And this is just as good. But what's so special about this particular one is that you not only get a great "thinking movie" storyline, it also supplies the pleasant blood and gore that most Hollywood films of this sort only hint to or simply happen off-screen. HAN SUK KYU (from SHIRI and NO. 3) stars as troubled police detective Cho on the trail of a terrible serial killer that chops up the bodies of the victims and spreads them throughout the city in black plastic garbage bags. But the niffty new trick here is to mix them up. In bag #1, you may get the arms, head, and heart of victim A. In bag #2 located somewhere else, you find the legs from victim A but they're mixed up with the guts and hands of victim B. Then in bag #3, there's the head and heart of victim B with the legs and guts from victim C. And so on and so on. Get the picture? So after discovering several bags and finally piecing them together like a puzzle to identify the corpses, he finds one link between them all, a lovely young museum currator named Su-Yeon (actress SHIM EUN HA). She's had affairs with all the male victims at one time or another so maybe she's gotta be the killer, right? Well, as I said before, this is more of a "thinking" movie so it's never who you'd expect. There'll be plenty of other suspects to point the finger at as the movie goes on. So without giving away any more details that may spoil the movie, I'll wrap this review up rather short. All in all, this was just another example of how good the Korean film industry has been for me. I hope they continue to impress and maybe, just maybe, they'll find a home here in America.

As I watched this film, I kept asking myself: What's the killer's motivation(s)? Not until the last few minutes did that become clear – well, as clear as it could be, given the narrative structure: reminiscent of the plot of Se7en (1995) but with the addition of a number of flashbacks that do more to confuse than to wholly satisfy.

And, there are obvious nods to not only Se7en, but Silence of the lambs (1991), also, particularly the cinematography and scene construction. At one point, echoing a scene from the former, Detective Cho (Suh-kyu Han) is lying exhausted in a rain-soaked alley way, while the killer sits waiting in his car, only two metres away; but instead of running Cho down, the killer screams away into the rain. In another scene, Cho is in an elevator and looks up to see bright blood dripping from the hatchway, and then also dripping down the wall; suddenly, the hatch breaks and buckets of blood cascade onto him. Add to that are the many interior scenes in run-down tenements and so forth, all evocative of the spooky corridors of those earlier films.

Still, the story is interesting, in a macabre way: across Seoul, body parts turn up in black plastic bags, but not all parts belong to the body. Somebody is perpetrating murder piecemeal. Enter Detective Cho, somewhat under suspicion for corruption but handed the case as way to redeem his career. More mixed-up body parts are discovered, but no hands with fingerprints. So, no clues. Until a head appears with teeth fillings that can be traced. One thing leads to another until Cho finds himself knocking on the door to Chae Su-Yeon (Eun-ha Shim), a young woman who knows all the male victims.

And so begins the real mystery for Cho - and the viewer. Through questioning and a series of flashbacks, it looks like Chae is in the frame; yet, murders continue while she is under surveillance. Suspicion falls upon her father, who, from Chae's account, is shown to be a sadistic, authoritarian figure; but he can't be found. And then there's a further nod to another thriller, Kiss the girls (1997), where the idea of a deadly duo is raised and then quashed when a prime suspect is himself reduced to a jumble of parts in a bag. All very messy for Cho, and increasingly so, because he appears to be attracted to the sweet Chae Su-Yeon, a complication he can do without, you would think.

In a way, I can also compare this film to the manner in which David Lynch constructs his films. When you see any of the more recent Lynch films, the real mystery (and challenge) is how to understand the story. For Tell Me Something, the problem is how to understand the mystery because, as I said, the killer's motivation(s) is the key. And yet, at the end, there is no absolute clarity, even though the identity is obvious. So if I provide my understanding here and now, I think that would detract from the pleasure of unraveling it for yourself. Meanwhile, I'll continue to ponder the significance of the title, the significance of which escapes me.

However, the production is excellent and the special effects (dismembered bodies, body pieces, heads, gutted torsos and so on) are so realistic they may cause some people more than just some discomfit. It will certainly satisfy the slash-and-gore set who liken this movie to Italian giallo cinema, exemplified by Dario Argento's works such as Deep Red (1977), Tenebre (1982) and others. It's classified as a horror film and I think that's justified, given the underpinnings of the story and the camera work.

I can't comment much on the acting as I'm not familiar with the actors or Korean cinema, having seen only a few; generally, however, I think the actors performed quite well.

Recommended for those who like a mixed bag of horror, mystery and thriller...and body parts.

Ya know i really wanted to like this movie. It had all the things I would normally love. Good Gore. Moody settings. But then i finished the movie and Frigging Hated it. It felt like a waste of my time. Why set up all these plot points only to never hear about them again? Why take the time to show us these things only to have them fade away?

Oh and BTW I guessed the killer 20 min into the movie.

Good: Gore, Settings, Creative use of garbage bags. Bad: Pacing, The Plot holes bigger than your mom's Pasties, Dumb red herrings 2/10

I *am* the AngryWhiteNinja

"Tell Me Something" is a slick and stylish noirish Korean crime flick which tells of one cop's obsession to stop a serial killer who dismembers his victims and leaves body parts in trash bags to be found. Long on style and atmospherics, "TMS" becomes somewhat convoluted and disjointed, fails to connect on an emotional level, and ends with an unsatisfying conclusion. Nonetheless, audiences into grisly crime flix may enjoy the above average and artful execution.

Note - The VHS I watched was subtitled and, though dialogue is kept to a minimum, something may have been lost in the translation.

TELL ME SOMETHING is one of the few South Korean films to take a stab at the serial killer genre. The Japanese have been doing it for a while, but the Koreans haven't seemed particularly interested in the genre. TELL ME SOMETHING works in that it's incredibly atmospheric, with visuals that matches even Finch's SEVEN, the new benchmark for serial killer movies post SILENCE OF THE LAMBS.

The one thing that sinks TELL ME SOMETHING is that it is rather routine, and more than once it falls into the same cliches that suffocates teen slasher films, in that characters act incredibly stupid and without reason. Also, the movie's mystery is a bit convoluted, and the ending seems almost irrelevant after all that's happened.

It's a good movie, with some very nice things to look at. The constantly falling rain will remind most people of SEVEN, and why not? TELL ME SOMETHING is basically a rehash of every American serial killer made in the '90s. Just because it's Korean doesn't make it anymore original, unfortunately.

6 out of 10

(go to www.nixflix.com for a more detailed review of this film and reviews of other foreign movies)