The Treacherous

I watched this movie not expecting much, considering it's probably not the best budget movie out there, but was really impressed with how the story caught me. It contains a good dose of intelligent political intrigue and and the beginning and the end are well chosen.

When the seemingly mad king orders a search for the "perfect beauty", it's subjects search around all the land for beautiful women and drag them to the palace offering them a royal life or, if they're not choose in the end, slavery.

It's a good depiction of the madness of an absolute power and as the story goes forward, the women contest become itself a political contest, for the ministries and other subjects in the palace know that the chosen girl will have a tremendous power over the crazy king. Eventually, different sides do whatever it takes to classify their favored candidates, and the king's madness has its peak when he finds about possible traitors inside the contest, adding to his paranoia.

After all, I found it to be very intelligent overall. The king's madness is shown progressing in the course of the movie, the scenario was beautifully recreated and the scenes (although they might be uncomfortable if you're not watching alone) are pretty good. All in all, it's a remarkable movie.

This film is not an erotica for me. The mood is dark and morbid. The characters are not redeemable and most of the film is extremely violent. It was a difficult watch for me and I would not recommend this to someone seeking erotica. The story itself was intriguing and makes you want to finish the movie but curb your expectations.

I was expecting to look bad due to the budget, but the acting, special effects and quality was amazing, the gore/violence scenes were the best I've seen, the sexual stuff was very questionable and often times really hard to digest (subjective to everyone), but sometimes its pretty comical, pretty good movie overall.

I didn't know anything about this being a true story, as some reviewers have said here, before watching this. As a narrative story I found this a little all over the place. I was never sure who was who and whose side they were all on, although I think that may be lost in translation and more of a 'me' thing.

The acting of the king was simply ridiculous, crazed one minute and crying the next.

The sets, the cinematography and the costumes are wonderful and although the story may be difficult at times, the film is always a delight to look at.

References to this being the Korean Caligula on the right track. This is not a film for the feint of heart.

When people think of 'The Treacherous', they think of eroticism in the movie. However, visual directing should be praised more. Use of water and the color red is very well thought out and appropriate. Costumes and settings show traditional Korea in a sexiest way possible. However, too much focus on sex scene and unnecessary nude scene can downgrade the quality of the movie. It had so much potential to be historical drama but stay being an erotic art film.