I Saw the Devil
★★★
(2010)
Jee-woon Kim’s ever present obsession with revenge and redemption took a bit of a holiday in the sun with his last effort, the completely off the wall The Good, The Bad, The Weird. It returns full force and darker than ever in the long and brutal I Saw the Devil. When a special agent’s pregnant wife is murdered by a serial killer, the young man (Byung-hun Lee), almost egged on by his grieving father in law, sets about exacting a massive revenge, opting for the lesser used “catch, torture, release, catch, torture, release” method; An interesting concept but one that ultimately puts the final nail in this South Korean shocker’s coffin.
Undoubtedly bleak and excessively violent, it’s the repetition of our “hero’s” vengeance which ultimately turns down the heat over the film’s (also excessive) 2 and half hours. Jee-woon’s drab colouring certainly gives the film a claustrophobic mood and it’s stone cold psycho is effectively frightening and creepily played by Choi Min-sik. As the darkness deepens, the question of who is the titular Devil becomes more uncertain and sadly so does the films edge, descending into a bit of a muddled thematic mess involving a circle of psychopaths and multiple killer’s as even the police start to become unsure as to who they are hunting.
However, there are genuine flourishes throughout. The action sequences are wild and flowing, though viciously punctuated with more on-screen blows to heads than a months’ worth of South London CCTV footage.
It’s territory the talented director has already covered especially in A Bittersweet Life, a film which I Saw the Devil could perhaps stand alongside if not for duration and repetition. It’s an effectively unnerving film but sadly has little else to offer. The comparisons to Chan-Wook Park’s masterful vengeance trilogy will no doubt come thick and fast (especially to Oldboy) but, unlike Park’s thought provoking and stylish triple turn, Jee-Woon Kim’s bloody film can’t quite deliver anything beyond a short sharp blow to the head.
