The World of Horror

Lady Vengeance - Reviewed by Miss Twisted

(Originally called Sympathy for Lady Vengeance)
Its Korean title, Chinjeolhan geumjassi,
translates as "Kind-hearted Ms. Geum-ja"

Released: July 29th 2005 (South Korea)
February 10th 2006 (UK)
Run Time: 1 hour 52 mins
Starring: Lee Yeong-ae, Choi Min-sik
Directed by: Park Chan-wook

This feminine revenge story is the third and final instalment of what has become known as The Vengeance Trilogy. It focuses on the seemingly delicate Lee Geum-ja, who is released after a 13 year prison sentence for a murder she did not commit.

The film tells her story of revenge against the real murderer, a man named Mr Baek (Choi Min-sik) who kidnapped and threatened to kill her newborn daughter unless she confessed.
Over the next hour we witness the highs and lows as Lee Geum-ja is reunited with her daughter, tracks down Mr Baek, now a school teacher and discovers that this crime is sadly one of many.
We often flip back to her prison days showing how she cared for her cell mates, even donating an organ to one of them and how she ended up fatally poisoning the prison bully. Geum-ja is a very likeable character, you almost want to reach into the screen and help her yourself. But don't be fooled by her outward frailty because Lee has suffered. And she wants revenge.
Eventually she imprison's him and with the help of a detective, who worked the initial case that saw her incarcerated, goes to Mr Baek's apartment and finds several snuff tapes of his young victims.

The last section is possibly the most emotive forty minutes of fictional film i have seen.
Take an abandoned school, a wronged woman, a handful of tapes showing the deaths of Baek's victims and then add the parents, or other surviving relatives, of those victims. Innocent children he was able to hand-pick through his teaching job. Lee Geum-ja plays each tape, not to torture the grieving families, but to answer questions that have tormented them for years, to give them closure.
As the tapes are playing the camera switched between the pained families faces and the horrors unfolding on-screen before them. The sound of terrified children crying out for their mama's broke me. I am a parent. I have children of the same ages. The amazing yet harrowing film making had me, the bad assed Miss Twisted, sat sobbing to the point I had to hit the mute button until the snuff tapes finished playing...
When Lee tells the parents and guardians that Mr Baek is tethered in a nearby room and offers them the choice of turning him into the police to seek justice or the opportunity to personally avenge the cruel deaths, I didn't even hear the answers or explanations. I was far too busy ranting at the screen, firmly telling them my opinion and then describing exactly what I would do in their situation.

As if the disturbing screenplay, incredible acting and graphic camera work wasn't enough to embed this soul destroying film into the viewers memory, the heavy baroque themed music pounded it in deeper still. However the most impressive thing here is the colour desaturation used for an additional version of this film, labelled 'Fade to Black and White'. Park Chan-wook had wanted to use this exceptional visual technique in an earlier project, but budget constraints prevented it at that time. Thankfully he revisited the idea with a special release of Lady Vengeance, which I would recommend to everyone. This amazing version begins in full colour and gradually fades until totally black and white at the end. It is something you are not fully aware of, but it is hugely effective. The film also starts with bright primary colours, which become pastels and mutes before losing colour completely. It all adds to the changing atmosphere as the story unwinds.

The movie has won so many awards including; Best Film, Best Innovative Film, Young Lion Award, Cinema of the Future, Best Director and of course Lee Yeung-ae, with only a small handful of roles behind her, won four International awards for Best Actress, before retiring to the U.S and never blessing us with her incredible acting talents again.

9/10

Lady Vengeance is nothing short of fantastic. A strong meaningful film that no audience could forget. The only reason it doesn't get top marks is simply because in my opinion it doesn't quite equal Park Chan-wook's previous film Old Boy, but it certainly isn't far off.

- Miss Twisted has decided that Park Chan-wook is almost as special as Choi Min-sik -