Chugyeogja

a.k.a. The chaser
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1190539/
In Mapo, a quarter of Seoul, some girls are missing.
Mi-jin Kim ( Seo Yeong-Hie ) a call girl recieves a call from her pimp Joong-ho Eom
( Yun-seok Kim ) a former taskforce police.
He wants her to meet a man, but, there is something fishy though by the telephone number from wich the man have contacted Joong-ho.

Mi-jin Kim













Mi-jin leaves her daughter and goes to meet the man, while driving away with the man she is being phoned by Joong-ho. He have recognised the phonenumber, a number that have some connection to several of his callgirls gone missing.

The director/screenwriter Hong-jin Na shows in his debut that this is a man to keep an eye on. His second movie The yellow sea is now under production and stars both of the male stars from Chugyeogja.


As much as it may sound strange, Chugyeogja reminds me quite a bit of Saw, Se7en and Martyrs.
First thing it´s a movie that are realistic and really really well acted by everyone. In some scenes and the way it ends are things that make you wonder if or maby even why movies of today has such tiny hope. It would be easy to explain what I mean, but it may also be a big spoiler if I´d tried to give a deeper review on it.
Second. It was also made in 2008, as Martyrs, they both where screened in Sitges - Catalonian International Film Festival and in Cannes.

Not only is it a brutal vision of a society - the police, the government lack as much humanity as the serialkiller does, well in some points that is. It is also a sad movie, told in an oldfashion drama the asian way (for those of you who have seen asian dramas you know what I mean).
As an example is when Joong-ho drives his car, shouting in his cellphone, the rain pooring down, violin music is played and beside him in the car Mi-jins daughter cries her heart out.

It is a beautiful shot movie and mixes it with dark scenes - dark as in the same style cinematography - as for example the first Saw movie or for that matter Martyrs. The absent of so-called “ living colours “ in the bathroom scene gives it a dirty feeling.














It is however a classic “ cat - mouse “ thriller but it is also a movie about the downfall of a society. It might not be obvious for some who see this movie, for some it´s more understandable.

So if you are into darker serial killing movies that are based on real events or just feel that you wanna see one of the last decades best thrillers this is the one to get.

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- Don´t let him be suspicious. You die if you screw up.
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- Do you know Ji-young?
- Sob…
- Haven´t seen her in a while have you?
- sob sob
- Hush hush. She kept screaming, so I cut her tongue out.
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Official trailer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WKAwfNdv0cs

Official sites
Japanese
http://www.chaser-movie.com/

French
http://www.hautetcourt.com/fiche.php?pkfilms=145

Info about the real events.
http://www.trutv.com/library/crime/serial_killers/weird/yoo_young_cheol/1.html

http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2010/05/113_49958.html

http://asianmediawiki.com/The_Chaser