20 Amazing South Korean Movies You Must See Before You Die
7. Memories Of Murder
Long before his Oscar glory, Bong Joon-ho had already firmly established himself as a major talent not just within Korea but in world cinema as a whole. Indeed, with just his second feature back in 2003 Bong had already demonstrated himself as a director with a lot to offer.
Inspired by the real life then-unsolved Hwaseong serial murders that took place in the late 1980s, South Korea's first serial killer manhunt, Memories Of Murder's pitch sounds like a gritty true crime story. And, in some ways, it is that, but Bong's mastery of genre-mixing also delivers a film with a strong streak of dark comedy and even farce.
Regular Bong favourite Song Kang-ho alongside Kim Roi-ha play a pair of small town local cops in way over their head in a case of this magnitude, finding the first suspects they can grab and either trying to beat a confession out of them or attempting an unconvincing frame up.
Yes, Memories Of Murder comes with a hefty helping of comedic set pieces, but they are all in service of a very human story about flawed people becoming increasingly desperate in a truly impossible situation. As with much of Bong's later work, the comedy makes the humanity of the movie all the more apparent.