When film fans think of hard-hitting, confrontational South Korean cinema, the first name which springs to mind is Park Chan-wook, the ultra stylish director of the Vengeance trilogy in which the central entry, Oldboy, has gone down as a masterpiece of Korean cinema. Oldboy and the other Vengeance movies are certainly deserving of their accolades, but all too often their popularity tends to overshadow other South Korean films which are equally deserving of a wider audience. This applies perhaps most of all to Kim Ji-woon's I Saw The Devil, which stars Lee Byung-hun as an intelligence officer hunting down the serial killer who tortured and murdered his pregnant wife. The serial killer is instantly recognisable to fans of Oldboy - played by Choi Min-sik with a fevered intensity and wild-eyed mania, it's one of the greatest screen villain performances you're likely to see. It's certainly miles ahead of his more recent forgettable appearance in Luc Besson's Lucy.
