I Saw the Devil (2010)

“The cat-and-mouse dynamic between Soo-hyeon and Kyung-chul is nothing short of Fincheresque (think The Game, Se7en, Gone Girl, or Zodiac), and we rarely know who is in the driver’s seat. It doesn’t hurt that both actors are excellent in their roles—particularly Choi Min-sik in his most high-octane role since 2003’s Oldboy. Kim Ji-woon’s penchant for drawing emotion out of his characters’ faces accentuates the performances, giving every scene a real sense of presence for the viewer.

Though you never stop rooting for Soo-hyeon, there are several times when you have to ask yourself, “Is he going too far? Should I be feeling the way I feel?” There’s no clear path to victory for the viewer, which is a brilliant way to turn the revenge-action genre on its head. It’s a genre that appeals to the viewer’s desire to take matters into their own hands—fulfilling their wish for a renegade type of justice in which we could never actually engage. There is a certain moral ambiguity that is necessarily present in this kind of anti-hero driven film. With I Saw the Devil, however, Kim Ji-woon expertly approaches this ambiguity head-on, challenging our perception of vigilante justice and how we identify with protagonists in these films.” – What Sleeps Beneath

“Beneath the broken bodies and rivers of blood, I Saw the Devil is an unrelentingly melancholic film. Soo-hyun’s vendetta is at once sympathetic and accessible to the audience, in no small part due to the rather moving first act. Though the ghastliness and mayhem gradually escalate – resulting in a glaring inevitable shift in the paradigm – it is Lee Byung-hun’s remarkable performance as the heartbroken agent that shines through. So while the violence may reach ‘torture porn’ levels of uncomfortable, there’s at least a compelling framework to provide context. The ‘revenge’ isn’t just a series of hollow encounters designed to showcase crowd-pleasing gore effects as is the case with most revenge-thrillers. No, it’s there to give a point of reference to the downward spiral of madness. See, the real horror of I Saw the Devil isn’t just Kyung-chul’s depravity, but that the capacity for animalistic violence exists within us all – highlighted by the fact that we so readily identify with Soo-hyun’s campaign. I’m reminded of the iconic phrase by Friedrich Nietzsche. I believe it goes something like: “He who fights monsters should see to it that the Koreans don’t turn it into another pissing revenge-thriller.”” – Midnight Cinema

“here’s no shortage of Korean revenge-thrillers, but this, along with the recent The Man from Nowhere, proves there is plenty of life left in the genre. Unlike Oldboy (where you’ll have seen this film’s villain, Choi Min-sik, taking the lead), this one doesn’t rewrite the book, but it does take the familiar elements and pushes them far beyond extremes to brutal and mesmeric effect. A serial killer’s latest victim turns out to be the wife of a highly-trained government secret agent who turns the tables on the murderer, relentlessly pursuing him to ensure that he experiences the same terror he instilled in his victims. But the roles of cat and mouse keep switching, the evil at play so pervasive and corrosive that even those on the periphery of the agent’s quest for vengeance have their lives drastically changed or ended. Utterly compelling and adroitly told.” The Guardian