The Wailing

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The movie in 3 sentences

• Jong-goo, an inept but well-meaning police officer, investigates a series of brutal murders and mysterious illnesses in a remote village. Suspicion falls on a reclusive Japanese stranger, but when Jong-goo’s young daughter begins showing signs of possession, he turns to a flamboyant shaman for help and becomes trapped between conflicting explanations of who—or what—is truly evil.
• I had already heard a great deal of praise for the film, particularly for the philosophical questions it poses about the boundary between good and evil and the difficulty of knowing whom to trust. It was also one of the first major films to place Korean shamanism at the center of its story, anticipating a trend that would become far more prominent a decade later. Still, I am not entirely convinced that the film has stood the test of time as a classic, nor am I as certain as others seem to be that Na Hong-jin is a truly great director.
• I did come away with a newfound respect for the Japanese actor Jun Kunimura. Despite being an established and highly respected actor, he continues to choose roles that are unusual, challenging, and not always conventionally “prestigious.” The fact that he is still pursuing interesting work in his eighties is what I would call real passion.
• I’m so sad that English translation is not doing any justice to the Korean script. Awesome writing.

My top 3 quotes

• 절대 현혹되지 마소
• 뭐시 중헌디
• 자네는 낚시할 적에 뭐가 걸릴지 알고 미끼를 던지는가? 그놈은 미끼를 던진것이여. 자네딸은 그 미끼를 확 물어분 것이고. 그놈도 뭐가 나올지는 지도 몰라겄지.