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- The Spirits Are Strong as Occult Films Invade Local Screens
- by Pierce Conran / Sep 09, 2019
- Korean Supernatural Horror on the Rise
Last month, just shy of the two thirds mark of the year, the Korean box office welcomed its third mainstream occult film. Metamorphosis became the second of these to top the charts (after SVAHA : THE SIXTH FINGER) as the genre becomes an increasingly common fixture in Korean cinemas.Much as is the case elsewhere around the world, the horror film has seen a resurgence on the charts in Korea. When it comes to ghost stories, the lion’s share of the spoils has gone to Hollywood fare such as the popular The Conjuring series, with GONJIAM: Haunted Asylum (2018) holding a lone beacon for Korean ghost stories at the box office. However, where the local industry has excelled has been with bigger supernatural works anchored in religious themes. 2015 truly kicked off this trend with JANG Jae-hyun’s The Priests, while 2016 kept things going a few months later with the release of NA Hong-jin’s THE WAILING (it also introduced the Korean zombies to mainstream Korean cinema to spectacular effect with TRAIN TO BUSAN).These films, which concern men of the cloth or shamanists engaging in exorcisms and rituals, hark back to the New Hollywood classics of horror, such as Roman POLANSKI’s Rosemary’s Baby, William FRIEDKIN’s The Exorcist and Richard DONNER’s The Omen, while also straying from horror conventions and providing a Korean twist. Studios were quick to take notice and the trend has only gotten more prominent since then.For this week’s KoBiz newsletter, we’re taking a look at some of the most possessed films in Korea’s recent output.Metamorphosis
Director KIM Hong-sunRelease Date August 21, 2019Just three short weeks after The Divine Fury, Korean audiences were treated to yet another exorcism-laden occult tale in Metamorphosis. From The Con Artists (2014) and The Chase (2017) director KIM Hong-sun, the film sees a family (with SUNG Dong-il and JANG Yeong-nam playing the parents) move into a new home only to soon be terrorized by a power in the residence who takes the form of different members of the family in turn. The patriarch calls his estranged priest brother, played by BAE Sung-woo, when he realizes he has nowhere else to turn.Adding Korean family dynamics and a cramped (mostly) single location to the popular occult format, director KIM shows us a new face of Korean supernatural horror with a tale that seems to be just the ticket for late summer audiences this year.The Divine Fury
Director Jason KIMRelease Date July 31, 2019A few years ago it might have been hard to imagine that the summer’s priciest offering would be an occult action-thriller poised as the start of a new franchise, but that’s exactly what happened with The Divine Fury, the second mainstream work (fourth overall) from Midnight Runners (2017) director Jason KIM.KIM teamed up with his Midnight Runners star PARK Seo-jun once more, here playing an MMA fighter with a chip on his shoulder after having lost his father as a child who develops a stigma on his palm. He visits a church to heal it, where he meets a priest (AHN Sung-ki) in the middle of an exorcism. The unlikely pair soon form a bond and before long they find themselves going up against a dangerous man possessed with the power of the devil.SVAHA : THE SIXTH FINGER
Director JANG Jae-hyunRelease Date February 20, 2019Director JANG Jae-hyun brought us down a dark and tormented path at the beginning of this year with his devilishly plotted sophomore chiller SVAHA : THE SIXTH FINGER. Following on from the more traditional thrills of his debut The Priests, his latest dives deep into theological territories, weaving a chilling mystery by thatching together elements from several religions. Diligent research notwithstanding, the film also explores a rising mistrust of religious groups, in the wake of many documented cases of fraudulent cults that swindled people out of their savings and sometimes even more. This theme was also the main building block of YEON Sang-ho’s searing animated effort The Fake (2013), which was actually brought to the small screen this year as a live action version called Save Me 2, from director LEE Kwon.LEE Jung-jae stars as a man who investigates suspect religions and when he looks into the organization known as Deer Mount, he quickly finds himself mired in unsolved murders and unexplained happenings as the crumbs he follows drag him further and further away from his reality.THE WAILING
Director NA Hong-jinRelease Date May 12, 2016Though NA Hong-jin was an established name with a pair of acclaimed and commercially successful films under his belt (The Chaser, 2008; The Yellow Sea, 2010), few could expect that his third outing, a dark and heady 160-minute mix of shamanistic rituals in the countryside, would take the box office by storm. But that’s exactly what happened when THE WAILING, which screened out of competition in Cannes in 2016, became the director’s biggest hit with close to seven million viewers (USD 46.13 million).A small rural town descends into terror as a series of bizarre deaths and even stranger behavior run rampant throughout the area, all after the arrival of a mysterious foreigner. A helpless local cop, whose own daughter seems afflicted by the malevolent force, hires a shaman to try and rid the village of whatever is causing the chaos.A sterling cast comprised of KWAK Do-won, HWANG Jung-min, CHUN Woo-hee and Japanese star JUN Kunimura leads us down into an unforgettable pit of fear and panic, which includes several pulse-raising showstoppers.The Priests
Director JANG Jae-hyunRelease Date November 5, 2015Four years before releasing SVAHA : THE SIXTH FINGER, JANG Jae-hyun became one of the chief architects of the current occult film boom when he debuted with the smash hit exorcism chiller The Priests (2015).Adapted from his own short film 12th Assistant Deacon, the film pairs superstars KIM Yun-seok and GANG Dong-won as a solemn priest and rebellious young seminarian who must force a demonic spirit out of a young girl’s body (played by PARK So-dam of PARASITE). Massively inspired by William FRIEDKIN’s seminal occult classic The Exorcist, the film takes a very sober and traditional approach to the genre, while also twisting in some Korean characterizations and a memorable shamanism ritual, which adds a strong local flavor.Possessed
Director LEE Yong-juRelease Date August 12, 2009Released in 2009, several years past the heyday of Korean horror films but long before their current resurgence, Possessed remains one of the most impressive films in the Korean horror cannon, though it was released at a time when it had little chance of finding an audience. A college student returns home from school when her sister goes missing, but rather than alert the police, her pious mother believes that only prayer will bring her back. The police do get involved, but only after several bodies start to pile up in the dilapidated building.Director LEE Yong-ju imbues the film with a mix of Christian and shamanistic styles, a combination that while common now was very novel a decade ago. To this day, few films have pulled off the mix so well. Making a complete about-face, director LEE struck box office gold in 2012, with his nostalgia-tinted romantic drama Architecture 101.
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