Into the Mirror 거울속으로 written and directed by Kim Seong-ho(김성호) 2007
27 December 2007I picked this one up because Yoo Ji Tae has proven to be a good actor in the past (especially disturbing in Old Boy), and this is an enjoyable horror film with an interesting conceit, a world behind the mirror. A fun film with an enjoyable ending. I actually watched the Chinese Region 3 disc of this film, which has English subs, and is significantly cheaper than the Korean disc.
At a huge department store named Dreampia in Seoul there was a huge fire the year before under unusual circumstances, and they are now working to re-open the store on time and restore money to the stock holders. A woman named Choi Mi Jeng (Lee Yeong Jin 이영진) steals a MP3 for her friends birthday, and also a pizza cutter, then her image in the mirror uses the pizza cutter to slice her throat, though it is deemed a suicide. Now we meet Yong-min (Yoo Ji-tae 유지태) a former police inspector, who had some accident where he caused his partner to be shot, and is no longer a police, but works for his uncle as security at Dreampia. Then another worker has an apparent suicide by shoving a pen into his ear, and the actual police are brought in to check the possible serial killer. A former colleague of his is brought in, his name is Hyeon-su (Kim Myeong-min (김명민) who has nothing but contempt for Yong Min. The security director gives Yong Min a gun and tells him to investigate on his own. Yong-min finds that there was a single employee death in the fire, and the rest of the people in her department are the ones who are dying, including one who quite and is going insane in his apartment, bouncing like a mad man.
REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS…
Yong-min finds that the the women who died in the fire has a twin sister named Lee Ji-heyon (Kim Myeong-min 김명민) who is hiding in the department store, and searching for her sister in the mirrors there. Yong-min tries to convince Hyeon-su, but he won’t listen, and wants to arrest Lee Ji-Hyeon for the murders.
Eventually the last employee is killed with Yong-min’s gun, so he is arrested, but Hyeon-su has started to believe, even though it may cost him his promotion. We learn that Yong-min in fact shot a mirror image instead of the killer, which caused his partner to be killed, but the mortician saw the bullet in the killer’s mirror image.
Yong-mi gets out and with ji Heyon head to the department store and start smashing mirrors and find her sisters body behind a mirror, and then the security director who has plotted to take over the store comes out. He killed her because he was using the department to betray the store, and she betrayed him, so he killed her, and she has been killing the people who betrayed her.
Yong-min is shot, but manages to save Ji-heyon, but in the hospital things are strange, even mirrored, and we realize that in fact in the real world he died, but his mirror image lives on.
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An interesting twist on parallel worlds, and the worlds within. Not always successful, but fairly enjoyable overall.
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