HIDE AND SEEK (2013 - Korean)

Studio:       RAM Releasing
Director:    Jung Huh
Writer:       Jung Huh
Producer:  Eui-sung Kim
Stars:     Mi-seon Jeon, Jung-hee Moon, Hyeon-ju Son, Ji-yeong Kim

Review Score:

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Summary:

While investigating the disappearance of his brother, a man and his family become the targets of a mysterious figure determined to break into their home.

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Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

An unidentifiable figure wearing a dark motorcycle helmet follows Eun-hye back to her rundown apartment building. Eun-hye watches as the cyclist apparently enters the apartment next door. Inside her own apartment, Eun-hye discovers signs that an intruder has been there. She verbally threatens the cyclist through the door, warning him that her webcam recorded everything. Eun-hye is drawn to noises in the hallway, but finds only a little girl wearing a bandage over one eye. When she returns to her apartment, Eun-hye is attacked and killed by the cyclist who sneaked inside.

Sung-soo and his wife Min-ji live in a luxury high-rise with their daughter Su-ah and son Ho-she. Sung-soo receives a call that his estranged brother Sung-chul, with whom he has not spoken in years, has gone missing. Sung-soo goes to his brother’s apartment, which is in the same building as Eun-hye’s, to investigate.

While asking the neighbors about his brother, Sung-soo notices that a code is written underneath every unit’s doorbell. Sung-soo deduces that the code identifies the gender and number of residents in each apartment. As Ming-ji waits for her husband outside, a deranged homeless man accosts her children, but they are rescued by apartment resident Joo-hee. The little girl with the eye bandage is revealed to be Joo-hee’s daughter Pyeong-hwa.

Joo-hee invites Sung-soo and his family into her apartment and they get to know each other. When Joo-hee discovers that Sung-soo is Sung-chul’s brother, she angrily kicks everyone out and tells Sung-soo to stop his brother from peeping on her daughter.

Min-Ji takes the children home while Sung-soo continues looking around his brother’s apartment. Sung-soo uncovers a hidden panel that connect Sung-chul’s apartment with Eun-hye’s. Back at their own building, the helmeted cyclist reappears, terrorizing Min-Ji and her children. Surveillance cameras capture the figure on tape, but authorities are unable to identify him.

Flashbacks reveal that Sung-soo was adopted. When Sung-chul faced sexual assault allegations as a child, Sung-soo corroborated the story that sent Sung-chul away. The implication is made that Sung-soo lied because his brother’s skin disorder made him uncomfortable, and possibly because removing their birth son from the picture was the only way to inherit the parents’ fortune.

Sung-soo returns home to find the strange code system scrawled underneath all of the doorbells in his building. When a guilt-fueled nightmare causes Sung-soo to lash out in frustration, Min-ji vows to take the children with her to the United States.

Sung-soo eventually finds the cyclist again and gives chase. However, another man assaults Sung-soo. Sung-soo learns that this man is Eun-hye’s boyfriend, who has been searching for her since she too disappeared. The two men investigate the connection between Sung-chul and Eun-hye’s apartments and find Eun-hye’s body. Just then, the cyclist appears, killing Eun-hye’s boyfriend and causing Sung-soo to flee.

Sung-soo escapes to the apartment next door. Joo-hee is not home, but Pyeong-hwa lets him inside. When Sung-soo asks to borrow a cell phone, Pyeong-hwa produces an entire collection of them, including Min-ji’s missing phone. Sung-soo realizes that Joo-hee was the cyclist all along. She and her daughter had been breaking into other people’s homes and assuming their lives. Just as he realizes that his family is Joo-hee’s next target, Sung-soo finds his brother’s body in Pyeong-hwa’s closet. Joo-hee returns and knocks him unconscious.

Joo-hee takes Pyeong-hwa to the other apartment building, terrorizing Min-ji and her children once again. Sung-soo recovers and comes to their rescue. When Joo-hee gains the upper hand in their struggle, Sung-soo threatens to start a fire and destroy the home, which sends Joo-hee into a panic since her demented mind sees it as “her” house. Sung-soo lights the fire and Joo-hee tries so frantically to extinguish the blaze that she is consumed by the fire and dies. In the aftermath, it is revealed that Pyeong-hwa is still hiding inside the closet in Sung-soo’s apartment.

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Review:

Aside from a possibly unhealthy compulsion to scrub his skin until it bleeds and to make sure every bottle label faces the same direction in his refrigerator, Sung-soo leads an ideal life.  His wife is kept in fur coats, his two children appear content, and their entire family lives inside a luxury high-rise protected by electronic keypads and 24/7 video surveillance.

It turns out that Sung-soo’s OCD is rooted in a tragic event from his hush-hush past.  Sung-soo had a brother with a skin disorder.  Possibly to put those unsightly sores out of the picture, and possibly to put his hands on the family fortune, Sung-soo corroborated a story of sexual impropriety that sent his brother away at a very young age.  The truth of that damning accusation is a matter of some question.  Yet after receiving a phone call informing him that his now adult sibling is inexplicably missing, Sung-soo cannot let sleeping dogs lie.

Sung-soo investigates his estranged brother’s apartment.  Not only does he find hidden panels connecting multiple domiciles, but underneath every doorbell in the building is a crudely scribbled code.  Sung-soo quickly deduces that someone has identified the residents of each unit by gender and number, although for what reason he has no idea.  Things grow weirder still when he comes home to find the same code next to every door in his own building, and a shape in a black motorcycle helmet stalking his family.  Could this be the work of Sung-soo’s troubled brother, or is something more sinister afoot?

Korean thriller “Hide and Seek” is a masterful movie about being unsafe in one’s own home that doesn’t require killers in creative masks to make you feel uncomfortable.  “Hide and Seek’ would be a remarkable achievement in cinematic suspense no matter who turned out to be steering its course.  The fact that writer/director Jung Huh is a first-time feature filmmaker makes it all the more stunning.

Huh displays a natural instinct for camera placement and beat alternation that other directors spend entire careers developing an understanding of.  “Hide and Seek” features twists, flashbacks, and red herrings, but it is otherwise a straightforward tale that rarely slows down long enough to become predictable because its style is so invigorated.  Suspense is consistently tight whether Sung-soo is scrubbing a toilet or chasing a lead.  And the tension remains high from the very first setup all the way through to the very last scene.  Maintaining an unrelenting essence even when the story quiets down is a genuinely impressive feat.

The mystery is so maddening that it becomes excruciatingly frustrating in the most entertaining way possible.  You want so badly to see this persistent, faceless, silent stalker unmasked that you end up exemplifying those clichéd thriller descriptions as you find yourself edging up in your seat with an ever-tightening grip on the armrest, remote, or nearest loved one.

“Hide and Seek” arrives in an era when genre films constantly work around modern conveniences, always finding ways for cell phones to not work, or cutting a power cord to jump a scripting hurdle that way.  Cell phones play a key communication role in “Hide and Seek,” but Huh keeps their use organic to his main goal of delivering a character-driven mystery.  There is a subtle underlying message about how cameras, monitors, and passcodes only provide an illusion of security, and that no amount of surveillance and protective countermeasures can match the sheer determination of a psychopath with a lead pipe.  More interesting is how Huh weaves contemporary technology into clever story-related uses without making a big deal about it.

Undoubtedly, “Hide and Seek” would wobble on a house of cards if its story were held up to intense scrutiny.  Or maybe even just a pinch of scrutiny.  To maximize thrill satisfaction while watching, eliminate any thought that starts with “wait a minute” or backtracks towards a previous detail to recalculate if it adds up or not.

When an innocent bystander is pursued because he happens to be wearing the same distinct outfit as the mystery stalker, there is no arguing that it anything other than a contrived moment.  But no more so than when Ben Tramer met his demise in “Halloween II” because he was coincidentally decked out in the same coveralls and white mask as Michael Myers.  Such moments are so few and far between however, that turning the other cheek is done without “Hide and Seek” even asking.

The film relies on numerous shots of quiet creeping.  Trimming some of the ones that stretch too long might have sped the pace and made “Hide and Seek” a bona fide classic, but most of the moments are still effectively executed with expert precision.  There is little doubt that “Hide and Seek” would have its work cut out for it to come off as fully satisfying on a second viewing.  But it is that first spin that counts above all else, and that one is a true pulse-pounder grounded in a reality-based premise that is as frightening as it is fun.

NOTE: The film’s Korean title is “Sum-bakk-og-jil.”

Review Score:  85

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