Samaritan Girl - DVD Review

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Review

Movie:
This is Kim Ki Duk’s 10th film and one for which he won the Silver Berlin Bear for best director. Made in 2004, the same year he also released and won a host of prizes for film number 11, 3 IRON (including the special director award at the Venice film festival), SAMARITAN GIRL is an unsettling film told in three parts.

The first part starts by establishing the intimate relationship between two schoolgirls, Jae-Young and Yeo-Jin, who are chatting on MSN Messenger and trying to land a male client for Jae-Young. They successfully arrange a meeting, with one being the pimp for the other. The girl who prostitutes herself begins to become emotionally involved with some of her clients, a fact jealously pointed out by the other. We find out that the girls are saving money for two tickets to visit Europe. On one occasion, the police turn up to the hotel where the liaison is taking place, and with a smile on her face, Jae-Young jumps out of the 3rd floor window…leading to her death. This begins the second and most interesting part of the film where Yeo-Jin vows to return all the money they have made back to the previous clients…after they have had sex together, so that she can experience what her friend went through. Posing as the ‘real Jae-Young’, she begins to take these relationships in her stride, much as her friend had done. During one such meeting, she is seen by her father, who is a cop and situated across the street after his arrival at a gruesome murder scene. A switch in the narrative then begins as we start to follow her dad, who himself begins to follow his daughter. He confronts the clients that she sees, with gradually worse and more shocking results coming for the males in question. This leads into the 3rd part of the film where the girl has successfully revisited all of her friend’s clients and the dad has metered out justice to those whom he has visited. They go on a trip to the countryside to visit their wife/mum’s grave and the dad seeks to bond with his daughter again. As she was unaware that her dad had been following her, we mainly see this trip from his perspective. His pain is clear and the journey remains symbolic…which leads into another one of Kim Ki Duk’s endings that could be debated until the end of man. Like in the masterful THE ISLE, the soon to be released TIME, and to a lesser extent 3 IRON, SPRING SUMMER, WINTER, AUTUMN …AND SPRING, ADDRESS UNKNOWN and THE COAST GUARD, the ending facilitates debate, which in the time of neatly tied up Hollywood endings is a breath of fresh air. Not only does in make you rethink what you have watched, it also elevates his films to another level.

The film itself, as you can gather from the above, works not so much on a realistic and plausibility level but more in a metaphoric and thought provoking way, even though the film itself uses realism in its storytelling to convey unfolding events. The camera mainly stays handheld, which gives the film an intensity and the feel that you are never quite sure what will happen next, which is especially evident during the middle part of the film where we begin to follow the father. The film also uses natural sound to sell the conceit.

The acting is also exceptional, not least by the father played by Eol Lee whose pain we can feel just by his facial expression throughout. Starting out as the loving single parent, his journey takes him through the darkest days of parenthood as he watches his daughter grow up in the most alarming of ways. The two girls also put in strong performances, especially Min-Jeong Seo, the girl who copies her friends behaviour and seeks to shed her own guilt at having a hand in her best friends death. Given more speaking opportunities that we would normally expect in a Kim Ki Duk film (in 3 IRON for example, neither of the main characters actually speaks) it is refreshing to see that he changes around this formula and is not typecast by the clear skill he has for telling a story in images alone.

Unfortunately, the film is not accompanied by any extras whatsoever but as with many of Tartan’s releases, it is the film itself that is the lure. The picture is presented in Anamorphic 1.85:1 and is a quality copy. It faithfully preserves the tone of the film stock, and as the majority of the film takes place during the onset of Autumn, the colours of the changing trees and the leaf filled streets add a dab of colour to the grey look of the city. The sound comes in Tartan’s usual suspects: Dolby Digital 2.0 and 5.1 Surround and in DTS Surround 5.1. I listened to it in Stereo and found myself immersed in the film’s world. The sounds were crisp and I felt transported out of my front room, which in Athens is a miracle as you are never more than 2 seconds away from a huge lorry flying past your window.

Overall:
This wasn’t the first time I had seen this movie because I plugged for the region 3 version two years back so I wasn’t hit with the force of the film like the first time I watched it. On that viewing I didn’t know what was going to happen, so I sat opened mouthed during certain segments and I just couldn’t predict which way the story would go. The effortlessly brilliant storytelling of this Korean director is something to behold, which is probably the reason why he is now one of the most highly anticipated filmmakers on the international circuit. This film retains his unique storytelling ability and manages to blend controversial subject matter (Internet chat rooms, underage sex, prostitution) universal issues (young love, paternal love) with suspense and considerable drama. The film also has many shocking scenes and although they are not all as violent as those that take place in his other films, like the hook sequences in THE ISLE or the resolution to ADDRESS UNKNOWN, they leave the viewer in a state of permanent tension about what will follow. I can’t recommend this film highly enough…so I won’t….just get hold of it and give it a go, you might be surprised with what you get.

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