Review of Bedevilled

There’s something about the languid, slow paced, opening acts of this film which transform it from being a mere revenge film into something far more interesting and complex. I had a friend describe it to me as a Korean ‘I Spit On Your Grave’ and without any more information I girded my loins for transcendental violence. As it is the film is a kind of fascinating debut picture which has far more on its mind than simple blood and guts.

Set on a remote island on Korea, seemingly just off the mainland, the film follows a young career-woman (Hae-Woon) as she returns to her childhood home following a run in with some rapists in Seoul. There’s something rotten going on in this idyllic community, with its small populace split between five families. At the centre of the community is Kim Bok-nam a young woman, Hae-Woon’s childhood friend, who along with her daughter experiences both physical and emotional abuse from every male resident of the island and veiled contempt from every female resident. For the first hour or so of the movie we essentially watch as Bok-nam is systematically abused by everyone on the island and is ostracised by even her friend. Despite a few key moments of connection Hae-Woon is largely dissociated from her friends suffering, caught up in the crowd and incapable of action. It’s a film that is designed to make you broil with anger, tinged with a fatalistic view on society. Bak-run deserves none of the abuses she receive and none of the scorn she receives for simply being the subject of abuse.

As such when the tension is wound to its tightest point and Bok-nam is reduced to her lowest ebb we understand the sudden descent into violence. This is a film which views not only the abusers, but the people who turn away, as parts of the overall problem and it at times seems to be a polemic against wider society. I can understand a lot of people being turned off by the film, largely because how much focus is put on the abuse and how fatalistic the entire movie seems, but I think that focus allows us to understand a little of the humanity in Bok-nam even she becomes monstrously terrifying towards the end.

Whilst the turn to slasher film right at the end is a little awkward, it’s easy to understand the initial flashes of violence but Bok-nam’s full on turn into disassociated bringer of mallet based destruction feels a little off, isn’t handled particularly gracefully I think the film does a great job of building suspense and tension.

It’s definitely one of the more interesting, and rewarding, films I’ve seen this year. Well worth checking out.


9/10