I Saw the Devil
Encyclopedia
I Saw the Devil is a 2010 South Korean thriller film directed by Kim Ji-woon
, written by Park Hoon-jung and starring Lee Byung-hun
and Choi Min-sik
. The film premiered at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival
and had a limited U.S theatrical release. The film was Choi Min-sik's first major role since his self-imposed exile in protest of the changes to the Korean screen quota system. The film has received mostly positive reviews.
) drives up and offers to help fix her tire. Joo-yun turns down the request. However, she does not know that Kyung-chul is a sadistic murderer, and he ends up kidnapping her and brutally kills her. Afterwards, Kyung-chul cuts Joo-yun into pieces and scatters her body parts. The next day, a boy encounters one of Joo-yun's severed ears, and the police are called in to find the rest of the body, under the command of Section Chief Oh (Cheon Ho-jin) and Squad Chief Jang (Jeon Kuk-hwan), who is the father of Joo-yun. After it is confirmed that Joo-yun is the victim, her fiancée, Soo-hyun (Lee Byung-hun
), who is a secret agent, becomes determined to track down and take vengeance against Joo-yun's murderer, even if he is forced to become a monster himself.
After receiving a list of potential killers from Jang, Soo-hyun receives Kyung-chul's location from his son, whom he has abandoned and sent to live with his grandparents. Upon finding his fiancée's wedding ring in Kyung-chul's home, Soo-hyun attacks him in his greenhouse, while Kyung-chul is raping one of his would-be victims. After suffocating him until he passes out and breaking his wrist, Soo-hyun places a transmitter inside Kyung-chul, so he can find his exact location and listen to his conversations. Waking up, Kyung-chul goes to a hospital where he sexually assaults a nurse, only to be again attacked by Soo-hyun, who severs his achilles tendon
.
Kyung-chul goes to the home of his friend Tae-joo (Choi Moo-sung), a cannibalistic murderer, for a place to stay. After explaining his situation, Tae-joo remarks that whoever is after him must have some relation towards one of his victims. Through the transmitter, Soo-hyun arrives at the house, where he proceeds to incapacitate both murderers and Tae-joo's girlfriend Se-jung (Kim In-seo). The next day, both Tae-joo and Se-jung are found by the police and sent to a hospital. Meanwhile, Kyung-chul is sent to a private medical area where he and Soo-hyun are treated for the their wounds by a trusted subordinate of Soo-hyun's. However, a barely conscious Kyung-chul manages to learn about the transmitter inside him.
While Soo-hyun is buying painkillers, Kyung-chul taunts him over the transmitter, now knowing who he is and how he's being tracked. To make Soo-hyun lose track of him, Kyung-chul injures a clerk, defecates out the transmitter, and places it inside a taxi driver he assaults, and then steals his car. Determined to find out where Kyung-chul is going, Soo-hyun interrogates Tae-joo and learns that Kyung-chul is going after Joo-yun's family; Jang and Joo-yun's sister Se-yun (Kim Yun-seo). Afterward, Kyung-chul intends to turn himself over to the police.
Soo-hyun arrives too late to stop Kyung-chul, who blinds Jang with a dumbbell and murders Se-yun. However, he manages to prevent the police from capturing Kyung-chul by abducting him before Oh and his men can reach him. Soo-hyun brings Kyung-chul to his old home, where he states his intent to only kill Kyung-chul when he is filled with fear and pain. Eventually, Soo-hyun sets up a guillotine above Kyung-chul's head that will be activated when his parents or son open the door to the room he is in. Placing a new transmitter nearby, Soo-hyun's hears the death of Kyung-chul and his family's reaction to his decapitated corpse. He attempts to walk away from the house, but breaks down crying on the street.
forced Kim to recut the film for its theatrical release, objecting to its violent content. Otherwise, the film would have received a "Restricted" rating, preventing any sort of release in theaters or on home video. Seven cuts were made with the total run time of removed material between eighty and ninety seconds. It was made available in its original form in other countries.
on 21 January, 2011. It also received screenings at several other international film festivals, including the Fantasporto
Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival
, Sitges Film Festival, San Sebastian Film Festival and the London Korean Film Festival.
American distribution rights were acquired by Magnet Releasing who released it in theatres on a limited basis on March 4, 2011.
The film was met with generally positive reviews. Review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes
gave the film a rating of 81% based on 72 reviews, with an average score of 7.2/10. However, Rotten Tomatoes' selected top critics gave the film a mixed rating of 55% based on 11 reviews. Metacritic
assigned the film a score of 67%, based on a weighted average of 19 reviews from mainstream critics.
Jeannette Catsoulis of The New York Times
wrote "From an unexpectedly moving first act to a hilariously disgusting sojourn with Kyung-chul’s cannibal pal, Mr. Kim and his cinematographer, Lee Mogae, retain complete control of the film’s fluctuating tones and impressive set pieces."
Mark Olson of the Los Angeles Times
wrote "There is all the violent mayhem, for certain, but the thing that sets I Saw the Devil apart is its undercurrent of real emotion and how unrelentingly sad it can be."
Rob Nelson from Variety magazine
stated that "Repugnant content, grislier than the ugliest torture porn, ought to have made the film unwatchable, but it doesn't, simply because Kim's pic is so beautifully filmed, carefully structured and viscerally engaging."
2011 17th FANT-Bilbao Fantasy Film Festival
2011 29th Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival
2011 5th Asian Film Awards
2011 31st Fantasporto
Film Festival
2011 Festival international du film fantastique de Gérardmer
2010 31st Blue Dragon Film Awards
2010 13th Director's Cut Awards
2010 47th Grand Bell Awards
Special features include:
It was released on DVD and Blu-ray Disc in the US on May 10, 2011 which will include deleted scenes and "HDNet: A Look at I Saw the Devil".
Kim Ji-Woon
Kim Ji-woon is a South Korean film director and screenwriter. Kim Ji-woon has a history of successfully tackling a wide range of film genres, garnering a cult following among Asian films fans all over the world.-Career:...
, written by Park Hoon-jung and starring Lee Byung-hun
Lee Byung-Hun
Lee Byung-hun is a South Korean actor, singer and model. He has starred in popular television dramas such as Iris , All In and Beautiful Days...
and Choi Min-sik
Choi Min-sik
Choi Min-sik is a South Korean actor. He is best known for his critically acclaimed roles in Oldboy and I Saw the Devil.-Movie career:...
. The film premiered at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival
Sundance Film Festival
The Sundance Film Festival is a film festival that takes place annually in Utah, in the United States. It is the largest independent cinema festival in the United States. Held in January in Park City, Salt Lake City, and Ogden, as well as at the Sundance Resort, the festival is a showcase for new...
and had a limited U.S theatrical release. The film was Choi Min-sik's first major role since his self-imposed exile in protest of the changes to the Korean screen quota system. The film has received mostly positive reviews.
Plot
During a snowy night, the car of Joo-yun (Oh San-ha) gets a flat tire and Kyung-chul (Choi Min-sikChoi Min-sik
Choi Min-sik is a South Korean actor. He is best known for his critically acclaimed roles in Oldboy and I Saw the Devil.-Movie career:...
) drives up and offers to help fix her tire. Joo-yun turns down the request. However, she does not know that Kyung-chul is a sadistic murderer, and he ends up kidnapping her and brutally kills her. Afterwards, Kyung-chul cuts Joo-yun into pieces and scatters her body parts. The next day, a boy encounters one of Joo-yun's severed ears, and the police are called in to find the rest of the body, under the command of Section Chief Oh (Cheon Ho-jin) and Squad Chief Jang (Jeon Kuk-hwan), who is the father of Joo-yun. After it is confirmed that Joo-yun is the victim, her fiancée, Soo-hyun (Lee Byung-hun
Lee Byung-Hun
Lee Byung-hun is a South Korean actor, singer and model. He has starred in popular television dramas such as Iris , All In and Beautiful Days...
), who is a secret agent, becomes determined to track down and take vengeance against Joo-yun's murderer, even if he is forced to become a monster himself.
After receiving a list of potential killers from Jang, Soo-hyun receives Kyung-chul's location from his son, whom he has abandoned and sent to live with his grandparents. Upon finding his fiancée's wedding ring in Kyung-chul's home, Soo-hyun attacks him in his greenhouse, while Kyung-chul is raping one of his would-be victims. After suffocating him until he passes out and breaking his wrist, Soo-hyun places a transmitter inside Kyung-chul, so he can find his exact location and listen to his conversations. Waking up, Kyung-chul goes to a hospital where he sexually assaults a nurse, only to be again attacked by Soo-hyun, who severs his achilles tendon
Achilles tendon
The Achilles tendon , also known as the calcaneal tendon or the tendo calcaneus, is a tendon of the posterior leg. It serves to attach the plantaris, gastrocnemius and soleus muscles to the calcaneus bone.- Anatomy :The Achilles is the tendonous extension of 3 muscles in the lower leg:...
.
Kyung-chul goes to the home of his friend Tae-joo (Choi Moo-sung), a cannibalistic murderer, for a place to stay. After explaining his situation, Tae-joo remarks that whoever is after him must have some relation towards one of his victims. Through the transmitter, Soo-hyun arrives at the house, where he proceeds to incapacitate both murderers and Tae-joo's girlfriend Se-jung (Kim In-seo). The next day, both Tae-joo and Se-jung are found by the police and sent to a hospital. Meanwhile, Kyung-chul is sent to a private medical area where he and Soo-hyun are treated for the their wounds by a trusted subordinate of Soo-hyun's. However, a barely conscious Kyung-chul manages to learn about the transmitter inside him.
While Soo-hyun is buying painkillers, Kyung-chul taunts him over the transmitter, now knowing who he is and how he's being tracked. To make Soo-hyun lose track of him, Kyung-chul injures a clerk, defecates out the transmitter, and places it inside a taxi driver he assaults, and then steals his car. Determined to find out where Kyung-chul is going, Soo-hyun interrogates Tae-joo and learns that Kyung-chul is going after Joo-yun's family; Jang and Joo-yun's sister Se-yun (Kim Yun-seo). Afterward, Kyung-chul intends to turn himself over to the police.
Soo-hyun arrives too late to stop Kyung-chul, who blinds Jang with a dumbbell and murders Se-yun. However, he manages to prevent the police from capturing Kyung-chul by abducting him before Oh and his men can reach him. Soo-hyun brings Kyung-chul to his old home, where he states his intent to only kill Kyung-chul when he is filled with fear and pain. Eventually, Soo-hyun sets up a guillotine above Kyung-chul's head that will be activated when his parents or son open the door to the room he is in. Placing a new transmitter nearby, Soo-hyun's hears the death of Kyung-chul and his family's reaction to his decapitated corpse. He attempts to walk away from the house, but breaks down crying on the street.
Cast
- Lee Byung-hunLee Byung-HunLee Byung-hun is a South Korean actor, singer and model. He has starred in popular television dramas such as Iris , All In and Beautiful Days...
as Soo-hyun - Choi Min-sikChoi Min-sikChoi Min-sik is a South Korean actor. He is best known for his critically acclaimed roles in Oldboy and I Saw the Devil.-Movie career:...
as Kyung-chul - Jeon Kuk-hwan as Squad Chief Jang
- Cheon Ho-jin as Section Chief Oh
- Oh San-ha as Joo-yun
- Kim Yun-seo as Se-yun
- Choi Moo-sung as Tae-joo
- Kim In-seo as Se-jung
Alternate versions
The Korea Media Rating BoardKorea Media Rating Board
The Korea Media Rating Board ' is a ratings organization in South Korea. They rate movies, videos, stage performances, and phonogrames. The current chairperson is Kyung-Soon Lee...
forced Kim to recut the film for its theatrical release, objecting to its violent content. Otherwise, the film would have received a "Restricted" rating, preventing any sort of release in theaters or on home video. Seven cuts were made with the total run time of removed material between eighty and ninety seconds. It was made available in its original form in other countries.
Reception
I Saw The Devil was released in South Korea on August 12, 2010. The film premiered at the Sundance Film FestivalSundance Film Festival
The Sundance Film Festival is a film festival that takes place annually in Utah, in the United States. It is the largest independent cinema festival in the United States. Held in January in Park City, Salt Lake City, and Ogden, as well as at the Sundance Resort, the festival is a showcase for new...
on 21 January, 2011. It also received screenings at several other international film festivals, including the Fantasporto
Fantasporto
Fantasporto, also known as Fantas, is an international film festival, annually organized since 1981 in Porto, Portugal. Giving screen space to commercial feature films, auteur films and experimental projects from all over the world, Fantasporto has created enthusiastic audiences, ranging from...
Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival
Toronto International Film Festival
The Toronto International Film Festival is a publicly-attended film festival held each September in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. In 2010, 339 films from 59 countries were screened at 32 screens in downtown Toronto venues...
, Sitges Film Festival, San Sebastian Film Festival and the London Korean Film Festival.
American distribution rights were acquired by Magnet Releasing who released it in theatres on a limited basis on March 4, 2011.
Critical
| Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance... |
Metacritic Metacritic Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,... |
||
|---|---|---|---|
| All Critics | Top Critics | Audience | |
| 81% (72 reviews) | 55% (11 reviews) | 85% (11,934 reviews) | 67/100 (38 reviews) |
The film was met with generally positive reviews. Review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
gave the film a rating of 81% based on 72 reviews, with an average score of 7.2/10. However, Rotten Tomatoes' selected top critics gave the film a mixed rating of 55% based on 11 reviews. Metacritic
Metacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...
assigned the film a score of 67%, based on a weighted average of 19 reviews from mainstream critics.
Jeannette Catsoulis of The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
wrote "From an unexpectedly moving first act to a hilariously disgusting sojourn with Kyung-chul’s cannibal pal, Mr. Kim and his cinematographer, Lee Mogae, retain complete control of the film’s fluctuating tones and impressive set pieces."
Mark Olson of the Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
wrote "There is all the violent mayhem, for certain, but the thing that sets I Saw the Devil apart is its undercurrent of real emotion and how unrelentingly sad it can be."
Rob Nelson from Variety magazine
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
stated that "Repugnant content, grislier than the ugliest torture porn, ought to have made the film unwatchable, but it doesn't, simply because Kim's pic is so beautifully filmed, carefully structured and viscerally engaging."
Awards and nominations
2011 47th Paeksang Arts AwardsPaekSang Arts Awards
PaekSang Arts Awards, also known as BaekSang Arts Awards, is an awards ceremony held annually by IS PLUS Corp, since 1965. It is to honour outstanding achievements in the South Korean entertainment industry and to garner public attention upon the best in Korean films and dramas...
- Grand Prize Award for Film - Lee Byung-hunLee Byung-HunLee Byung-hun is a South Korean actor, singer and model. He has starred in popular television dramas such as Iris , All In and Beautiful Days...
2011 17th FANT-Bilbao Fantasy Film Festival
- Official Selection Best Film
2011 29th Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival
- Golden Raven
2011 5th Asian Film Awards
Asian Film Awards
The Asian Film Awards are presented annually by the Hong Kong International Film Festival Society to recognize excellence of film professionals in the film industries of Asian cinema.-History:...
- Best Editing – Nam Na-youngNam Na-youngNam Na-young is a female South Korean film editor and negative cutter. She won an Asian Film Award for her work on I Saw the Devil. She was born in 1971 in Busan and graduated from Kyungsung University's Department of Theater and Film.- Filmography :...
- Nomination - Best Cinematographer - Mogae Lee
2011 31st Fantasporto
Fantasporto
Fantasporto, also known as Fantas, is an international film festival, annually organized since 1981 in Porto, Portugal. Giving screen space to commercial feature films, auteur films and experimental projects from all over the world, Fantasporto has created enthusiastic audiences, ranging from...
Film Festival
- Fantasy section Best Director - Kim Ji-woonKim Ji-WoonKim Ji-woon is a South Korean film director and screenwriter. Kim Ji-woon has a history of successfully tackling a wide range of film genres, garnering a cult following among Asian films fans all over the world.-Career:...
- Orient Express sidebar Best Film
2011 Festival international du film fantastique de Gérardmer
- International Critic Choice Award
- Young Jury Award
- Public Choice Award
2010 31st Blue Dragon Film Awards
Blue Dragon Film Awards
The Blue Dragon Film Awards is an annual awards ceremony that is presented annually by Sports Chosun for excellence in film in South Korea....
- Best Cinematography – Lee Mo-gae
- Best Music – Mowg
- Best Lighting – Oh Seung-chul
- Nomination – Best Leading Actor – Lee Byung-hunLee Byung-HunLee Byung-hun is a South Korean actor, singer and model. He has starred in popular television dramas such as Iris , All In and Beautiful Days...
- Nomination – Best Art Direction – Jo Hwa-sung
- Nomination – Technical Award – Jung Do-ahn, Lee Hee-kyung
2010 13th Director's Cut Awards
- Best Actor – Choi Min-sikChoi Min-sikChoi Min-sik is a South Korean actor. He is best known for his critically acclaimed roles in Oldboy and I Saw the Devil.-Movie career:...
2010 47th Grand Bell Awards
Grand Bell Awards
The Grand Bell Awards is an awards ceremony presented annually by The Motion Pictures Association of Korea for excellence in film in South Korea....
- Best Lighting – Oh Seung-chul
- Nomination – Best Actor – Lee Byung-hunLee Byung-HunLee Byung-hun is a South Korean actor, singer and model. He has starred in popular television dramas such as Iris , All In and Beautiful Days...
- Nomination – Best Actor – Choi Min-sikChoi Min-sikChoi Min-sik is a South Korean actor. He is best known for his critically acclaimed roles in Oldboy and I Saw the Devil.-Movie career:...
- Nomination – Best Film
Home media
The film was released on DVD in South Korea on 29 March, 2011 as a 3 disc set, which contains both the Korean theatrical version and international version.Special features include:
- Making Of
- Art Direction
- Action Featurette
- Costume and Makeup
- Special Makeup
- Interview Collection
- Music Featurette
- Additional Scenes with Director Commentary
- Poster Shoot
It was released on DVD and Blu-ray Disc in the US on May 10, 2011 which will include deleted scenes and "HDNet: A Look at I Saw the Devil".