Memories of Murder (2003)

While I do try to keep up with the terrific flow of Korean movies that reach our shores, I hadn't seen this one previously, despite its many positive reviews.  It is an earlier effort from director Joon-ho Bong and lead actor Kang-ho Song, both familiar to me now from the current mega-hit "The Host".  It's a long and fairly slowly-paced policier and I had to control my anger at the police procedures on display, although these did have their comic overtones.  Based on a true series of murders, we are in a backwater town in the late '80s where Song and his sidekick on the local force are so stripped for resources that their approach is to torture a confession out of their very unlikely suspects and they are not beyond planting evidence to get a conviction.  A smart-ass detective from Seoul is seconded to the unit; he has a more sophisticated approach to crime-solving and initially it seems that his logic may unearth the hidden truths. However he too is eventually undermined by the frustrations of the search; it is unsettling to see anger and impatience overtake logic and this is part of what I think will haunt me about this movie.  To this day the killer has not been caught but a flash-forward to a latter-day Song who has left the force reminds us that there are killers walking among us who might just look like you or me.