With every passing month the demand for Korean movies and television series continues to grow and more and more continue to make their way to Netflix. This is now without good reason. The ability of Korean cinema to make gripping thrillers and action movies and series easily matches, and in some cases, even surpasses Hollywood. The latest testament to this fact is The Call.
Directed by Lee Chung-hyun, The Call is a dark mystery thriller that tells a tale of two young women who share the same home but live decades apart. Seo-Yeon (Park Shin-Hye) lives in the present while Young-Sook (Jeon Jong-seo) lives in the year 1999. However, their lives become irrevocably intertwined by a cordless phone in the house through which they begin to communicate and speak with each other.
The movie is a twisted tale of intertwined timelines. Think Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock’s The Lakehouse, with a dash of Ashton Kutcher’s The Butterfly Effect, but much more dark and twisted in its story.
The movie starts of pretty slow while the premise is established and the innerworkings of the phone are slowly revealed to the audience. However, once the two protagonists of the movie finally understand their predicament and begin to communicate with each other, sometime during the latter part of the first act, the story grabs your attention and never let’s go. As would be expected of such a movie, there are mindboggling twists and turns around every corner.
All the while, stellar performances from both lead actresses keep the movie and spectacular cinematography keep the movie firmly grounded in reality and stops it from drifting into the ridiculous spectrum, which is what usually happens to movies such as this. As good as the writing is, however, you will no doubt come across a few plot points that seem to defy logic, none more so than an end credit scene that almost derails the movie and tarnishes an otherwise spectacular story. That one gripe aside, the movie is terrific fun and one that we highly recommend.
The Call is available to watch on Netflix.
Director: Lee Chung-hyun
Starring: Park Shin-hye, Jeon Jong-seo, Sung-ryung Kim, El Lee, and Ho-San Park