Asian Horror 101: Ten Pre-Remake Originals You Need to See
by Brian Tallerico

8. Memories of Murder (South Korea, Joon-ho Bong, '03)

This one might be the biggest stretch when it comes to "Horror," but if you consider Se7en or Zodiac horror films, it definitely qualifies. Before he made The Host, Joon-ho Bong made an amazing thriller called Memories of Murder about the search for a serial killer in South Korea and how it drove a couple of detectives crazy. The movie has a lot in common with Zodiac (I wouldn't be surprised to find out that Fincher was influenced by it) in that it's more about the procedure than the crimes, but like Fincher's excellent film, it also features some incredibly tense sequences. Try and watch the final scenes without feeling the same hair-on-neck sensation that you get during any of the previous films on the list. The most-watched film in South Korea in 2003 (and the fourth most-viewed film ever in that country), Memories of Murder hasn't made much of a splash at all in the States outside of the festival circuit, but the success of last year's The Host will hopefully bring this near-masterpiece to a wider audience.

9. A Tale of Two Sisters (South Korea, Ji-woon Kim, '03)

One of the most influential "K-Horror" films (i.e. Korean Horror), A Tale of Two Sisters hasn’t attracted the press of The Eye but it’s also been tapped by the remake trend (with Arielle Kebbel and Emily Browning opening later this year) now that Hollywood has exhausted the J-Horror catalog. Two Sisters plays off the "evil stepmother" cliche in its retelling of an old folktale. (I'm not normally one to prejudge, but Korean folktale to Korean horror film to American movie with Arielle Kebbel sounds like a tough transition to make.) In Two Sisters, the title characters start to experience otherworldly events after their arrival at a new house with a new stepmother. Children are always scared of change, and Two Sisters plays off that brilliantly. The original film works because we all remember that time when we started to distrust the formerly flawless generation of our parents, and it even deals with the changing bodies of the two girls (one is terrified after her first menstruation.) Two Sisters goes haywire in the final act with a memorable twist that makes the audience question everything that came before. We're not sure we can even explain the end of Two Sisters, but it features imagery that has stuck with us, not something that can be said about every J-Horror or K-Horror movie. Let's hope that the remake reverses the trend and actually captures what worked about the original.

10. Shutter (Thailand, Banjong Pisanthanakun & Parkpoom Wongpoom, '04)

We'll end "Asian Horror 101" with another film headed for the remake train, Shutter, a Thai movie that takes many of the concepts of J- and K-Horror and offers its own spin. Shutter uses the camera as its weapon-du-fear, telling a ghost story about an otherworldly manifestation that appears in developed film. A photographer notices a horrible face in a picture of a graduating class. The ghost from the picture starts to haunt our hero in more physical ways and he's forced to try and figure out what it wants and why it's stalking him, especially after his close friends begin to kill themselves. Shutter is a fantastic combination of many of the films on this list with its focus on long, black hair, haunting through technology, and the eternal imprint of violence. Thailand has been a surprising source of several quality films in recent years (although mostly dramas) and Shutter is one of the best.