ap-80628 Often referred to as the first movie in the revenge trilogy, Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (hereafter SMV) is director Park's first attempt at examining revenge as a motif. The film does not address the moral, psychological, and social complexities of revenge and struggles of the characters involved. Those emerge in his later films. The principle of revenge in SMV might be aptly characterized as lex talionis, an eye for an eye, tooth for tooth. That's what the movie is about: pure, unadulterated revenge for an injustice done. Even cannibalism finds its way into the narrative as an act of vengeance. For fans who have enjoyed other revenge-oriented films such as Kill Bill, SMV's treatment of revenge is simply delicious. The injustice that starts the revenge cycle is both natural and man-made: The primary character's (Ryu) sister needs a kidney transplant, and he needs to come up with $10,000. He decides to sell his kidney, only to be duped by con artists: they steal his kidney, and he loses the money for his sister's operation. Ryu wants revenge; his sister realizes her role in the sequence of events and exacts revenge (of sorts); Boss Park avenges his daughter who accidentally dies during the kidnapping-for-ransom process; Cha Young-Mi's colleagues exact revenge upon Boss Park. The wheels of revenge turn round and round with the aforementioned characters.The fates of the characters involved in the story are implicitly connoted in the first twelve minutes of the film, when Cha Young-Mi writes a judgment pronouncement against the person who has yet to harm her; the primary character (Ryu) unwittingly encounters his swindlers while he is in a most vulnerable and defenseless state, literally holding his manhood in his hand. Boss Park's former employee demands his job back for years of faithful service. Boss Park's hand is slashed as a sign of things to come.Director Park's use of sound is particularly acute in the film. The characters, both primary and secondary, learn about the lives of others through background noise that is brought into the foreground. This audio technique creates a sense of anxiety and uneasiness about the peace and tranquility of a scene; that is, the background noise that is brought into the foreground creates anticipation in the viewer; the viewer knows something is about to happen, will happen, but is left unsure. For example, Ryu successfully returns with the money in hand; the scene is a happy one; he is playful; the kidnapping victim is happy. Yet, the pervasive sound of water running over a basin reverberates across the ears of the viewer. In another, viewers are treated to a comical sight of a communal masturbation session, only to reveal that the sound of their whack ammunition are not what they appear to be. Boss Park learns about Ryu through the hollow walls of Ryu's apartment. One relationship that has not been fully explored is an intrafamilial one: that between Ryu and his sister. Although the film shows them sleeping on the same floor, this is not necessarily indicative of any sexual interest. Sleeping in the same room, under the same blanket is normative practice for those who are poor. However, there are other moments when the director wants us to think otherwise. Although Ryu can't hear his upstairs neighbors having sex, his sister can: she can't sleep. She can't sleep so Ruy can't sleep. When Ryu is giving his sister a sponge bath, the sister's playful laughter as Ryu approaches sensitive areas leads the viewer to at least entertain the idea of intrafamilial sexual relations. (Park's second movie perverts this notion to unimaginable depths.) In this vein, director Park's use of siblings and family members closely mirror's Kafka's novels where there is an ambiguous relationship between the male protagonist and his sister. Viewers are left to wonder. Viewers are not left to wonder about the primal and visceral nature of revenge in SMV.

Anssi Vartiainen First in Park Chan-wook's Vengeance trilogy. A movie about a deaf-mute man, whose sister is in dire need of a kidney transplant, but unfortunately the man himself cannot be a donor. Through sheer desperation the man ends up performing deeds best left undone, all in the name of his sister.It's not a pretty movie. The man's, Ryu's (Shin Ha-kyun), actions are understandable to a degree, and one could even argue that he never crosses that final line. Oh, he crosses lines, multiple of them, but he's more pushed over some of them than he is willingly walking. Not that it changes the end results in any way. And that's the "beauty" of it.It's also a brutal movie. A lot of gore and blood is shown, the film certainly could be called tasteless by more conservative viewers and it certainly is not for everyone. But then again, you're watching a Park Chan-wook film. What did you expect? You either like his style or you don't.The biggest problem I have with the film is the way it flows. Or to be more specific, how the scenes are joined together. There is more than one scene where you end up having no idea how the characters got there. That man shouldn't have that information or how did that guy find this guy or wasn't that girl supposed to be there instead of here. Those kinds of things. And yes, it's mood over logic kind of film, but most of these scenes could have easily been made to work with a line of dialogue. There's no need for it to be this clunky.Still, it's a powerful film. Unapologetic, stylish and definitely memorable. It's not quite Oldboy, the second film of the trilogy, but if you liked that film, then this one should be right up your alley as well.

PeaceGuard I know that with 7,7 current overall rating, most people will not agree with me, especially Tarantino-Rodriguez fans. But my opinion is this.The movie is highly unrealistic, half-baked, has some major flaws and blanks and rationally it more often doesn't make sense than it does. You can say how beautiful are the interlacing threads of love, hate and vengeance, but in the end it doesn't have much meaning if everything else is just one big mistake.Let's be more specific here and make some examples. The deaf boy's sister kills herself because of the "asian honor thing", as a result of knowing about the kidnapping. Well.. let's just hope other people won't act like that, because everyone would kill themselves because of some reason they find morally unacceptable. The deaf boy doesn't help the girl at all, because "he thought the water was deep". The pair does not hide after the girl's death and they even send some message and photos to the radio (which, of course, Mr. Vengeance has to accidentally hear). Everyone find everyone in this movie, just like that, like the addresses of the people they look for are written in a phone book. A pathologist performs an autopsy of a girl before the eyes of his father.. what? And later he's even present during an autopsy of a girl who's completely strange to him, is this a joke? The father (I suppose he's the "Mr. Vengeance") kills the waiter who comes to deliver the food for no reason. The police doesn't arrest that guy the moment he kills the deaf boy's girlfriend.. they seem not to know who did this at all.But the moral part of the movie is the worst. It glorifies (well.. maybe that's an overstatement, but it surely doesn't disapprove it in any way) self-appointed vengeance. It suggests that death of two people (well.. three) by torture is the right way to answer for a kidnapping and a negligent homicide. The guy exploits his workers if a factory, where they have breaks lasting 10 seconds. He does not pay them enough to make a living. He has no empathy for a worker who begs him to help and later for his whole dead family too. But he still says "he thinks he's always lived uprightly" and morally justifies what he does throughout the movie. This is just a sick, radical-Muslim-alike thinking.I've watched this movie, because I thought that this director has done other movies which would be as good as Oldboy, or at least at the level of Stoker. But in this case I was wrong. I'm not some king of drastic scenes opponent, but it seems to me like this movie has just nothing more to offer and that makes it trashy.No.. I have no sympathy for Mr. Vengeance. Both as a character and as a movie. It's been one of the worst movies I've seen lately.

Johanna Eugenie Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance is fine piece of Korean cinema, it is a prime example of how great of a director Park Chan-Wook is. It features many great Korean actors such as Song Kang-Ho and Shin Ha-Kyun, who have appeared a lot through-out many great film by Park, amongst other great films.The atmosphere the character create, the acting, scenery and the dialogue create a very down-to-earth feeling. It shows several sides of people, it shows our happiness, our sorrows, hatred, depression, the feeling of loss and anger. The film was very good at making me sympathize with all the character, even though Ryu was in fact responsible for a death through a kidnapping, I only realized that I should have sympathized more with the character Park. However, everyone suffered, everyone lost what they had, everyone lost someone they loved, and everyone eventually dies in the end. That is what I love about this film the most - everyone feel pleasure at some point, but we all suffer and die. What I particularly "like" is how it managed to show how horrible it can be to be deaf-dumb, when he was eating noodles and she was dying, when he was burying his sister as the girl was drowning - these were all great at showing just how hard it can be. - and best of all, his crying when his sister commits suicide - it is the most genuine cry you can have, he can not hear it, so he weeps as genuinely as one can.There's a lot of cozy stuff too that make me happy, how nicely they fit together, their conversations. This film is a master piece.