Bedevilled

Hae-won (Ji Seong-won) works at a bank in Seoul, a hyper-competitive and male-dominated space that leaves her stressed and loath to get involved with others. After ignoring a woman being assaulted and refusing to take part in the investigation, she ends up slapping a co-worker due to a misunderstanding and is fired. To get away from the city for a while, she heads to Mundo, a small island where she used to go as a child. While there, she reconnects with Bok-nam (the absolutely riveting Seo Yeong-hie, probably best known in America for her appearance in 2008’s The Chaser), the mother of a young daughter who throws out all the stops to make sure her old friend’s stay on the island is perfect.

Nothing is what it seems (of course), and it is soon revealed that Bok-nam is all but a prisoner on the island, chained to an abusive marriage and regularly beaten by her husband and raped by her brother-in-law. To make matters worse, the women of the island also mistreat Bok-nam, berating her for being a disloyal wife. The incidents continue to escalate until tragedy strikes and Bok-nam is betrayed by her only hope to escape her hell when Hae-won’s urban apathy stops her from coming to Bok-nam’s defense and lies to the police.

Bedevilled then becomes something of a slasher, with Bok-nam wielding any farm tool she can get her hands on as she blazes a bloody path of revenge across the island. The film is harrowing in its slow-burn build-up and depictions of violence against Bok-nam, as well as her rampage, which is both cathartic and repulsive in its excess. The strong narrative meshes well with DP Kim Ki-tae’s camerawork, Hae-won’s Seoul aesthetic harshly contrasted with the island’s inhabitants, and despite the horror of Bok-nam’s situation, the rural setting is stunningly beautiful. It is hard to believe this was Jang Cheol-soo’s directorial debut—his time working for the late Kim Ki-duk clearly taught him how to maintain tension, but he flips Korean film’s usual trope of women passively bearing the violence of society on its head by handing Bok-nam a sickle and turning her loose on a bunch of vile humans.

Seo’s performance is the highlight of the film, perfectly capturing the all-too-human Bok-nam’s raw desperation. There are multiple points where tragedy and violence could have been avoided if only someone had listened to Bok-nam or intervened. This juxtaposition gives emotional heft to the story that is unlike most straightforward rape-revenge films and underpins a deep sense of tragedy to its graphic violence. It falters a bit toward the end, and may be about 15 minutes too long (what Korean film isn’t, really?), but Bedevilled is an interesting study in how apathy can wreck lives, and the oppression that exists in many rural spaces where backward social norms are propped up by those in power.