Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (2002)

2002 R 121 Minutes

This is the story of Ryu, a deaf man, and his sister, who requires a kidney transplant. Ryu's boss, Park, has just laid him off, and in order to afford the transplant, Ryu and his girlfriend develo...

Overall Rating

8 / 10

Verdict: Good

User Review

BarneyNuttall
8 / 10
Brutal and bleak, Sympathy for Mr. vengeance will have your heart aching and twisting itself into a knot as we see our characters make increasingly bad decisions. Much like the Safdie Brothers 'Good Time' Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance operates on an agreement with the audience to both sympathize and despise our characters. The film asks the audience to recognize the real villain at play, symbolized in the Korean healthcare system.

Like much Korean cinema, Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance builds towards mass violence. Here, it is displayed with a heaping of icky-ness including fecal matter and sexual deviation. This film is not for the light-hearted. Yet, the world the characters inhabit is neither. In one seen deaf Ryu (Shin Ha-Kyun) walks through a crowd, seemingly faceless in a sea of smiles. Revenge, crime, and death seem to found the building blocks of the world, with those in trouble being left to bury their losses whilst also making up for them. Avoiding loss isn't an option.

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Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (2002)

Overall Rating

User Review

BarneyNuttall