Starring: Kim Hye-soo, Kim Sung-su
Director: Kim Yong-gyun
Category: IIB (Korean)
The ascendancy of South Korea's pop culture in Hong Kong - from TV to music and film - shows no sign of slackening, with the number of South Korean movies theatrically released this month almost equal to that of local features.
The Red Shoes, loosely based on the Hans Christian Andersen tale, makes for a good comparison with its numerous ghostly Cantonese counterparts.
Director Kim Yong-gyun (Wanee and Junah, 2001) takes a different approach from the tale's most famous cinematic adaptation, the 1948 classic starring ballerina Moira Shearer. It was one of the few British films to be publicly screened in pre-Cultural Revolution China. In this version, the red shoes have high heels rather than pointed toes.
The first half is the most striking, despite almost no horror, after a gruesome pre-title sequence. Instead, the movie presents a discerning character portrait of Sun-jae (Kim Hye-soo), an ophthalmologist trying to re-establish her professional and personal lives after the break-up of her marriage.