Geu-rim-ja sal-in (Private Eye)

It was obvious halfway through that South Korea was walking away with the2010 Santa Barbara Film Festival: funny, sweet Castaway on the Moon followed Bong Joon-Ho’s marvelous Mother, and then there was a remarkably assured debut from Park Dae-min, the rollicking Private Eye. A detective story set in early twentieth-century Seoul, it opens in good atmospheric style with the removal of a body from a wooded clearing, and maintains fine form throughout.

Gutter PI Hong, who chases errant wives and is so recklessly fond of disguises that he usually gets found out, finds himself via an entirely organic chain of events teamed up with a clever young medical student, in order to track down the killer of a minister’s son. The kid proves pretty useful, as does Hong’s friend, a high-class lady inventor with a secret mechanical lair-cum-Q-lab, providing Hong with intricate optical devices beautifully fashioned from wood and brass.

There’s bumbling police, a brief but terrific old-school newspaper editor, and a marvelous circus, as well as plenty of action, from a rollicking punch-up in an opium den to the tense final showdown in the dark. It can get a bit silly, but in an endearing, old-fashioned way – after dispatching a load of goons Hong sighs “not another one” and takes more beatings than Marlowe. Less forgivable is a nauseating camera effect applied to mar an extended and otherwise finely choreographed chase through splendid street sets. 

Overall, performance, pacing, structure, music, and production design are exemplary. No detail is wasted, the release of information is judged perfectly to keep the audience half a step ahead of the twisty plot but rarely more, and just enough backstory is revealed about Hong and his lady friend at just the right time. Skillful, supremely good-humored, and with an unusually fine balance of character with/through action, it is so purely enjoyable, and winds up with such a shameless but stylish sequel set-up, that one is happy at the prospect of more. (it didn't happen)

d Park Dae-min p Lee Sang-yong, Han Seon-kyu sc Park Dae-min, Lee Yeong-jong, Yoon Seon-hui ph Choi Chan-min ed Nam Na-yeoung pd Choi Hyeon-syok, Jo Hwa-seong cast Hwang Jun-min, Ryu Deok-han, Uhm Ji-won, Oh Dal-su, Yun Je-mun, Ju Da-yeong, Jeong Gyu-su

(2009, SK, 111m)