The film - based on the debut director's script, which won the 2005 Makdoongyi Screenplay Contest - centers on Jin-ho (Hwang Jung-min), a private investigator who mostly deals with trivial cases. It is set in Seoul in 1910, while Korea is under Japanese colonial rule.
Jin-ho's routine is disrupted when he gets dragged into a high-profile murder case. The case comes from a budding physician Gwang-soo (Ryu Deok-hwan), who stumbles upon an abandoned corpse in a field. The corpse turns out to be the son of a powerful Joseon politician, and the duo set out to identify the murderer.
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| `Private Eye` |
Once the whodunit gets going, two intriguing characters are thrown in. First is female inventor Sun-deok (Um Ji-won), whose identity remains largely cloaked behind the countless gadgets she produces in her secret laboratory. Following the conventions of a detective film, she supplies a handful of gizmos to Jin-ho.
Another supporting character to note is Young-dal (Oh Dal-su), a Jongno police chief who follows the same murder case, seeking fame and wealth. Young-dal's gentle smile, however, cannot be taken at face value.
For the first half of the film, the plot progresses slowly. Park focuses on building up a cinematic rapport between Jin-ho and Gwang-soo - and rightly so.
Award-winning actor Hwang Jung-min puts in a smooth performance as Jin-ho, as if he were born to be a private detective yearning for a way out of his gloomy reality. His body language is fairly natural, demonstrating his talent in embracing a role to the full.
Ryu's Gwang-soo is fleshed out just as faithfully. Ryu, an up-and-coming actor, brings to life a likable sidekick who accentuates the detective character's stylish posturing.
The duo's lighthearted moments, however, are not frequent enough to compensate for the dark mood that underlies the main plot. The film is for 15-year-olds or older but the subject matter seems to go beyond the rating. Moreover, some audiences are likely to find a couple of climatic scenes unpleasant.
Luckily, "Private Eye" relies heavily on the charm of Hwang Jung-min to get the story rolling and hide the key piece of the puzzle until the last moment - a decision that pays off.
But the question remains. Given Hwang's undisputed talent, he might have pulled off an effective modern detective if the story was set in modern-day Seoul. "Private Eye" is part of a series of Korean films that taps into the country's early 20th century, when Seoul was called Gyeongseong. Last year saw several period films, including "Once Upon a Time," "Radio Days," "Modern Boy" and "The Good, The Bad, The Weird," which had limited success.
"Private Eye," produced and distributed by CJ Entertainment, will open in local theaters on April 2.
Source: Korea Herald
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