Directed by Bong Joon-ho
Written by Bong Joon-ho and Sung-bo Shim based on the play by Kwang-rim Kim
Starring Kang-ho Song, Sang-Kyung Kum, Roe-ha Kim and Jae-ho Song
Running Time: 2 Hours and 12 Minutes

by Ian Hrabe

2020 has been such an arduous undertaking that Bong Joon-ho winning Best Director, Best Screenplay and Best Picture for his 2019 film Parasite feels like a distant memory. That was the last time I remember feeling totally elated when the world was still relatively normal. Parasite was also one of the last movies I saw in the theater before everything shut down, and ranks up there with one of my all-time favorite moviegoing experiences. There are few joys simpler than weighing down your coat with snacks from the convenience store next to the movie theater and sitting in a near empty theater watching a film in the middle of the afternoon, but seeing Parasite was a transcendent experience. The only other Bong film I’d seen before that was Snowpiercer--which I loved for its incredible sci-fi premise, tonal insanity, social commentary and a weirdness I had never seen depicted on screen--and Parasite made me a true believer.It’s nice to see Parasite’s big night at the Oscars being parlayed into genuine interest in his filmography here in the States. It’s hard enough to get people to watch foreign films here– “UNG! I have to READ!!!”--so a Korean film raking in $53 million dollars at the American box office is no mean feat. Parasite captured lightning in a bottle, and digging deeper into Bong Joon-ho’s filmography, it becomes obvious that it wasn’t some sort of fluke and that he has been making films of this caliber basically since the turn of the century. Which brings us to Memories of Murder, one of the greatest true crime movies ever made. No, one of the greatest crime movies ever made. Hell, why stop there, one of the greatest films ever made. It’s a masterpiece.

The premise of Memories of Murder is not dissimilar from your average “ripped from the headlines” crime story. Loosely based on a true story, Detectives in a small South Korean town hunt down a serial killer preying on young women. It’s a trope you can trace back to Fritz Lang’s 1931 film M and that you can trace forward to David Fincher’s 2007 film Zodiac and to any number of true crime podcasts that analyze the inner-workings of the serial killer on a regular basis (we are truly living in a golden age of serial killer content). Almost immediately, though, Bong starts bucking conventions and illustrating what makes his filmmaking so special. 

One of the first scenes in the film involves one of the film’s protagonists--Detective Park, played by Bong mainstay Kang-ho Song--trying to secure a crime scene in the countryside from a gawking public. A long, unbroken shot captures the chaos of trying to do what is essentially an impossible job. Forensics hasn’t arrived yet and evidence needs to be secured. It’s basically five minutes of shouting that culminates with the scene’s clearest piece of evidence--a footprint in the muddy road--being run over by a farmer on a tractor. Here we have a sober crime drama about hard working detectives working sleepless nights to catch a killer. Shortly after that sequence, though, we see Detective Park and his partner Detective Cho trying to coerce a confession from a man with an intellectual disability for the serial murders taking place in their town. It’s jarring, and an incredible introduction into the weird world of Bong. 

Memories of Murder is a lot of things, but its most fascinating facet is how it plays with tone. It’s tonally jarring and, in the hands of someone without a clear vision, it might play as clunky but Bong navigates the various moods of this film masterfully. For instance, shortly after the Detectives’ first interrogation to coerce a confession, we see them sitting with the suspect watching TV and eating noodles before effectively looking at their watches, figuring it’s time to get back to work, and start beating the suspect once more. We quickly realize that the detective we thought was going to be our hero is an obscenely terrible cop (who, in a move that is equal parts hilarious and sad, forces suspects to look into his eyes because he is certain he has a gift for identifying perpetrators by looking in their eyes). So, the arrival of Detective Seo from Seoul (who is a decidedly better cop) is a relief. And though the film settles into a more straightforward procedural for a bit, if we have learned anything about Bong Joon-ho, it’s that even the most seemingly straightforward stories are at risk of going in a different direction entirely at a moments notice.

Memories of Murder is a film lover’s treat, and that it is finally getting a digital release is cause for celebration. The Criterion Channel hosted it for a while in the wake of Parasite but, until now, there was nowhere to stream it consistently and the DVD was shockingly hard to come by. “I can’t recommend this enough” is a platitude that doesn’t really express how much I recommend Memories of Murder. It’s one of those movies that sustains you, especially if you’ve been stuck in lockdown watching a bunch of trash. This one resets the dial and reminds you why you fell in love with movies in the first place. 

Available to watch digitally tomorrow, October 27th.