REVIEW: DVD Release: Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance

Film: Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance
Release date: 28th February 2-005
Certificate: 18
Running time: 121 mins
Director: Park Chan-wook
Starring: Song Kang-ho, Shin Ha-kyun, Doona Bae, Lim Ji-eun, Han Bo-bae
Genre: Crime/Drama/Thriller
Studio: Palisades Tartan
Format: DVD
Country: South Korea

Park Chan-wook’s Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance is the first instalment of what has subsequently been dubbed the ‘Vengeance Trilogy’ along with successive works Oldboy (2003) and Lady Vengeance (2005). While the three films are not directly linked via narrative or characters, they do evoke the same thematic substratum consisting of anger, loss and (as the trilogy’s title denotes) revenge.

The story fixates on well meaning deaf-mute Ryu (Ha-kyan Shin) who is desperate to save the life of his ill sister, and resorts to dealings with underground organ traders to find a kidney to match her blood type. Unable to pay the full amount, despite giving them all the money he has, Ryu loses one of his own kidneys to make up the difference.

However, when a compatible kidney then mysteriously becomes available, Ryu has no money left to pay for the operation. With time running out, he and his terrorist girlfriend (Doona Bae) kidnap a wealthy businessman’s (Kang-ho Song) daughter and hold her to ransom, with their actions leading to torture, pain and revenge…


Like its subsequent filmic counterparts, Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance serves up a compelling examination into the psychologically transformative process undergone when one seeks revenge on another, and explores the barbarity one is willing to cause when motivated by anger and hate. But, unlike its successors, Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance achieves this largely without the flash and pretence that shapes those latter films. Indeed, much like Takashi Miike’s breakthrough feature Audition (1999), this is a film that exhibits a lot of restraint; quietly disarming its audience to give the havoc unleashed in the final act extra resonance.

The pace of the story, while slow burning, is strangely engaging nonetheless. Shin’s deaf-mute steel welder, Ryu, generates empathy without ever having to say an audible word of dialogue; though we are occasionally privy to his thoughts via a sporadic internal monologue and subtitled sign language exchanges between him and his girlfriend. Song’s businessman is also commendable; playing host to an interesting shift in story dynamic in the aftermath of the botched kidnapping where he becomes protagonist, leaving the audience with the difficult decision of who to morally support as the stakes are raised.

Kim Byung-il’s camera work is equally passive and restrained, favouring locked off compositions over the elaborate and fluid motions that have gone on to characterise and form a major part of the Park Chan-wook experience. It may be worthy to note that this film marks Kim’s only collaboration with Park, with Chung-hoon Chung lensing the other two ‘Vengeance’ films and everything that’s followed thus far. For this reason, those who are well versed Park Chan-wook’s oeuvre may be disheartened by Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance’s rather minimalist and languid style at first. The camera sometimes feels oddly detached from the emotional situation depicted on screen. Characters are frequently lost in wide frames or interestingly disfigured in some of the film’s more stylised shots; Ryu’s first encounter with the black market organ dealers for instance. The results for the most part are beautiful, lending the film a quite sense of professionalism that, while not as immediately striking as Park Chan-wook’s latter work, is still appreciable and rewarding for the viewer.

Another initially frustrating but ultimately rewarded facet is the film’s method of storytelling that places just as much onus on what isn’t seen as on what is. Certain key moments are purposefully left on the cutting room floor - we never see the actual kidnapping of the businessman’s daughter, for example, going from planning it in one scene to having the girl playing on the floor of Ryu’s sister’s apartment, both of whom are unaware as to the real reason why. There are enough clues in the surrounding scenes to suggest that (according to Ryu) the girl has been placed in Ryu’s charge whilst her mother recovers from an accident in the hospital. It’s an approach that requires the audience’s full attention, which is also somewhat risky. It’s a style that will either draw the viewer in by making them fill in the blanks of the narrative, or alienate them by not easily giving them all the facts.

The sporadic moments of extreme violence follows a similar mandate. Some moments are quite brutal, such as Ryu’s eventual facing off against the organ traders, whilst other moments negate, showing the act itself in favour of exploring the tense build up and the bloody aftermath. This aptly fits in with the film’s selective storytelling motif, although cynics may interpret it as a cost cutting device. However, the main focus of Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance is the notion of the aftermath of a tragic event transforming the otherwise good natured victim into brutal and violent persona, so, with that in mind, the motif of skipping the act itself so as to immediately explore that action’s consequences is highly appropriate, and works within the framework of the narrative.

However, these proceedings don’t go by without a sense of humour. Like much of South Korea’s cinematic output of late, Sympathy For Mr. Vengeance exhibits a fine veneer of jet black humour, giving the film a sense of balance and relief. An early scene depicts Ryu’s sister writhing on the floor in pain from her failing kidney prompting a group of horny teenage men in the apartment next door to mistake the moans of pain with those of ecstasy – they feverishly get their rocks off with ears pressed against the wall, convinced that they’re eavesdropping on a highly sexual and private moment. Some quirkiness misses the mark, for instance; the mentally handicapped man who randomly resides near the river – a location that plays a pivotal role in the slowly unfolding narrative – and occasionally shambles into shot for no perceivable purpose. It may be a way of counter balancing Ryu’s disability, and perhaps emphasises that, through no fault of his own, Ryu being deaf (as opposed to the kidnapping itself) was the catalyst for the ensuing bloodshed.

Those simply looking for another Oldboy will be sorely disappointed by the film’s different yet gripping style that lacks the immediacy in which that landmark film operates. It may take a couple of viewings to appreciate it, but Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance is a quiet, deceptively complex and thought provoking work about the futility of revenge and the pain inflicted on those involved.


Whilst emotive and highly compelling, Sympathy of Mr. Vengeance doesn’t offer the instant gratification and perceived righteousness that other, more conventional revenge flicks do. Instead, Park Chan-wook presents a challenging and conflicting attitude towards the subject which will enthral some and infuriate others. MP