The Call is a South Korean thriller film directed by Chung-hyun Lee. It stars Jong-seo Jun, Park Shin-Hye, Sung-ryun Kim, El Lee, and Ho-san Park in main roles. It was released on 27th November 2020 on Netflix.
Set in 2019, shortly after returning to her family's abandoned home to visit her isolated ill mother, Seo-Yeon (Park Shin-Hye) receives a mysterious phone call on the old landline from a girl from 1999 named Young-Sook (Jong-seo Jun) is detained by her shaman stepmother (El Lee) and fears for her life. Seo-Yeon discovers a hidden cellar in the house that appears to have been used as a torture room and to perform exorcisms and soon learns that Yong-sook died in the same house 20 years ago. Divided by two timelines, phone calls continue between them and they share everything, where Seo-Yeon reveals that her father died in a fire. Young-sook sneaks out of the house to prevent the fire that killed Seo-Yeon's father. Well now, miraculously, the future is changed and Seo-Yeon has now both her parents and is living a great life whereas the Young-sook is still living a miserable life. Seo-yeon starts to ignore Young-sook's call, as she's now spending time with her father. Her newly discovered happiness distracts her from Yong Sook, and the fading jealousy of the latter turns into a fatal intention that wreaks havoc on the spacetime continuity.
Chung-Hyun Lee also wrote the film and it entertains you thoroughly. By firmly putting logic and realism on hold, The Call spins its bold premise into an effective and entertaining game of cat and mouse switching the time, from 1999 to 2019. The remake of The Caller, a British / Puerto Rican thriller from 2011, takes all the established rules of time travel movies and turns them upside down as Yong Sook repeatedly interferes with Seo-hun's past to irreversibly destroy her future.
In supernatural escalation, the film explores the fallout of a character from a vengeful past who becomes upset with someone in the present. The major portion of the film is entirely helmed by two characters. Obviously, there are supporting characters and they're playing big roles. However, the full plot and development of the story come from only two characters.
As usual, when talking about time travel or communicating with the past, we are dealing with a work of science fiction or, in explicit terms, there are no rules other than those established by the author. Nothing is "real" or "possible" when it comes to the world as we know it. But this does not mean that there is no chance for gaps and holes.
The character of Young-sook is somewhat unfulfilling, as we see exorcisms are being performed by her mother and she changes to a total psycho in the second half of the film. But was she possessed by some entity or why is so damaged mentally, nothing is very much clear. Then in one scene, an officer, doesn't know what he felt after hearing Seo-Yeon's story, without even thinking much, just puts forward the record of the past happenings of the house she lives in. Seriously! Is it so easy to persuade a police officer to make him present the information you're looking for!
However, when working with science fiction, you should create some boundaries and guidelines. And you need to stick to it. Something that I really thought The Call managed to do. Although it made me wonder along the way that it doesn't every time. For me, The Call's ending worked remarkably well and delivered the quality we expected from South Korean films.
After her star-making role in Lee Chang-dong's Burning, Jong-Seo Jun cemented her position as an innovator in Korean cinema, with a brilliant performance that reveals that Young Sook is as dangerous as she is fragile and damaged. Meanwhile, Park Shin-Hye plays the heroine perfectly, transmitting innocence and fear without becoming helpless or unable to support herself.
The cinematography by Jo Young-jik was good and in some places beautiful. The production design was terrific and so were the visual effects, where the present time changes due to the changes in the past. The music is also good and apt for a thriller movie.
The Call is an engaging thriller and despite using a time loop idea, it's very simple and easy to understand as many things and sequences are just there unexplained, like the phone calls, how is it possible, no idea! The things are not complicated as it should have been to tag this as a mind-bending thriller. However, it still manages to surprise us with whatever it delivers, and of course, it could have been more dark and horrific if Young-sook's character would have been more crystal and solid. Otherwise, it's a perfect time killing time travel film and a treat for those who love time travel thrillers.
Rating:- 3/5
Now streaming on Netflix.
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