Tacticalin An absolute waste of money

Breakinger A Brilliant Conflict

Motompa Go in cold, and you're likely to emerge with your blood boiling. This has to be seen to be believed.

Arianna Moses Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

dumsumdumfai Unbreakable - that was the movie. Kind of like that understated, more realistic view of how people with super powers deals with their 'gift'.The thing I find about Korean movies is, each is so focus on what each one wants to be, wants to tell, in such specific ways. You can say, the confidence is never an issue. It's overflowing in fact. And never murky who is good, who is bad. It's almost always entertainment. Unlike too many Hollywood these days, either over the top action, or too thought provokingly murky. No middle ground, no thriller any more.This is no exception. 2 guys, one can control minds, the other basically heals himself endlessly. One good, one bad. And there are at least 3 memorable scenes. One at the money shop, one at the subway, one during the end game.The comic relief is just a tad too obvious and see it coming. There are a few transitions moments with some information left out .. as in how did the plot get from here to there. Otherwise, I'm good with the way it holds up.

Chris_Docker HAUNTERS is an original take on the superhero movie. No capes, daft aerials, or superman latex costumes (why do superheroes always look and sound a bit gay?) Instead we have two young kids from the streets of South Korea. Both have a limp and both have the strange power to control other people's minds on sight. Cho-in is the bad guy, polishing his powers to live a comfortable lifestyle. Kyu-nam is the good guy, championing honesty and friendship in the face of Cho-in's merciless killing and avarice. From this simple idea, writer-director Min-suk Kim builds an intelligent, fast-paced thriller that keeps the audience wondering where it will go next. Although I wasn't entirely won over, I enjoyed it much more than the high budget but rather predicable niche into which Marvel comic super-heroes have fallen. With its fine South Korean pedigree, Haunters makes sure than people suffer realistically when they die and that blood never looks like strawberry jam.

Alison Cho-In (Gang Dong-won) has a remarkable ability: he can control the actions of anybody that he can see, up to and including large crowds. He has no friends, or family for that matter – in fact, as a child he forced his father to kill himself and almost killed his mother too – but he doesn't need people, except to have them do his bidding such as giving him all the money at a place of business. He has no fear, because nobody ever remembers him or what happened when he had control over them. Kyu-nam (Ko Soo), on the other hand, has supernatural powers of healing, which he needs as he seems to get into physical jeopardy fairly often. He and his two friends Bubba and Al, from Ghana and Turkey respectively, live life joyously although they are poor and work in a junkyard. After an accident, Kyu-nam is fired, but finds himself a new job in a family-run pawn shop, a place he very much likes. That is, until Cho-In comes along to take money from the old man who runs the place; and Cho-In is himself in for a shock when he discovers Kyu-nam, who turns out to be the one person Cho-In cannot control with his mind. As these two characters interact, the deadly body count starts rising, and it seems there's no way to stop more carnage, for Cho-In is determined to erase Kyu-nam from existence, seeing him as a threat, and Kyu-nam is damn near indestructible....This is one of those wonderful Korean movies that has a bit of everything: it's really funny, really sad, full of horrific deaths and full of loving exchanges. Oh, and it tells a really good anti-superhero tale, too. One thing I've rarely if ever seen in Korean films is non-Korean (or non-Asian) actors, so it was a special treat to see a Black man from Ghana and a Caucasian from Turkey – unfortunately, I couldn't discover the actors' names, but they were both excellent sidekicks. But the show belongs to Ko Soo and Gang Dong-won, as two men with inexplicable abilities doomed to be enemies to the death; recommended.

cafm HAUNTERS is vaguely reminiscent of M. Night Shyamalan's UNBREAKABLE insofar as we have an unlikely blue-collar superhero fighting a sociopathic arch-nemesis. After that the comparisons begin to break down. But like me, there may be some who will find themselves constantly reminded of UNBREAKABLE as they watch this excellent South Korean film. Cho-in (Dong-won Kang) is a reclusive man born with a powerful telepathy that allows him to control the actions of anyone within his field of vision. Parental rejection and a lonely life of petty theft has left him sociopathic. This is bad news for the one man who can stop him. Following a serious accident, Gyoo-nam (Ko Soo) discovers he has regenerative powers and soon thereafter learns that he is the only person not susceptible to Cho-in's dark telepathy. The game of cat-and-mouse that ensues results in a macabre body count of innocent bystanders possibly unlike any superhero film you've yet seen. South Korean films often contain an inherently maudlin quality (referred to as "han") that Western audiences sometimes find icy and distancing, but it reflects the sensibilities of a country whose national identity is one of constant heart-ache and profound loss. This is certainly true of HAUNTERS as Ko Soo's character, Gyoo-nam finds somewhere within himself the strength and will to get up and keep going after being traumatised and knocked down time and again. Watch this with an open mind and it will stay with you long after the end credits have rolled.