Review of Midnight / 미드나이트, directed by Kwon Oh-seung

There was a time when I came back from living in Busan, South Korea, for two months and was seriously missing Korea already. It was deeply ironic in some ways because towards the end of being there, I was thinking so much about how I was ready to go home and return to a somewhat normal life before going to India.

That said, I was missing some aspects of Korea. Hence why in the next few months there’s going to be an explosion of content on my blog when it comes to Korean television, movies, and general dramas. I went deep down the rabbithole as of late.

Regardless, Midnight was one of the first movies I watched. The synopsis sounded interesting to me when I saw it, and I noticed that Wi Ha-joon was in the movie pretty quickly when I saw the trailer. An unhinged Wi Ha-joon sounded right up my alley as well, so I watched the movie in one go while I was at home one day.

Let’s get into the review before I start rambling! It would be a shame to bore you.

A deaf woman becomes tangled up with a serial killer who decides she’ll become his next target.

The main character of this movie is Kyeong-mi, who is deaf. For her job, she works at a call center as a sign language counselor, and she works pretty hard at her job.

It’s when she’s coming home one day she witnesses something pretty awful. Her day was already kind of bad at this point, as she had a bit of confrontation earlier involving one of her client calls.

We meet serial killer Do-sik earlier on in the movie as he goes after one of his victims, using his van, which is full of props and clothing items, to lure her in. But when he crosses paths with Kyeong-mi, he’s going after someone else. He’s targeting her mother at first, but then spots another woman, So-jung, who’s on the phone.

Do-sik lures So-jung onto the back streets and alleys of the city, then stabs her. Kyeong-mi witnesses this and manages to get away from him, but then he claims to be someone else completely at the police station. So-jung’s brother wants to find his sister pretty quickly, but Do-sik tricks the cops when Kyeong-mi recognizes who he is.

The brother, Jong-tak, doesn’t fall for it, and almost beats him up right then and there. Do-sik uses his charm to slip away into the night, convincing the police officers that he didn’t do it, giving him just enough time to get away. The die has been rolled, and he decides that Kyeong-mi is going to be his next victim.

So begins a game of cat and mouse that lasts throughout the course of the movie. The climax is obviously when the game comes to its ugly moment of facing each other. Kyeong-mi heads home one day after work, and realizes something is seriously wrong when she’s in the home.

Her mother isn’t there, and her mother’s been trying to protect her throughout the course of the movie. Turns out Do-sik is inside of the home, and axes his way through the door after she barricades herself inside one of the rooms. Kyeong-mi narrowly escapes with Do-sik chasing after her.

Jung-tak and her mother also realize what’s going on, but then there are decisions to be made, especially when it comes to his sister. Do-sik continues chasing Kyeong-mi into a public area, and then convinces a crowd that she’s the insane one.

It’s when he finally lets his mask slip that people realize he’s actually a serial killer, and he manages to get Kyeong-mi with a weapon before going down with police actions. While it’s a serious wound, it’s pretty treatable as long as no one just leaves her there.

Overall Thoughts

I think this could have been an interesting movie, but it was missing something for me. Wi, as I said before, can play unhinged pretty well, but his character wasn’t sinister enough.

The problem for me as well was the plot overall. It was good on vibes and tension, but that was about it. Our main character, Kyeong-mi, is also portrayed as a bit helpless at times because she is deaf, but she shows capable of holding her own against a guy with serious problems and an actual axe to grind.

Watch this one if you’re interested. I think you could either really love this one or hate it depending on what you’re going for in the moment. I generally was apathetic towards it in the end, but I didn’t entirely hate the film and what it offered to me as the viewer.

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