Bedevilled

Korean director Jang Cheol-so makes his feature debut with this revenge tale with a heavy dose of social commentary. Hae-won, a young and successful woman flees her busy life in Seoul after several professional and personal ordeals to return to the island of her youth where she had an happy childhood. There she finds her childhood friend, Bak-nam, still living on the island with her child and abusive in-laws and villagers. Hae-won doesn't understand Bak-nam and ignores her plight for help. When tragedy strikes Bak-nam, she goes on a rampage to seek revenge on everybody around her including Hae-won. Cheol-so takes the popular revenge formula to shed a light on the society where complacency is worse than crime that allows people to destroy each other whether a young woman is murdered on the streets of Seoul and a woman is abused in a remote village. Jang Cheol-so along with his talented cast and crew prove that Korean cinema is one of the best in the world. YRCinema's coverage of the AFI Fest.