Akmareul boatda 2010

Critics score:
80 / 100

Reviews provided by RottenTomatoes

Jeannette Catsoulis, New York Times: A droll Nietzschean fable that's fully aware of its lapses into absurdity. Read more

Joshua Rothkopf, Time Out: The savagery is honest, raw and hardly entertainment. Read more

Scott Tobias, AV Club: Kim goes to ever-nastier extremes with I Saw The Devil, but he also extends the revenge theme into a mesmerizing study of the nature of evil itself. Read more

Wesley Morris, Boston Globe: As revenge fantasy, "I Saw the Devil'' is clever. As comedy, it's sick. As moviegoing, it's tedious... Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: This is the stuff of nightmares, where even the good guy is bad, and as shock cinema goes, it packs a punch. Read more

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly: Somewhere in all the blood (sickening realism is a selling point), a question is posed: When does the one fighting a monster become a monster himself? Read more

Elizabeth Kerr, Hollywood Reporter: On any number of levels, Devil is troublesome at best, offensive at worst. Read more

Mark Olsen, Los Angeles Times: Even at its most chaotic, the film never loses sight of the human toll of the increasingly over-the-top events it portrays. Read more

Rene Rodriguez, Miami Herald: We lucky westerners get to see it in all its hair-raising, stomach-churning glory, and that's a wonderful thing. Read more

V.A. Musetto, New York Post: When it comes to bloody revenge movies, it's difficult to beat the South Koreans. Read more

Calvin Wilson, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: A terrific but uncompromising film that's definitely not for everyone. It's not just that the violence is graphic, but that much of it is so mean-spirited. Read more

Liam Lacey, Globe and Mail: After a while, the sheer length and repetitiousness of the film begins to feel pornographic in the dullest sense. Read more

Nigel Floyd, Time Out: A remorseless catalogue of calculated violence, casual cannibalism and sexual sadism, this inflicts over two hours of suffering on the audience... Read more

Michael Atkinson, Village Voice: Never good with nuance, Kim is a beast with disarming imagery (like the severed head that turns face-up in a river current) but has few resonating ideas, leaving the domino-tumble of brutality to become its own tiresome spectacle. Read more

Mark Jenkins, Washington Post: Director Kim Jee-woon is a born filmmaker, even if this script (written by Park Hoon Jung and adapted by Kim) is unworthy of his efforts. Read more