Harry says MOTHER is another riveting success from Bong Joon-Ho!

Not sure why I've saved SERBIAN FILM, RED, WHITE & BLUE and MOTHER to review in a quick succession, but that is how it has worked out. I think, for some reason, I was ready to talk about them. All three films are excellent thrillers that have a very disturbing story to tell. These are tough movies. Films that for one reason or another I wasn't in a place where I felt like dwelling upon the atmosphere, the mood and the context that the stories took place in. KOREAN film is famous for it's attention to dire situations. Bong's MEMORIES OF MURDER is a case most apt to bring up regarding MOTHER, since it was made by the very same filmmaker. MEMORIES OF MURDER was the first time I made note of Bong Joon-Ho. That film was one of the most captivating and unique police procedural films that I have ever seen. Mainly due to the concept of what South Korean police investigation procedure was. It is so easy here in the United States to sort of just take Criminal Investigation as being the same process from country to country. A crime takes place, the crime scene is taped off and a series of investigators begin analyzing everything till they find the culprit. Nah, not always the case. Sometimes - in some places, they just grab the first suspect and throw him into the clinker, they then commence to beat the living shit out of the suspect till they confess out of fear of death - and the case is closed. Now - in MEMORIES OF MURDER - the only thing that saved several of the tortured 'suspects' was the fact that the killer was continuing to kill by the same fashion with the same song playing on the same station as it had before. Yeah. That was helpful. And it isn't to say that that technique is particularly unique to South Korea. When I was a kid - my father was pulled out of the family truck - which was SURROUNDED by Police Cruisers - because we had just come from a convenience store that had been robbed a few days prior - and the guy who did it had killed the clerks - and done this in a couple of other locations - but the clerk had positively identified my father as the man that did it. Dad was taken downtown, put in a line-up. Identified. The police took him to a room - showed him the tape of my dad robbing and killing. Dad told the police that the guy looks like him, drove the same orange truck with the same camper - and my Dad said he absolutely understood why they arrested him, but it was the Christmas season - when he made the most money a year - and he had no reason to do the crime and he was at home 9 blocks from the crime when it took place entertaining friends that evening. While the cops were questioning him, the killer robbed and shot up another convenience store - and proved my dad innocent. Now sure - he wasn't beaten to within an inch of his life... but had this been 1910 Austin, Texas... it might've been another story altogether. Well MOTHER centers around a Korean woman that grows rare herbs and practices acupuncture without a license on the sly - while living in pretty poor conditions with her "simple" son. That all changes when her son is named the killer of a young neighborhood girl - with the police not pursuing any other angles to the case. Something with his name handwritten by him upon it was found at the scene of the crime. So he's the guy. The titular Mother then spends the remainder of the film doing the police's job trying to find the real killer. There are many twists and turns in that investigation - and the film is killer. MOTHER succeeds due to Bong Joon-Ho's amazing story-telling abilities. First, it is beautifully shot - expertly paced - cast with actors that are truly invisible in their roles. It is also the smallest most intimate story that Bong has told so far. It is laser focused upon this Korean Mother discovering the truth of this horrible case. And that is what I love about it. I love that we don't go off on a million different angles, this remains an intimate crusade by a woman with very limited means. This is a mother in Korea that has to beg sometimes, that barely survives herself, but who loves her son so much that she's willing to die to find the real killer and save her son, who frankly... is all she has in her world. She tries to get him to remember, and he remembers pieces that she goes off to investigate - but you know this is a Korean film. You know this is a Bong Joon-Ho story. So you know - shit is gonna be real uncomfortable - and that is exactly what happens. I loved this film, the third in a row from Bong Joon-Ho - and that is always a very refreshing feeling. I am beginning to just trust in Bong Joon-Ho as a storyteller. I love the perspective that he comes from and the genuine craftsmanship that comes with his work thus far. He is one of the powerful filmmakers working in the world today, I just hope it continues! MOTHER is currently in release.