Ghosts of War

Introduction

It's 1972 and the Vietnam War is still in full swing but in the inevitable decline. A South Korean army base starts to receive mysterious radio messages from Donkey 30, a patrol that went missing six months earlier. The top brass decide that they want to investigate and choose the hard-boiled but battle-weary Lieutenant Choi (Kam Woo Sung) to lead a rather rag-tag band of soldiers known as Mule 3 into the area known as R-Point to locate the whereabouts of the missing soldiers, in what appears to be a simple search and rescue mission.

As usual though, it's just not that simple at all. R-Point is a piece of land that is supposedly holy ground for the Vietcong, who avoid it, and was also the site of a French hospital that was subject to a mysterious but quick massacre. Arriving at the site, the disparate platoon of soldiers find a warning carved into the rock "Whoever's hands are stained with blood will not survive". As strange and terrifying events start to haunt the soldiers, including more mysterious radio messages but in French, Choi has to use all his experience to hold his group together so that they can survive R-Point...

**NOTE** This is an exclusive to Sainsbury's by Palisades Tartan.

Picture

My review copy was a DVD-R and I'm pretty sure the picture was compressed as it wasn't as good as expected, rather soft in focus in places. I'm sure this will be sorted for the fully authored release though.

Extras

As well as a commentary, there are a few quite long featurettes, although they do feel to be a little padded out.

Overall

This is not your average horror film, it's pretty low on gore and the terror is much more psychological. Overall I'm reminded of the Andy Serkis/Jamie Bell film Deathwatch from a few years ago, and unlike a lot of people at the time I actually liked that film. I could also see minor elements of The Keep in this as well and writer-director Kong Su-Chang does well to keep the suspense ratcheted up. Ghosts of War was originally released under the name R-Point and was the 4th highest grossing Korean horror film of all time, I'm assuming the title change is due to the rumour of a Hollywood remake.

Whilst overall this film is great, it's not without it's issues. There are plot holes or jumps, whereby you'll see some hints of what may have happened, but nothing is really explained - I'm not too concerned at this as this puts you in the same shoes as the soldiers and therefore you are as confused as they are, trying to make sense of what they find. What I do find a little annoying is the tendency for battle hardened soldiers to be reduced to screaming fits and acting like boy scouts rather than the trained killers they are - there are more NCO's on this mission than you would normally find, at least a third of the platoon are Sergeants of some kind.

Despite this, and the fact I had to contend with a DVD-R, I rather enjoyed this film and may just pick it up if I can find it on blu-ray. The tension is kept pretty constant and things can get a little confusing if you don't pay attention. With a mix of Western ghost storytelling and Asian horror, Ghosts of War has an eerie tale to tell with an everincreasing sense of foreboding. There's a lot to take in here, whether it be the old French garrison located within the building now occupied by our protagonists, the brief encounter with the US patrol who warn them not to touch their stuff or the idea that most if not all of the Korean soldiers have blood on their hands to some degree.

Recommended.