Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum | Blu-ray & DVD (Well Go USA)
Director: Jung Bum-Sik
Writer: Jung Bum-Sik, Park Sang-Min
Cast: Wi Ha-Joon, Park Ji-Hyun, Oh Ah-Yeon, Moon Ye-Won, Park Sung-Hoon, Lee Seung-Wook
Running Time: 94 min.
By Paul Bramhall
The found footage horror film could be said to have started with Italian filmmaker Ruggero Deodato’s notorious 1980 jungle nightmare Cannibal Holocaust, but for many viewers it will arguably be a movie that came almost 20 years later, in the form of The Blair Witch Project, that introduced them to the genre. Filmmakers Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sanchez were ahead of their time in utilising the internet to market their movie, in a way which blurred the line around if what we were going to be watching was in fact real, and the result became a global phenomenon. Sure, it was just a bunch of unknown actors running around in the woods at night with camcorders, but no doubt for those that watched The Blair Witch Project at the time of its release (I was one of them), it was terrifying for all the right reasons.
Soon the found footage technique became the new trend, with the likes of Paranormal Activity and [REC] continuing its use in the horror genre, while the likes of Cloverfield and Chronicle put it to use within the sci-fi realm. The Korean film industry has found itself frequently revisiting the found footage horror, with the recurring theme being that they all tend to fail miserably. From the likes of 2010’s Deserted House, to the more recent Hide-and-Never-Seek. However while Hollywood horror looks to make social media the new found footage (with titles like Unfriended and Friend Request already exposing the limited scope of the concept) Korea has just unleashed a new found footage horror that’s become the 2nd most successful local horror flick of all time.
With only Kim Jee-woon’s A Tale of Two Sisters being more successful, Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum appears to have hit the spot that other found footage horror flicks have been repeatedly missing. So what’s the deal? Helmed by Jeong Beom-sik, the director responsible for the underrated 2007 horror Epitaph, his latest effort has provided him with the success that’s proved to be so elusive up until now. Beom-sik is an aficionado of the horror genre, and contributed segments to both 2012’s Horror Stories and its 2013 follow-up, Horror Stories 2. But when neither of them set the box office alight, he appeared to turn his back on horror, and made a raunchy adult comedy as his sophomore full length feature in the form of 2014’s Casa Amor, Exclusive for Ladies.
Thankfully his third feature sees him returning to the genre he loves, although it hit a few bumps in the road on the way to the screen, even if some of those bumps can also be contributed to its success. First of all, Gonjiam is in fact a real psychiatric hospital which was abandoned in 1995, the reasons for which are surrounded in urban myths (various blogs site everything from ghosts to financial problems). It frequently turns up on ‘Creepiest Places on Earth’ type lists, so if anything it’s a surprise a horror movie has never been filmed there before. Of course, understandably the owner of the hospital, who’s been trying to sell it ever since, didn’t feel that a movie about it being haunted would help attract any potential buyers, so filed a lawsuit against Beom-sik and the production company to prevent it from being released. Luckily, the authorities saw sense, and in March 2018 a Seoul court ruled in favour of it being released.
The plot of Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum is, as expected, little more than a rudimentary framework on which to hang off various scares. A popular vlogger (played by Wi Ha-joon) who runs a site dedicated to covering unexplained happenings, usually of the gruesome variety, decides the best way to increase his views is to broadcast a live stream special event of a group of young paranormal enthusiasts exploring Gonjiam at night. With each of the group fitted with GoPro’s and various other camera equipment, soon they’re on their way, with Ha-joon coordinating everything via headsets to his two regular staff that are accompanying them, while he runs the show from a nearby tent. While Ha-joon and his crew have set up various staged scares to ensure they get the views they’re after, soon events begin to happen which aren’t in the script, and an increasing sense of real terror and panic creeps in as Gonjiam begins to reveal its secrets.
Beom-sik has made a bold move reverting to a genre that many would consider ran out of gas several years earlier, however his back-to-basics approach for the large part pays off. Just like in The Blair Witch Project, most of the cast in Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum are not well known actors, with perhaps the most recognizable face being former frequent Kim Ki-duk collaborator Park Ji-ah, who has a small but meaningful role. The rest are either regular supporting actors (Park Ji-hyun, Oh Ah-yeon, and Park Sung-hoon) or are making their debut (Moon Ye-won and Lee Seung-wook). Just like any horror movie of this nature, the strange events also spilled into real life, with Seung-wook announcing his departure from the entertainment industry just days after its release, marking him as noticeably absent from the promotional activities the cast were taking part in.
The real question of course is the only one that matters for any horror movie – is it scary? To which the answer is, yes, in varying degrees. Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum is a lean movie, running for just over 90 minutes (a small miracle for any Korean movie in recent years), and as such it has to get the sense of dread instilled almost from the word go. Instead of choosing this approach though, Beom-sik plays with the audience just as much as he does the characters exploring the asylum. Some of the scares seem too obvious – loud noises, dolls that suddenly show up in different locations, and alike. Just as it seems the latest found footage horror isn’t going to bring anything different to the table than any of the other failed attempts, that’s when it’s revealed that most of the scares so far have in fact been staged. It’s a smart move, and one which speaks to the cynical mind-set modern audiences have to such setups.
The benefit of this is, once the real scares do come, we’ve been lulled into a false sense of security, which helps to make even the most basic bump in the night that much more terrifying. With that being said, the real scares also don’t last as long as they should, with proceedings abruptly ending just as it begins to feel we’re ramping up to something truly terrifying. It could easily be argued that Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum delivers its scares just as effectively as The Blair Witch Project, and to a point I’d agree. However the difference is, in The Blair Witch Project the terror is sustained, whereas Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum cuts out at a point when you still want to be scared more. It feels a bit like if The Shining ended just as Jack Nicholson was about to enter room 237 in the Overlook Hotel.
What we do get though is a few effectively drawn out scenes of terror, with the U.S. educated character (played by Moon Ye-won) earning the title of scream queen with aplomb. Korean’s have always had somewhat of an awkward relationship with their fellow countrymen who weren’t raised on Korean soil, so it seems somewhat fitting that in the horror genre, being educated overseas marks you as the equivalent of a character having pre-marital sex in a slasher movie. You know they’re going to die first. The dimly lit surroundings are also utilised to maximum effect when it comes to wringing out the tension, with the face-facing cameras allowing us to witness the terror up close and personal. Indeed it’s the stripped down realism that works so much in Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum’s favour, with no unnecessary CGI or booming soundtrack, we’re simply left to be absorbed in the dark recesses of the hospital, and what lurks in them.
Does Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum reinvent the Korean horror genre? No, not by a longshot, and purveyors of the horror genre will no doubt note its similarities to the 2011 Canadian found footage flick, Grave Encounters. However Beom-sik has approached the material with a refreshing lack of pretentiousness, seemingly with no further ambition than to creep the audience out and give them a few jumps along the way, and sometimes in a horror movie that’s all that’s needed. My only wish is that he dedicated as much time delivering on the expectation to be jumping out of our seats every few minutes, as he did on subverting them. As it is though, Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum is a horror movie which deserves to be seen, and for anyone that’s planning to visit Korea at some point, it at least gives you one more place to add to your itinerary.
Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 6/10
