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Tale Of Two Sisters (A)
[Blu-ray]
Blu-ray B - United Kingdom - Palisades Tartan Review written by and copyright: Christopher Brown (30th December 2009). |
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The Film
 After being released from a hospital psychiatric ward teenage sisters Soo-mi (Su-Jeong Lim) and Soo-yeon (Geun-Young Moon), are brought back to their isolated country home by their emotionally distant father Bae Moo-hyeon (Kap-su Kim). Waiting to greet them is their stepmother Eun-joo (Jung-ah Yum), a woman who harbours a barely concealed hostility towards the young sisters. Beyond the drama of this fractured family unit is a tale of dark secrets, and once the sun goes down a more sinister and infinitely more menacing force makes itself known. As a huge fan of Asian cinema, in particular their unique take on my beloved horror genre "A Tale of Two Sisters" is quite simply a joy to watch. Coupled with a chilling, and beautiful score by Byung-woo Lee this film really does drag you into its world where nothing is quite as it first appears. Director Ji-woon Kim presents us with an affecting and slow boiling suspense piece that carefully builds the tension and once it has you it doesn't let go. For such an intimate film the cinematography by Mo-gae Lee here is brilliantly dramatic with long sweeping shots, and acute dramatic camera angles that give a sense of scope not usually afforded to such character driven films. Coupled with soft almost ethereal lighting gives a dreamlike quality to the daylight scenes. In stark contrast the night time scenes are wonderfully claustrophobic with ragged cuts and short almost panicked camera moves that build the tension, and feed the fear. The audio here is also given the same level care and thought. A score that is equally beautiful and haunting. One thing that Ji-woon Kim also does well is his use of silence. In a few key scenes the audio is stripped bare and its sudden absence is so off putting you can't help but hold your breath and pull you knees in close for fear of what's to come. I don't want to give away any plot points. My suggestion is if you like intelligent scary films watch this film as soon as you can. It unfolds with such elegance everything (even the unnatural) feels organic. Like this film was grown rather than shot.
Video
Presented in the film's original theatrical ratio of 1.85:1 this film comes to Blu-ray in high-definition 1080i using VC-1 compression. The transfer itself is very good despite not being presented in 1080p. Perhaps not as sharp as a lot of releases, but its a definite upgrade from the DVD release. I didn't detect any noticeable artefacts or compression flaws. The picture is clean, the colours are clear. My major issue would be regarding the "blackness" in some scenes whether is a short coming from the video source or something that has been bought in during the encoding process it can be (for me at least) slightly distracting to have a slight blue tone to the deep shadows in some partially dark scenes.
Audio
The quality of the audio is quite simply brilliant with a choice of either Korean DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 or Korean Dolby TrueHD 5.1 both mixed at 48kHz/24-bit, you can't go wrong. For the purpose of this review I went the DTS-HD route, and really it was a joy to listen to. The levels are well balanced, dialogue is neither overly loud or overshadowed by the score or other sources. the real winner here though is the music. Its clear, rich and vibrant a true joy to listen to. The subtitles are clear and always easily read and available in English only.
Extras
The weak point of this Blu-Ray release is the shocking lack of extra features. I also own the Aztec International DVD release and its packed to its 8GB brim with interesting features almost all of which are missing here. In fact the only feature included was the "Creating A Tale of Two Sisters" making-of featurette, and at a paltry 23 minutes 55 seconds in standard-definition no less one cant help but wonder what Palisades Tartan was thinking. A missed opportunity to be sure.
Overall
"A Tale of Two Sisters" is a captivating and haunting story of one family's struggle to come to terms with a dark secret past and an unseen presence that may destroy what remains of the frayed familial bonds barely holding them together. Anyone who is a fan of horror or Asian cinema should immediately check out this wonderful little film. A true gem in an overpopulated sub-genre.
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