Black House 2007

Jean Juno, a former banker, starts a new job working as an insurance salesman, immediately finding himself in a bit of a quandary, a client, demanding payment on the loss of his child, could have murdered his own step-son. Juno, not accepting that this little boy actually committed suicide, believing he was murdered, will attempt to prove his death was in fact a homicide. Juno is haunted by the suicide of his brother(a victim of bullies)and this has shaped him as an adult.

In regards to cold blooded female psychopaths, Shin Yi-Hwa reminded me of Béatrice Dalle from À l'intérieur and Asami Yamazaki(Eihi Shiina)of Takashi Miike's Ôdishon. She has these black soulless eyes reminiscent to Michael Meyers, there's a void where humanity should be present yet isn't. Yi-Hwa moves in a deliberate but determined manner, a crook in her walk due to a handicapped foot which bends inward. Director Terra Shin often points his camera at Yi-Hwa's feet, establishing her presence in a room approaching her quarry with evil intent.



The hero of this movie Jean Juno(Jeong-min Hwang)wants desperately to believe that Yi-Hwa is human, that she has emotions, can feel something. What we see, though, is anything but. To manipulate her unstable (third) husband to chop of his arms for insurance money(and to sew a victim's eyes shut, pulling another with a chain in front of a moving train), it's hard to accept that Yi-Hwa is human at all.

BLACK HOUSE is definitely macabre in the grandest sense as Jean Juno's insurance salesman/investigator questions whether or not Yi-Hwa's son actually committed suicide or was hung by his step-father, Park Choong-Bae(Shin-il Kang)for a 30 million dollar policy taken out only recently on the entire family. Choong-Bae was heavily in debt due to a gambling habit, only a sheet metal worker unemployed yet somehow still making the payments on the policy. Juno is a direct opposite of Yi-Hwa, his heart is pure and only wants justice for the dead boy he found hung in Choong-Bae's home. At the onset, Juno thought Yi-Hwa was in danger, but as he crusades in behalf of the fallen child, a startling discovery awakens him to the truth..it's not Choong-Bae who is the mastermind behind gaining moneys from insurance policies, but Yi-Hwa.



Warning Juno to pay up and butt out, Yi-Hwa is only concerned with the money and will kill anyone who stands in her way. Labeling Yi-Hwa as dedicated would be an understatement. Juno also inadvertently brings his beloved girlfriend, a hospital doc, Mina(Seao-hyeong Kim)into the cross-hairs of Yi-Hwa's mania. Yi-Hwa will use Mina to draw Juno into her lair, a veritable slaughterhouse where multiple victims(including an insurance investigator from Juno's company whose upper torso is hanging from hooks, eyes and mouth sown shut)and their body parts are stored.

I'm amused at how the butcher knives in horror movies nowadays resemble machetes, they're so long and gigantic, quite imposing especially when you have someone as intimidating as Yi-Hwa pressing her way towards you with only one goal in mind, burying it into her prey's body. Juno pays a price for his courage, taking his share of lumps(more like stabs)because of this pursuit to see that Yi-Hwa is stopped. Fans of horror movies about psychotics should enjoy this one.

There's a character whose role is small but important as it pertains to Yi-Hwa's downfall, a student working on a thesis about psychopaths who provides Juno some information on his subject, this research costing him his life.

I imagine that anyone who sees BLACK HOUSE will be hard pressed to forget Seon Yu's role as Yi-Hwa; she definitely leaves a lump in the throat, particularly at the end where she toys with her bleeding eye socket(Juno punctures it with a house key!)seemingly unable to feel any pain whatsoever.