'Sarajin shigan' (boringly retitled in English as 'Me and Me') has one of the most innovative and original plot threads I have encountered this year. To know anything about the film's plot beforehand, apart from what's written in the logline, will seriously diminish the joy of discovering the story's bold, unpredictable turns. The genre treatment is very refreshing too, since this is one of those movies that do not fall in any particular category. The basic premise is a rather supernatural fantasy, but the course of events tend to run like a satirical social drama, and there's always an air of mystery hanging in the atmosphere. And intriguingly, the film manages to knit all these together into a compelling narrative - a very praiseworthy job. But truth be told, maybe in the hands of a more experienced writer/director these ideas would have flourished to their full potential. There are a few instances where the scope of the narrative and plot threads run beyond the grasp of the director, resulting in some relatively weaker, confusing scenes, especially towards the end. Also, all the actors did great to turn this rather outlandish story extremely convincing.
A current trend among Korean films is to pick up plot elements from established genre structures (like horror, thriller, sci-fi) and remodel them into a completely different genre of filmmaking, thus conveying sociopolitical standpoints by subverting their origins. This film should rightfully be placed along with the best examples of that trend, for its ingenuity, if only its narrative craft were as good.
