kayakofan "Into the Mirror" has an interesting and unique premise, a good story, and a few decently creepy scenes. And even though it sounds promising, you can't help but feel as if there's something missing. The first ten minutes has all the atmosphere, all the suspense, and the shock factor to make the rest of the film great. But the atmosphere, the sense of dread and suspense strangely disappears after then, and never really comes back. From then on, it sets up the mystery, and until the last twenty-five minutes, things are dull and uninvolving.Despite the apparent terror factor that's missing, I do have to say that the film itself is well-made and has high-quality production values. The photography and imagery is nice, the Ho-sung Kim's direction is stylish and artsy, the acting is really good (with a very welcomed performance by Ji-tae Yu, as seen in "Gawi" and "Oldboy"), and the visual effects are impressive.So, I know a lot of people love this movie, but I personally think this is, well.. a wasted opportunity. There's some interesting things here, but "Into the Mirror" left me disappointed.My rating: 5.5/10.

Danny_G13 Despite being unsure what it is, Into the Mirror succeeds in spinning an entertaining yarn.Ji-tae Yu is Woo Yeong-min, a former policeman who's been reduced to security guard for his uncle's company since a hostage incident 1 year prior resulted in the death of a man as a consequence of a mistake from Min. He opted to shoot the aggressor and missed, shooting his reflection by mistake. The occurrence left him completely traumatised and entirely miserable, and unable to look himself in the mirror.However, when 2 employees of the company die in extremely mysterious circumstances, Min's former partner on the force, Heo Hyeon-su joins the investigation and strange goings on continue.Part supernatural chiller, part cop drama, part psychological drama, part surreal mystery, Into the Mirror is very much an eclectic mix of different styles of movie. It without question succeeds in the basic discipline of any film, that of concertedly engaging the viewer's attention for the duration, and it does this thanks to a number of elements:First of all the cinematography is spot on, and is extremely good at facilitating the supernatural psychology. Aided by a director who seems to know exactly what to show us, each scene is smartly captured, with many clever uses of mirrors. Many occasions will call for your attention on more than one thing, and the mystery of wondering what, if any, wrongness will occur is well realised. Furthermore, the acting is surprisingly decent for an Asian movie. As ignorant as that may sound, I have viewed many Asian films and the acting is uniformly rather bland. Even though westerners do not understand the language, emotion et al can still come across on celluloid and Asian movies are often left wanting here. However, Into the Mirror is more than decent in this area for once, with good performances from a fair few players. It certainly adds to the experience when it's not just the story we watch for.There lies another strength. As touched on earlier the movie is downright entertaining, and relies on a pretty strong script and effective narrative. This film is never boring, aided and abetted by a script which never has vacuous moments and empty sequences. Everything is there for a reason.However, the big weakness is the overriding suspicion that the film really doesn't know what it is trying to be. With so many styles mixed together, it comes across as more of a salad bowl than melting pot. Weird goings-on akin to the spooky occurrences in movies like Ring seem a little out of joint in the company of a police drama and crime mystery.However, if you are willing to forgive this lack of harmony, like I, then you can overlook it and accept the movie for what it is: An entertaining yarn with enough going for it to keep you watching.One last flaw though is the ending. Obviously I am not going to give it away, but the problem with it is it seems far too ambitious, and not a tad confusing. I was left not so much baffled as to what was going on, but what it actually meant overall. This took the shine off perhaps a little, but it was still a fine picture overall and I would still recommend it.

BennyM I was expecting something along the lines of The Ring or Dark Water with this one. The general mood, however, it much lighter and less claustrophobic, and the story focuses more on the plight of the ex-cop and the traumatic experience that cost him his job than on the haunted supermarket in which the film opens.Certain story points are left dangling (eg. why was Yeong-min released? They still had his prints on the gun, which, as far as evidence went, was harder than anything else in this film).In my opinion, the potential in the effects was never fully realised. There are no real shocks. Maybe this is because Kim Seong-ho himself expected to make a Ring kind of film, so instead of going straight for the jugular, he went more for the lurching things-that-go-bump-in-the-night approach. I for one would have liked it if they had used more won on the effects and made them really jump at me (and make me jump).Still, the final scene and the chilling realisation of what has happened to Yeong-min is worth it all.

narcissus293 This film was based on a psychological analysis for mirror and patients who suffered severe shocks. The movie doesn't really have a ghost or a bloody scene, however, the flimmaker intentionally puts mirror into the film many times, the fear and thrill flows underneath the screen.The film starts with a department store in South Korea, the department store caught fire and one woman was killed. Few years later the department store was opened again and those people who hold secrets of the department store and the dead woman began to be killed.To tell the truth, the film was great and I recommend you all to see this!!