Be-seu-teu-sel-leo

Bestseller is a 2010 Korean movie. Here's your story: Popular writer gets accused of plagiarizing her latest novel. She retreats with her young daughter to a small town to begin resurrecting her career and working on her next book. Increasingly frustrated, and with a bad case of writer's block, she becomes obsessed with finding her literary inspiration by any means necessary. She soon finds what she's looking for, but it's way more than she bargained for.

SPOILERS AHEAD!

From there, this movie plays out as part ghost story, part murder mystery, part psychological drama, part action crime thriller. That's a lot of parts for one film!!!...This movie could have easily gotten by with just one or two of these story parts that are typical of this genre, and it probably would have been a much better film if so. But, that's not the case, and this flick is what it is!

Did I like it?...Well, Kinda!...but, I can't make up my mind, and have several varying opinions of what I thought of it overall:

On the one hand, it does seem to be a movie that ran out of steam halfway through, and ended up haphazardly slamming 2 separate one hour stories together in order to get to the finish line. This is the simplest and most likely explanation. These 2 stories are actually intertwined well enough, but the differing tones and themes of each story just don't seem to mesh together very well as a whole.

On the other hand, when I saw this film a second time, I couldn't help but think this story was primarily intended to be interpreted as somewhat of a 3 act play based around the life of the heroine. It's interesting to look at this film this way, but even in doing so, it's still not quite right.

On the third hand (Yes, I have 3 hands!), this movie is not all that different than an anthology type film that tells 3 or 4 horror/mystery/thriller stories that are usually somewhat loosely woven together. The exception here being that it's the same characters continuing the same story along a differing path as the movie progresses. Hmmmm. This movie works well from this point of view, but it's still a little bit off!

Aside from the disjointed way this story unfolded, there's not too much else to complain about; Overall production was quite solid, acting by entire cast was sufficient, and the lead actress was quite effective throughout.

So, make of this film what you will. I thought it was entertaining enough to give it a watch, but I can't wholeheartedly recommend it in all honesty, because it doesn't quite hit the mark no matter how you look at it. None of my 3 hands can give it a definite thumbs up!

I think it's current IMDb rating of 6.3 is pretty much "spot on"!...I'd really like to give it a rating of 7, but I just can't bring myself to do it, so 6 out of 10 stars it is!

The question arose when I finished watching this movie, is it worth it to have that many twisting sides of a story in a single narrative?

Bestseller begins with a stereotypical horror tale with a struggling female novelist with her depression after accused for plagiarism and writer's block. Away from her estranged husband, she with her daughter encounters horror after they move to an old villa in a small city with a secret.

Actually, this movie is promising when the first plot is over, although obvious, it makes an expectation about the mystery and horror combination like The Ring. However, the plot drastically changes into a crime thriller without any traces from the first plot scenes. No apparitions, no jumpscares, just pure crime thriller you'd know and love. It's okay too. Then, all of sudden the mystery in the plot starts to unveiled, but another plot suddenly came in. It's (also) not shocking, but I felt tired. Luckily, the movie ends.

I have watched these kind of movies with drastic changes of plot to give a sense of longing shock and twist so that the impression lasts longer. This movie clearly wants to head that direction, because I noticed for few times the nature of the movie keeps changing throughout the duration. You will have horror jumpscare scenes, continued by psychological horror, followed by crime investigation, and finished by "slapstick" thriller that brings more comedic scenes. Is it not okay?

The movie is actually okay in terms of the production design and the acting. They convey the situation in the scenes pretty much as expected. Besides that, the screenplay really wants to have all packages of what you may expect from a horror/thriller/mystery/crime film. It's good if you separate it, but to collide them and crumble the plot for almost two hours, the movie only left confusing storyline with certain good scenes.

Three plots, should be offered separately or make a solid premise that have to be consistent. This movie seems potential to have the second option (I mean, the screenplay and story are quite complex), so why went the difficult way to narrates a disjointed story? It's like someone greedy wants to execute a fairly good screenplay with all genres. Only ends bad, unfortunately.

I don't know if this movie is worth watching. If you can concentrate with the confusing storyline, I guess it's okay to give it a try. For me, acknowledging the plots with 6/10 is enough to covers up the failed ambition. And, no need to rewatch it.

A writer and her daughter moved into an abandoned house in a country side, her daughter talk about some imaginary friend and she started to experience some super natural forces.she use that as a opportunity to finish her story and force her daughter to ask her imaginary friend about her story. The movie starts like an mediocre Hollywood horror movie. But started to take turns after some time. The movie consist of two twists one is during the end of first half and another one is in the climax. The first half twist is decent but the twist from the climax is weak and predictable. The major dissapoinment in the movie is inconsistent screenplay, the first and second half of the movie are traveling in the completely different ways and dimensions. Some of the questions left unanswered. May be the tight screenplay and some impressive climax may make the movie even better.

If you're a fan of Korean dramas, you're probably familiar with Uhm Jeong Hwa as she was the lead actress in the popular series "Get Curl!" Oh, so young. She has been active in the entertainment industry since the 90s and has steadily gained popularity over the years as she always played her various roles realistically and captivated many people. She is definitely one of the most famous and outstanding actresses in South Korea. Her dedication to the role of Baek Hee Soo, a hopeless writer who uses up her brain cells for her comeback title, created a very convincing and charming performance in this movie. In keeping with her angry and excitable appearance, she lost 7 kg. This, combined with a confusing plot, made an impression on viewers.