Death Bell

"Death Bell" is a South Korean high school horror movie released in 2008. It includes lots of slasher elements, a few minor mystery passages that can be seen as a nod to many popular Asian ghost movies but also several twisted enigmas that the surviving pupils and teachers have to resolve to save those who are kidnapped one by one by a vengeful mind. Imagine a mixture of the "Yeogo Goedam" series and "Saw".

The problem I have with this movie is not that it doesn't introduce anything new to the genre. A solid high school slasher flick like "4th Period Mystery" can be quite entertaining without being innovative. This movie takes too much time to kick the story off. The first twenty minutes don't even introduce you adequately to the story. The real reasons behind what happens in this movie are shown later in a few rushed flashbacks. The opening minutes introduce you to many unimportant secondary characters.

In fact, there are so many pupils running around that it's a little bit hard to realize who is who. After twenty lame minutes, pupils are suddenly kidnapped and murdered at such a high speed that you might soon feel confused about who is still alive, who has been kidnapped and who is about to be murdered.

Then we have the enigmas. Each time a pupil is about to be tortured to death, a madman presents the surviving crowd an enigma they have to solve at time to save their kidnapped colleagues. Sometimes the survivors even solve the enigmas but that doesn't keep the killer from continuing his slaughter which is pretty lame as the challenges feel somewhat useless. No matter if you solve the enigmas or not, the killer continues to spread death and terror until the very end of the movie.

The enigmas are also rather hard to follow. The first enigma has something to do with mathematics but the solution is never shown to the viewers. For the second enigma, the survivors have to create a sentence which is very hard to understand. I neither understand the sense behind the sentence nor the way the survivors manage to compose it in the end. The other enigmas are a little bit easier to understand but not very interesting as well. The movie should have spent some more time on explaining the enigmas and their more or less associated traps as it is the case in movies like "Mindhunters".

The ending of the movie is rather intriguing and includes a minor twist. Some people felt disappointed by it, others thought it was great and to me it was just okay. At least, it ended this short movie on a rather high note.

Fans of high school horror movies or slasher films can try this movie out. It's nothing groundbreaking but surely entertaining enough if you don't want to watch your "Scream" movies over and over again. It's decently entertaining but only an average horror movie, especially if we compare this to other unique and stunning South Korean horror movies like "A Tale Of Two Sisters", "Bedevilled" or "I Saw The Devil" for example. But for what it is, it's an acceptable fast food horror flicks with a few Korean pop stars acting in here.

Seeing how this movie did so well in Korean box office, I thought it would be pretty good. It's not really a horror flick, but sort of works like the "Saw" movies except not the victims but the students that still hasn't been kidnapped yet has to solve the puzzles in order to save there classmate. My guess is that there wasn't many Korean horror movies released during that year, and since Asians tends to crave horror flicks it did so well. Although the premise is pretty well done, none of the characters seem to stand out much and you just don't care who lives and who dies. None of them were believable and the character decisions don't make sense sometimes, there just isn't any logic. Plus everything about this movie seems to be rushed, especially the ending, the twist also wasn't that shocking or original. But what annoyed me the most was the cliché, it's safe to be in one area but a person can take it anymore or goes off to investigate when the person they leave behind is the one that really needs help, which tends to get annoying since it gets used way too much in this. Although I ain't really looking forward to the sequel to this, I hope it's better than this although sequels tend to suck.

5.3/10

If you're looking just for entertainment than it's great, fast phased, filled with action and a little gore. Other than that the acting is not outstanding but not awful either, the special effects are okay. However the story is nothing special it's kind of a revenge story with saw-ish elements. I gave it 6 stars because I did enjoy watching but it's not something that'll stick with me or have any impact whatsoever.

This is more a slasher film where you count down who is going to be next on the list to be crossed off - it is formula driven. That being said, Death Bell has some very good moments and the middle half brings a lot of suspense and excitement and tension, though the plot gets a bit repetitive after that so you are simply waiting to find out who is the culprit.

The plot is simple: a class full of high grade students are being held captive in their school. An anonymous person has told them they must answer all the questions he gives them or student by student will be killed.

Of course, with Asian horror films, there is usually the usual cliché's - not to say that they won't work - because they usually do. This is no exception - you have your flashbacks, a tormented past and the reflections of adolescent school kids who often make the stupid choices while in stages of panic in their predicament - I guess that is universal.

The choice of music in this film is a bit questioanble as it felt more like a high beat sort of atmosphere that doesn't work at times. The concept is interesting but at the same time the film feels more like a detective game rather than anything really scary - there are only a few moments which made me shudder - and it is mainly shock tactics that don't last for more than a few moments.

Still, it is an entertaining ride. The final payoff at the end - I admit I didn't see it coming and it wasn't too bad. Think of this film like Battle Royale meets Saw.

Fast paced Korean high school spin on Saw. Students are kidnapped, set up in traps, and their classmates must answer questions to set them free. Simple set-up that requires a lot of generous suspension of disbelief by the audience. The killer becomes almost omniscient, and their technical skills are flawless. Still, if people didn't follow the rules we wouldn't have a film. The traps are pretty unsettling, and the story behind why this is going on manages to intrigue for the short running time. Also a critique on the competitive nature of education in South Korea, we see the students scores represented like sports scores. It knows when to build the suspense and when to relish in its gore, but the victims are simply that, and the twist is just too convenient.