Phone (film)

Phone (Korean: 폰; RR: Pon) is a 2002 South Korean supernatural horror film written and directed by Ahn Byeong-ki and starring Ha Ji-won and Kim Yoo-mi.

Not to be confused with The Phone (film).
Phone
Theatrical poster
Hangul폰
Revised RomanizationPon
McCune–ReischauerP'on
Directed byAhn Byeong-ki
Produced byAhn Byeong-ki[1]
Written by
  • Ahn Byeong-ki
  • Lee Yu-jin[1]
StarringHa Ji-won
Kim Yoo-mi
Music byLee Sang-ho [1]
CinematographyMun Yong-sik[1]
Edited byPark Soon-duk[1]
Production
company
Toilet Pictures[1]
Release date
  • 26 July 2002 (2002-07-26)
Running time
103 minutes[1]
CountrySouth Korea[1]
LanguageKorean
Box officeUS$21.7 million[2]

Plot

After writing a series of articles about a pedophilia scandal, journalist Ji-won receives threatening calls on her cellular and subsequently changes her number. Her close friend Ho-jung, who is infertile, and her husband Chang-hoon invite Ji-won to move to their empty house in Bang Bae that is newly furnished. When Ho-jung's daughter Young-ju answers an anonymous phone call on Ji-won's new cell phone, the girl screams and begins to show a disturbing attraction for her father and jealous rejection towards her mother. Meanwhile, Ji-won receives more mysterious phone calls and sees a teenager playing Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata" on the piano. After investigating her phone number, Ji-won discovers that the original owner of the number, Jin-hee, had vanished and that the two subsequent owners of the number had died mysteriously in unusual circumstances. Her further investigation about Jin-hee reveals that the teenage schoolgirl was obsessively in love with a man who had broken up with her.

Before Jin-hee vanished, Ji-won found out that Jin-hee was in a relationship with Chang-hoon. Ho-jung found out about the affair and confronted Jin-hee. During their confrontation, Jin-hee mocked Ho-jung's infertility problem and told Ho-jung that she was pregnant with Chang-hoon's baby. In a struggle between the two women, Ho-jung accidentally pushed Jin-hee down the stairs and killed her. Ji-won also discovers that Jin-hee's dead body was hidden inside one of the walls at the house she is staying at. However, before Ji-won can go out for help, Ho-Jung arrives and knocks her out. Ho-jung reveals that aside of Jin-hee, Ho-jung is also jealous of Ji-won, who had let her egg be used in in vitro fertilisation so Ho-jung could conceive Young-ju, which technically made Ji-won the true biological mother of Young-ju. It is also revealed that Ho-Jung stages suicide for Chang-hoon, making it seem that he is guilty of Jin-hee's death, so he commits suicide in the bathtub.

Ho-jung plans to burn the body of Jin-hee and the unconscious Ji-won with gasoline. However, Jin-hee's spirit awakens and takes revenge on Ho-jung, thus saving Ji-won. The film ends with Ji-won dropping the cursed cell phone into the ocean, which rings after entering the water.

Cast
  • Ha Ji-won... Ji-won, a young journalist
  • Kim Yoo-mi... Ho-jung
  • Choi Woo-jae ... Chang-hoon
  • Choi Ji-yeon ... Jin-hee
  • Eun Seo-woo ... Young-ju
  • Choi Jung-yoon ... Min Ja-young

Release

Phone was released in South Korea on July 26, 2002.[1] Phone was among the highest grossing domestic productions in South Korea in 2002, having 2,182,915 tickets sold making the eighth highest grossing domestic production that year in South Korea.[3] Phone received theatrical distribution in multiplex cinemas in the United Kingdom in August 2004.[4]

Imprint Entertainment bought the rights for an American remake in 2009.[5]

Reception

Jason Gibner of AllMovie commented on Phone, stating that despite the film "having many good scares", if the viewer was familiar with Ring, The Eye or Ju-on they would not find much fresh in the film as Phone "relies far too heavily on visual frights that have been executed many times in the past."[6]

See also
  • K-Horror

References

Footnotes
  1. "The Phone ( Pon )". KMDb. Retrieved December 2, 2020.
  2. "Pon (Phone)". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 2014-06-02.
  3. "2002". Koreanfilm.org. Retrieved December 2, 2020.
  4. Martin 2013, p. 152.
  5. Barton, Steven (4 December 2009). "Imprint Entertainment Answers the Phone for Remake". Dread Central. Retrieved 2014-06-02.
  6. Gibner, Jason. "Phone (2002)". AllMovie. Retrieved December 3, 2020.

Sources
  • Peirse, Alison; Martin, Daniel (2013). Peirse, Alison; Martin, Daniel (eds.). Korean Horror Cinema. Edinburgh University Press.


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