Directed by: Lee Kyoung-mi (이경미) Starring: Son Ye-jin (손예진), Kim Joo-hyuk (김주혁), Kim So-hee (김소희), Choi Yu-hwa (최유화), Shin Ji-hoon (신지훈) Release Date: June 23rd, 2016
Director Lee Kyoung-mi who helmed and co-wrote Park Chan-wook’s first self-produced film Crush and Blush (2008) shares writing credits with acclaimed director Park Chan-wook (The Handmaiden, Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance) again for her second feature length film The Truth Beneath. Not for the faint-hearted, director Lee Kyoung-mi has crafted a script that plunges face first into the coldest depths of humanity with its unforgiving narrative. The Truth Beneath is a true no-holds-barred dark mystery thriller that features a story where murder, blackmail, forbidden love, and revenge take center stage.
On the eve of Kim Jong-chan (Kim Joo-hyuk) officially beginning his congressional campaign, his daughter Min-ji (Shin Ji-hoon), who has struggled with delinquency in the past, never returns home from school. As the party favorite, he goes against his wife’s wishes and chooses to delay filing a missing persons report in fear he will lose standing in the polls. When Min-ji fails to turn up, a full-on police investigation ensues and Jong-chan makes finding his daughter the focus of his election campaign. But as public sympathy looks to be pushing Jong-chan towards political victory, his wife Yeon-hong (Son Ye-jin) begins to suspect her husband had something to do with their daughter’s disappearance and begins an investigation of her own into to uncover the truth beneath.
Yeon-hong’s search leads her to question a suspicious classmate of her daughter’s named Mi-ok (Kim So-hee), whom she learns not only shared a special bond with bond with her daughter Min-ji, but was also mercilessly bullied by her classmates. When other anomalies like the girls’ school teacher So-ra (Choi Yu-hwa) revealing that their class grades began to dramatically increase during despite their substandard study habits, the stage begins to set for one shocking revelation after the next surrounding the truth behind Min-ji’s disappearance.
As a mystery thriller, The Truth Beneath delivers on multiple fronts with its ever evolving lines of questioning and inquiry. Everyone from campaign rivals and associates to school friends and teachers become persons of interest seeming to hide different truths as if they’re taking part in either some massive conspiracy surrounding the disappearance of the girl. Even the parents of the missing girl themselves seem to be coming to grips with their own respective degrees of negligence that bear some responsibility in producing such horrific outcomes for their daughter. The twists and turns come fast and furious in The Truth Beneath, and many of the film’s shocking revelations left me stunned.
The Truth Beneath (2016) also sees lead actors Son Ye-jin (The Classic, A Moment to Remember) and Kim Joo-hyuk (Confidential Assignment, Believer) reunite to play a married couple with a set of problems that make their love triangle in 2008’s My Wife Got Married seem like child’s play. The two get into some domestic bouts as their marriage falls apart that send chills down my spine as their anger and resentment towards each other boils over into dangerous territory.
Son Ye-jin delivers her most devastating and powerful performance to date as the grief stricken mother Yeon-hong. She goes from happy and faithful supporter of her husband and his campaign to beginning to resemble the desperate and frantic antics of the mother in Stranger Things (Season 1) as she connects one seemingly crazy dot to the next to locate her missing child. Her character’s desperation is strongly felt through this private investigation that flies in the face on an apparently incompetent/unmotivated police force as she turns to shamanistic rituals and prayers exhausting every line of inquiry. Whatever I had seen of Son Ye-jin prior to The Truth Beneath, nothing could have prepared me for the dark descent her role takes her to. In short, I was floored. And the late Kim Joo-hyuk (who we’ll forever miss, R.I.P) also being previously known for more melodramatic and comedic roles, surprises with the level of depth and conflicted darkness expressed through his role as the promising congressional candidate.
Despite The Truth Beneath being only her second feature film, for my money, director Lee Kyoung-mi remains one of the more gutsy and unique filmmakers out there who I’d love to see take on more projects. Her segment on the Netflix production Persona (2019) is also worth a look. But in the best of ways, there are moments in The Truth Beneath that look and feel a lot like a Park Chan-wook film, especially when it comes to the on screen revenge that could fit right in to the vengeance trilogy alongside Oldboy (2003) and Lady Vengeance (2005).
As in a Park Chan-wook film, the music, editing and cinematography in The Truth Beneath plays a big part in establishing tone. The mise en scène especially post Min-ji’s disappearance is dominated by an abundance of blacks and dark blues that help to emphasize the hurt and despair felt by the characters, while also using shadows to obscure faces and events that reinforce the concept of hidden truths. The flashbacks establishing Min-ji’s school life and budding relationships tend to portray a brighter and more colorful reality. This offered an incredible contrast between a youthful world guided by truth clashing with an adult world corrupted by endless lies. But as harrowing as the narrative becomes, The Truth Beneath boasts an undeniable visual splendor that had my eyes glued to the screen.
There are a handful of serious, dark drama films that have the courage to enter the kind of uncomfortable territory and extreme measures taken by the characters in The Truth Beneath. Fans of Korean directors like Park Chan-wook and Jung Ji-woo (Heart Blackened, Eungyo) would strongly be advised to add The Truth Beneath to their watchlists and to take notice of director Lee Kyoung-mi, whom remains my number one most eagerly awaited Korean director to tackle a new film project.
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