Number 3:
The story follows Hae-won and her friend Bok-nam, as children they grew up on a small island named Moodo.  Hae-won has since escaped and moved to Seoul City working for a bank, after witnessing a crime where three youths assault a young woman she does nothing to help letting the three thugs walk free. An altercation at work ends up with her being told to take a vacation from and she decides to return to Moodo to relax and regroup. On arrival she is met by her old friend and they start to rekindle their friendship.
We quickly find out life has not been easy for Bok-nam, in the years that Hae-won has been away she has been treated like nothing more than an animal, beaten by her husband and constantly insulted from the elders of the island, the film is the story of one person sanity slowly getting grinded away.
Not without humour in its darkness, the first hour or so of this film is pretty hard to watch as we see just what life is like for Bok-nam, we see the violence and hatred that is shovelled upon her and how she for the most part lets it go and bottles it up inside. The film builds tension steadily throughout with each new revelation being worst than the last.
The city life seems to have made Hae-won cold and reserved as she sees what is happening to Bok-nam but never extends a helping hand, just like the crime at the beginning she doesn’t want to get involved. Hae-won’s selfishness runs throughout the film and is one of the reasons why that first hour or so is so hard to swallow.
In the same way as I Spit on Your Grave’ after watching the brutality and humiliation laid on one character for so long you are just begging for blood and in this case Bok-nam’s release of a lifetime’s worth of bottled up emotions and turn it into a dish of ice cold revenge. When it finally happens the relief and satisfaction from that first kill created a sense of exhaling, the tension was over, you could unclench and just enjoy the retribution that Bok-nam was going to lay on these awful people.
The film isn’t perfect in anyway, it has final act issues where it drags on the conclusion a little too long, I counted at least two different places where the film could have ended and it have been more satisfying for me. Also, the villains in the story are very one dimensional, there really isn’t any depth to them whatsoever and they never change their tune. It’s always just an onslaught of hatred for Bok-nam, which I agree is rather bad writing but also adds to the blood lust and the relief when the revenge finally begins. In my opinion it’s a case of bad writing but good storytelling; in a strange way they remind me of Disney villains who are just evil for evils sake.
People have made an issue about the films pacing and that it takes too long to actually get going, I would disagree as I felt the gentle build up and the overbearing sense of something big was about to happen  felt like gently simmering water about to boil. That slow start along with the gradual increase of tension and anxiety just meant that the pay off was that much more rewarding.
Bedevilled just like The Pack was a complete surprise for me, I had no interest in them before my screenings but both give me a great time at the cinema. Bedevilled is a superbly told story of one woman’s well deserved revenge.  Yes, it’s a tad long at the climax and yes, it’s got one dimensional villains, but when you have such a vibrant character as Bok-nam at the centre of your story I couldn’t help but fall a little in love with this movie and hopefully you will too.
8.5/10
