REVIEW:
Memento Mori truly cannot be appreciated on one viewing. It's quite enjoyable the first time, but the subtleties and the thought on the viewer's part really kick in that second time. This hybrid social drama, romance, and horror film has a lot going for it and what seems at first to be a fuddled end sequence is truly thought provoking upon further inspection, giving new meaning to the entire film.

While Memento Mori seems to try come across as a horror film in its marketing and in its intro, it's much more so a social drama and romance. The first two-thirds of the film are primarily spent exploring the relationship between the two young lovers and how this is viewed by their fellow students. Truly this gives a harsh look at the teenage social atmosphere. These girls are truly vicious, not only to the lesbian couple, but even to their own "friends". In one particular scene, where students are getting their regular phsyical exams, we see outcries and lots of ridicule as the girls' chest sizes and heights are read. Of course, our lesbian couple are the recipients of the harshest of this ridicule. Both were already outcasts and found comfort in each other. But, how will they handle the reaction to their true relationship when they make it public?

The romance element is also well-built. To see how the two girls come together and find comfort in each other is quite convincing. Even more convincing are the strains put on their relationship by various events in the film, calling into question their trust of each other and their own feelings about how their peers view them. By the end of the film, the relationship reaches a crushing level as the we look back at the hard times of the relationship while the supernatural occurences are happening.

Finally, there is the horror segment of the film. First of all, this is not a scary horror. It is more of a supernatural, unexplained type of thing. This occurs mostly towards the end of the film. The first insights into it, as Min-Ah reads the "Memento Mori" chant from the couple's diary is quite intriguing and really gets the viewer to sit up and pay attention. Then, as the movie heads into the almost true horror segment of the fim in an elaborate supernatural school scene at the end, things get quite strange. Upon first viewing, this seems unnecessarily ambiguous and the plot here seems terribly fuddled. The viewer is left with many questions. I almost faulted the film for this on my first viewing, but I didn't realize how much more impressive it would make the second viewing. Knowing what my questions were and where to watch, I started to really look into the relationship and relate all the happenings to the end sequence. While some questions still remain unanswered, I really got to thinking and lots of good ideas started just pouring out. This made this viewing an unexpected and pleasantly engaging experience.

Most movies are not as good, or at best, as good the second time as they are the first. Memento Mori, on the other hand, while quite good on the first viewing seems to really set the viewer up for an awesome experience on the second viewing. The horror segment changes everything, but it makes viewers' rethink all the aspects of the film, particularly the strains on the relationship between the two girls. With an amazingly moody, atmospheric soundtrack to back up this intriguing story that does well to combine social drama, romance, and horror - Memento Mori will engrain itself into your brain for a long time.

When schoolgirl Min Ah discovers a secret diary belonging to two of her classmates, Hyo-Shin and Shi-Eun, who share an unusually close bond she becomes almost obsessed with them. Feigning illness so that she can skip class to spend more time reading the diary she witnesses an obviously emotional meeting of the two girls while in the clinic. Shortly after Hyo-Shin commits suicide by jumping off the school roof but Min Ah still feels her influence as if reading the diary has somehow brought her closer to the dead girl's spirit. A series of mysterious events occur which gradually reveal the reasons behind Hyo-Shin's suicide.

Directors Kim Tae-Yong and Min Kyu-Dong undertook considerable research, through interviewing students and visiting their hang outs, to help them recreate a realistic picture of life in a girls' boarding school and to develop credible characters. It paid off as, ghostly occurrences aside, the situations presented are completely believable especially in the subtle way that the love affair between Hyo-Shin and Shi-Eun is portrayed. Schoolgirl lesbianism and student/teacher affairs are rather taboo subjects in any society and the film makers have used the perfect approach with subtlety and inference instead of voyeurism. The film does have its problems though as due to frequent use of flashbacks the film is, at times, difficult to follow and the method of storytelling isn't as effective as it could have been. Also as a horror story it doesn't really succeed in being scary enough. However its the strength of the performances, especially of the two central characters, that make this film worth seeing.