Such is the story of Joon-ho Bong's Memories of Murder (Salinui chueok), which takes an impressively objective look at the overwhelmingly inexperienced South Korea law enforcement officials who were never able to crack this case.

A young woman is found dead in a ditch, and it's not long before rural police officers Park and Jo are stymied. From Seoul comes the hard-boiled detective Seo, who quietly manages to overlook his colleagues' relative cluelessness; it's not the fault of officers Park and Jo that they've no idea where to look -- and possess even less in the resources department. But a few canny calls lead to a few tenuous leads:

Our killer likes to stalk at night, in the rain, and always to one particular song. The local cops tend to grab hold of one obscure (and often ridiculous) clue, while Detective Seo tends to be a little more methodical with his approach. Alas, nothing works.

What's most interesting about Memories of Murder is that it works as a casual indictment of the slipshod police-work while also sucking you in as a well-oiled crime procedural. It's not just that these well-intentioned policemen were way out of their element; but what they do know, they seem to have learned from American movies and TV shows.

In today's modern era of hyper-forensic wizardry and criminal profiling of the most accurate sort, one may find the casual confusion of these policemen a bit old-fashioned and sadly lacking ... which I suppose is part of Bong's point; it's not just that a terribly slippery killer struck and killed several innocent victims; it's that the murders were able to continue due to the investigators' inadequate training, lack of resources, and general over-reliance on the obvious answers.

Memories of Murder moves slowly and methodically, but it's a pretty fascinating story all the way through. It might not have the flash of American thrillers like Silence of the Lambs or Seven, but it's a true-crime story brought to cinematic life with insight, irony, and intensity.

Final Thoughts: Low-key, unassuming, and crafty in the way it slowly gets under your skin, Memories of Murder is a sly and smart thriller. It works as a straight crime story because it's a well-crafted piece of storytelling, but it's even better than that -- because it tells the whole ugly truth about a series of murders that you've probably never even heard about before.

It begins when a girls body is found in a drainage ditch located in an expanse of fertile farmland. Soon, another body is found, same as the last, a young girl, bound, strangled, with her undergarments over her head. The crime scene is sloppy, too many reporters, too many cops, and a tractor runs over some footprints that could have been the killer's. Inspector Park (Song Kang-ho) and his partner begin compiling a book with possible suspects, finally deciding to pin it on a retarded boy who was known to follow the last victim around. They begin their standard forced interrogation, keeping the kid in the basement, leading him into a coerced confession by giving him a smack or two when he answers wrong.

Inspector Suh (Kim Sang-hyung), a detective from Seoul, volunteers to help with the case, and he instantly shuns Parks investigative method. While Park and his partner are busy falsifying evidence and appeasing the local reporters and their chief, Suh insists that the simple minded kids underdeveloped hands couldn't possibly strangle anyone, much less hold a pair of chopsticks. To the departments discgrace, Suh is right. So, as suspects come and go, the two detectives find themselves forced to merge with the others style. Suh's eyes offer a new perspective and details. Park knows the land and its people. But, it seems they only get the thinnest clues and possible coincidences to follow. Pinning their hopes on leads that dissipate, the two men struggle to find a killer before he can strike again.

One of the things I've learned from reading the good true crime books/case studies is that the way serial killers are portrayed in most movies and fiction novels is about as outlandish as a Batman villain. When you read anything by actual criminal psychologists and investigators, you quickly realize Thomas Harris' (and 99% of the crime fiction/film community) serial killer musings are about as transparent and hokey as a Friday the 13th film. It is also the reason why, if you want to get down to the nitty gritty, Citizen X is a vastly better serial killer film than Seven. Not that there isn't room for the wild, outlandish, and pulp. But, due to their exaggerated portraits in books and film, serial killers have in most peoples minds been bloated into some kind of mythic evil.

Memories of Murder doesn't offer easy answers or tidy resolutions. By taking the procedural stance, it is more about the detectives character and method while the killer remains an enigma. Park and Suh make for an engaging odd couple of the rural and the urban detective. As Park says, Suh wants to think like the FBI, but the FBI has to use their brains because the US is so detailed and has so much land to cover. Illegal tactics aside, Park relies on his instincts because he is Korean and in Korea detectives use their feet. The case the film is based on remains unsolved. The film finds its poignant ending based on this and offers a glimpse at different side of the investigative world- what if, despite all of your efforts, you still came up empty, and people died as a result?

Though the films villain is a mystery and the case has a futility, the film is not completely mired in the doldrums or lacking in suspense. Surprisingly, there is good deal of levity, little asides, dollops of humor that also keep it from being a one note dirge. While it isn't uncommon for Asian films to offer a grab bag of styles, the humor here isn't bracingly forced. It feels quite natural- a kid at a crime scene mock mimicking Inspector Park, or Park mistaking Suh's good samaritan actions and (a by the way quite real- no stuntmen) dropkicking the new detective, or the passed out chief suddenly waking from a drunken stupor to separate his two arguing detectives. Director Bong Joo-hoo injects humor as a realistic reaction and the detectives way of coping with their dark jobs. It also always remains true to character, with the more at ease and world weary Inspector Park having a more casual nature, whereas the younger and more dedicated Inspector Suh takes everything serious.

Conclusion: While it doesn't offer a wise-cracking serial killer who creates elaborate booby traps or kills people based on the seven deadly sins, Memories of Murder offers something a bit deeper, and admittedly dramatically methodical, than your standard thriller fare. Great performances. Interesting characters. Solid direction...

"Memories of Murder" broke box office records in its native South Korea. The film, based on an actual police case that is still unsolved to this day, has achieved international acclaim and might just be the most hyped Korean film since "Shiri". As was the case with the other movie, "Murder's" popularity has a lot to do with its local appeal, and most international audiences won't be aware that there's more to the movie than the serial killer genre on display. "Murder" is one of the few films to juggle quirky comedy and realistic crime well; but it's much more ambitious than that if one really pays attention to the background.

"Memories of Murder" opens in 1986 in the Korean countryside, where two local women are found murdered in similar fashion. Detectives Du-man Park (Kang-ho Song) and Yong-gu (Roe-ha Kim) are put on the case, but it becomes quickly apparent they have neither the skill nor the temperament for the job. After an attempt to pin the murder on a mentally challenged man goes awry, the cops reluctantly accept the help of Tae-yun Suh (Sang-kyung Kim), a cop from Seoul who has come offering his assistance. Suh thinks they have a serial killer on their hands and sets to prove it. Meanwhile, Park and Yong-gu are already looking for someone else to pin the crimes on so the whole thing will blow over.

At the heart of the movie is Kang-ho Song ("JSA") as Park, whose lack of police talent isn't an exception, but the rule. Everyone around him is not up to the task, including the police chief. This is most evident in the film's first half, where Park and Jo struggles to do simple things like keep kids from trampling over a crime scene. Later, the cops fail to stop a tractor from driving over a potentially valuable piece of evidence. If bungling cases were crimes, these guys would be on death row. In fact, the only person who deserves an exemption is female cop Gui-ok (Seo-hie Ko), but the men of her precinct treat her mostly as a glorified maid.

As mentioned, "Memories of Murder" is one of the few movies that manage to straddle comedy and crime with great ability. The last movie to do this was "Public Enemy", which managed to be funny and brutal at the same time. "Murder" goes for stark reality when it comes to the killings, but plays it goofy and loose with everything else. After failing to "convince" a suspect to allow himself to be prosecuted, Park theorizes that the murderer is a hairless Buddhist monk living in the monastery nearby. Later, he seeks divine guidance from a fortuneteller, but ends up badgering the woman to look at his makeshift mug book and pick out a face.

Much of the movie's police work may seem primitive to viewers raised on Fincher's "Se7en" and weaned on the high-tech crime-solving prowess of "CSI". How does Park corral his first suspect? Simple: his girlfriend mentions a name to him after sex. And how does Park encounter his next suspect? He's in the woods with Jo using magic charms to magically discover the face of the killer, when the suspect wanders into the area and masturbates at the crime scene while wearing women's underwear.

Less successful as a main character is Sang-kyung Kim as Suh. We see a lot of Suh as he goes about trying to solve the murders, but we never really get to know him as a person. Suh is out of his depth because he's saddled with cops that shouldn't be cops, and trying to solve murders committed by an efficient and intelligent killer. Despite all of his cerebral problem-solving abilities, Suh ends up just as stump as Park and the thoughtless Jo, whose idea of "police investigation" is to kick first and punch later. In any case, by the end of the film my memories of Suh seemed to fade away and I really had a hard time remembering that he was ever there.

"Memories of Murder" is directed by Joon-ho Bong with cinematography by Hyeong-gyu Kim ("One Fine Spring Day"). It's a technically accomplished film, with some gorgeous country scenery to be found. But while the crime and humor take center stage most of the time, the film offers a subversive undercurrent for those with the background to appreciate it. The '80s was a time of social upheaval in South Korea, as the student populace gained strength and courage and began protesting the military dictatorship with greater frequency and force.

The film gives us this ongoing civil strife in spurts, always careful to keep them in the background -- at least until a climatic free-for-all at a restaurant brings all the tension to the forefront. If one wasn't aware of Korean political history, especially in the last 20 years, this entire subplot will come across as minor diversions that seem to have little to do with the ongoing police investigation. Context is needed to really appreciate what the writers were going for here. And yes, there is more to a main character's leg getting amputated than meets the eye.

At any rate, the film could still work as just a serial killer movie, although modern audiences might find it a bit lacking. Sometimes "Murder's" investigation borders on the mundane, and things don't really pick up until 90 minutes into the 2-hour movie. The film closes with a short coda that takes place in 2003; it's supposed to supply answers, or maybe it just introduces more questions.

"Memories of Murder" is one of the more ambitious films to come out of Korea. It doesn't do everything it does successfully, but it probably succeeds more than it fails. It's a decent crime film, but an even better social drama.

Perhaps it's my unfamiliarity with most of Korean cinema's past and current history, but several recent South Korean cinematic masterpieces has made me take notice of the films this Asian country is producing, therefore causing me to place South Korea on a short list of countries (Mexico, Brazil and Iran included) currently producing the most interesting and exciting films. Films such as Shiri (Je-gyu Kang), Nowhere to Hide (Myung-Se Lee), My Wife is a Gangster (Jin-gyu Cho) have all gained wide pop appeal for Korean cinema, while films such as Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (Chan-wook Park) and Memories of Murder (Joon-ho Bong) have garnered respectability and excitement for the cinematic depths these filmmakers have accomplished. Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance impressed the hell out of me in its stylization of art direction, cinematography and editing. Memories of Murder continues this feat with an absolutely impressive script and mesmerizing performances.

Memories of Murder is set in South Korea during the military dictatorship of 1986. In a small and secluded rural area two detectives investigate a series of related murders and rapes. They torture their suspects into confessing to crimes they may or may not be involved in, but their methods are brought into question once an urban detective volunteers himself in the investigation of the murders. Although the new detective brings a professional and experienced approach to the investigations, the murders continue to escalate in an alarming rate, haunting the desperate detectives. The films narrative structure is straightforward and traditional, but it allows for a compelling story that builds with each scene. The sense of urgency is rooted throughout the film, which maintains our attention and focus on the stories development.

Although the film can be violent and serious at times, there is an element of dark humor throughout it. Interjecting humor into a true-life story of a series of unsolved murders can be a difficult task to balance and maintain in a film without losing or distracting the audience. Memories of Murder successfully accomplishes this feat and a tremendous amount of praise should go to the screenwriters of this film: Joon-ho Bong, Kwang-rim Kim and Seung Bo Shim.

However, what stands out the most in this film is the remarkable cast. Early in the film a brash detective, Du-man Park (Kang-ho Song), without much evidence other than speculation, arrests whomever he considers suspicious and forces false confessions out of the detainees. His tactics are unprofessional and unethical. Once Seoul detective Tae-yun Seo (Sang-kyung Kim) volunteers his services to the investigation, personalities clash and both actors brilliantly play off each other. Kang-ho Song especially stands out with his characters defiance and insecurities towards Tae-yun Seo. His performance starts from a child-like charisma and curiosity and progresses to an adult level of maturity and responsibility. His character arc is subtle, but dramatic.

My praising of this film finally ends with the director Joon-ho Bong. Coming off the critical success of his directorial debut Barking Dogs Never Bite (2000), Bong succeeds once again in making an astounding film that demonstrates his astonishing visual storytelling skills. Memories of Murder thrives in not being a crime film that places so much emphasis on figuring out who the killer is, but rather a crime film that explores the characters and the environment caught amongst the terror of the killer.