''Suddenly at Midnight'' (; also known as ''Suddenly in the Dark'' or ''Suddenly in Dark Night'') is a 1981 South Korean erotic horror thriller film directed by Ko Young-nam.

Plot

Kang Yu-jin, a wealthy biology professor doing a butterfly field study, takes in a new housemaid; the young woman, Mi-ok, is the daughter of a shaman priestess who recently died in a house fire. At first, Yu-jin and his wife, Seon-hee, welcome Mi-ok into their home, but Seon-hee begins to have misgivings when she sees a strange wooden doll that the maid has brought with her. Having suffered from nightmares about exactly the same doll, Seon-hee becomes increasingly suspicious and paranoid that Mi-ok is trying to kill her and usurp her household. In a sudden fit of madness, Seon-hee causes Mi-ok to fall to her death. From then on, Seon-hee is tormented horribly by visions of the doll attacking her and it starts to take a great toll on her sanity. Is it actually happening or just all in the girl's mind?

Cast

* Kim Young-ae ... Seon-hee * Yoon Il-bong ... Kang Yu-jin * Lee Ki-seon ... Mi-ok * Hyun Hye-ri * Kim Geun-hie * Kim Min-gyu * Kim Gi-jong * Lee Yae-sung * Gwak Geon * Yoo Myeong-sun

Release

''Suddenly at Midnight'' was released in South Korea on 17 July 1981, and received a total of 28,178 admissions.Paquet, Darcy.
Suddenly At Midnight (1981)
. ''Koreanfilm.org''. Retrieved on 19 April 2009. It was then subsequently released on Blu-ray for the first time ever worldwide in early 2017 by Mondo Macabro.

Critical response

The movie and Ko Young-nam are referred to as a classic work and director of Korean horror film. In a review for ''Koreanfilm.org'',

Darcy Paquet Darcy Paquet (born 1972) is an American film critic, university lecturer, author and actor. In 2010, Paquet was awarded the Korea Film Reporters Association Award at the 15th Busan International Film Festival for his contributions in introducing ...

cited ''Suddenly at Midnight'' as a rare example of 1970s-80s Korean horror that was genuinely frightening, describing it as "a mysterious psychological study... that beguiles the viewer right up to its bizarre closing image." He praised the film's direction, saying, "Ko has a good feel for how to create tension from precise editing and the patient accumulation of evocative details", and also credited actress Kim Young-ae for a "convincing performance as the panicked wife".

References

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External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Suddenly At Midnight 1981 films 1980s Korean-language films South Korean horror films 1981 horror films Erotic horror films