User reviews

One of the biggest reasons other than availability in OTT that this classic has been missed en large by Indian audiences is that it is confused with Bong Joon-ho's immortal 2003 blockbuster Memories of Murder.

While Won Shin-yun's 2017 tale does not rise up to that level, it is nevertheless a compelling, gut-wrenching tale of deceit, violence and outright blatant evil that will constantly keep you guessing.

The brilliant Sol Kyung-gu plays a retired serial killer who is suffering from bouts of dementia and the onset of Alzheimer's Disease. He encounters another serial killer in the city only to have no one believe him because of his illness and to add insult to injury, the same killer starts to pursue his daughter as a love interest.

The story moves at breakneck speed from there, constantly throwing up unexpected surprises and twists till the audience is as confused and disoriented as the lead character with his constant memory lapses.

Following the same non-linear narrative as Memento (2000), the director excels at building up the suspense without ever dragging the narrative, threading the needle and keeping the audience on a knife edge.

A masterclass in storytelling among Korean thrillers. Watch the full director's cut if you want your mind blown again.

Highly recommended!

Not to be confused with the 2017 Japanese film 'Memoirs of a Murderer'.

A very clever script delivers a nail-biting movie, with a great premise. 'Memoir of a Murderer' is an interesting mystery thriller that will keep you guessing until the end. The fact that Byung-su - excellently portrayed by Kyung-gu Sol - suffers from dementia, adds to the suspense. As the film progresses one wonders whether the reality is indeed as he perceives it to be. Is Buyung-su's mind really playing tricks on him, or does he actually remember events as they happened? This mystery intensifies towards the end as the film is filled with twists and surprises.

'Memoir of a Murderer' is another perfect example of great South Korean cinema. I enjoy the unpredictability of their films, and this is no exception. Brilliant!

Memento meets Dexter which at times reminds of The Wailing and Insomnia. Byung-Su is a former serial killer who is living with his daughter and has got Alzheimer's disease. When new killings start to happen he suspects a young police inspector to be the culprit but not sure if he himself has been doing the murders and forgetting it. Sul Kyoung-Gu gives an incredible performance as Byung-Su and carries the whole film. The film keeps the audience guessing what's actually happening, a bit too much. The effect of domestic violence and relationships are touched upon. The mysterious mood is kept throughout the film which was effective in engaging the audience.

The creativity of the whole plot is similar to "Memory Fragments", but too many reversals in the plot make the audience feel tired and weaken the theme. Especially in the end, we can't understand why we need to do more.

I can only assume that to be true - I only watched the theatrical cut. Which is more than fine - don't get me wrong, but from what I've read about the Directors cut ... that is where the money is at. Or the cuts ... or the action ... or the extended ending for that matter.

Having said all that, the movie is another great example of an excellent (thriller) movie from South Korea. I am almost surprised I haven't heard anything about an American Remake yet. They probably can't keep up remaking those great movies ... sometimes getting them (somewhat) right, but also often just plainly failing in getting to the core that made movies like this one great.

Excellent performances and a moral complexity that will make your head spin. And that is without all the narration, the what is real and what is not. Just when you think you've guessed everything right ... another twist will sweep you of your feet. But it is the humanity of the story, it is the character driven (great) acting that will keep you on the edge of your seat. And scenes where a match lights up the dark revealing ... something "sinister". And being more shocking (as in horror) than your average horror movie from the States.

So while I have unfortunately not seen the Directors cut (yet), I can only imagine I would like it even better and go the full 10/10 on it ... be it as it may, this is an excellent watch as well.

A couple of days ago I reviewed a Japanese movie, with the lowest rating possible, and there I stated that I rarely come across good Asian movies, unless they are Korean, and once again it's been proven right. What a difference when you watch a Korean and a Japanese movie. Memoir Of A Murderer (or Salinjaui Gieokbeob) is a movie with surprisingly good twists and turns. The acting is much better than any Japanese movie where they tend to overact all the time. I wouldn't score this movie high for the acting but for the story itself, which is entertaining to follow and with a good mystery feeling. So once again I'm impressed by the Korean movie makers, clearly the best out of Asia.

Im stunned! I really didn't have any clue how the movie gonna end up. One thing I have to say, it's gonna blow your mind. I would have rated this 10/10 but I really didn't get the ending. It's so confusing...

Honestly the journey and structure of this film is great at the start but becomes a bit lost and over convoluted further into the story. The reason for this I believe is a lack of focused writing. Playing with the time and memory lapses of Byung-soo and how it relates to trying to catch his daughter's bf is a good idea and I think there are parts where it was very well executed.

However there were also parts where it was badly executed and parts where the story becomes convoluted without any real reason.

The audience attention is lost because of this lack of focus and instead you are left a bit confused about why certain scenes happened instead of gripped throughout. This confusion remains at the end of the film.

Also the film commits the crime of continuing after the story ends, dragging on an extra 15 mins or so that could easily have been cut from the end.

The concept is interesting and there's certainly parts where the story is engaging but it's not as well brought together as one would hope.

Memoir of a Murderer suck's you in from the very beginning. That's what SK writers are so good at doing. They don't rush the development of characters. They give them believable backstory's then let it play out at a slow rate. A lost art for U. S. writers.

Even tho the main character was a serial killer now with dementia you really feel for this guy, the sense of loss he is living with. I'm not going to give anymore away plot wise, but if you want to watch some great films look up the SK ones, they have taken over Hollywood.

I'm glad they did, you can only watch so many Superhero films without losing your mind....

Honestly, like I said, it's a good film but could've been better.

A good storyline combined with even better storytelling will make you feel totally hooked to the plot. You'll find yourself asking "Wait what?! Now happens next??" - after all, that is what we all like about good mystery thrillers, right? Well, this one is no exception. Good news is, there are multiple twists in it - making it even more watch worthy.

But unfortunately, although the plot that was being developed initially would seem perfectly balanced and flawless, it eventually loses the flow somewhere in the second hour - and continues to do so until the end. I was questioning myself throughout the first one hour "This one surely should've had a higher rating. Why this low?" Well, my take is that the disrupted flow is to blame for that.

Anyway, it's still a good watch. Definitely worth trying! Happy watching :)

The lead is one of SK's finest actors, and the actor who plays the younger villain is also extraordinarily talented. The stalking and fight scenes are well executed and become vicious as they would between two serial killers. Writing, direction, and acting are all excellent, though there are definitely some plot holes, especially about the "daughter", and a rather strange open-ended bit at the end. Still, this is a fine movie: SK simply knows how to make them.

Excellent acting from the leads and a story that doesn't go in a straight line. The main character has dementia and his memory of events can't be relied upon or can it? That's the premise of this movie. Engaging from the first scene with interesting characters. I definitely recommend this is a Netflix movie.

We had never seen a S.Korean film and went only by the trailer. The whole thing was a fabulous surprise. Excellent story, writing, direction, art-direction and most certainly, excellent acting by all. The star, Kyung-gu Sol, is a superb actor who handled the different aspects of dementia and Alzheimer's beautifully, but all of the others are incredibly good as well.

You cannot miss this film. We first had to get the right subtitles, but once they were in place, we thoroughly enjoyed the movie. We can even say it is a Masterpiece

I really enjoyed this film. I was struck with interest from the beginning and never lost interest. It is about a former serial killer who is diagnosed with dementia. He has the unfortunate coincidence of being in a fender bender with a man that he automatically senses to be an active serial killer. It isn't long before active serial killer takes notice of the elder man's daughter and a suspenseful struggle to keep his daughter safe, whilst losing his memory, ensues.

I thought this was a well rounded thriller. The acting, scripting a filming was all done well. I can't complain about much of anything other than wanting to know more of our elder killer's victims and wishing there would've been more to the ending. This is a solid movie though. Totally worth the watch.

So, just finished this amazing thriller which combines a decent serial killer plot with a near perfect depiction of dementia and the reality of losing ones own personality, along with the frailty it has got.

But, there's one big catch. apparently there are two versions of the movie, while the original holds it own at around 6/7 the Directors Cut (titled- Memoir of Murderer: Another Memory) takes the story to new heights a different ending (alongside a few select scenes inserted along the storytelling).

So in summary, both the movie shares a common 95% footage, with DC having some extras, and changes the entire POV of the story. I presume the Directors Cut version was not published/distributed with as much enthusiasm as the original one, but why that is beyond me, because the DC version contains the true key pieces that binds the narrative together. Highly recommended to see the DC version if you're likely to see just any one. Enjoy. :)

"A former serial killer with Alzheimer's fights to protect his daughter from her psychotic boyfriend."

How can you not want to see that film? Well, that's what I thought, anyway.

It seems though, that once the makers came up with the pitch for the movie, they simply thought it would write itself, and unfortunately it didn't. The dialogue is laughably poor at points, and while at least some of this might be poor translation, a lot of it is clearly just sloppy writing. Much of the plot seems a badly thought-out ragbag of scenes from other Korean and non-Korean movies - Memento in particular - that don't have any particular relevance or resonance. The main character is good but behaves in ways that are frustratingly inconsistent and lead nowhere (the delayed laughing, for instance). Every other character is either weakly written, implausible or out of place.

It's not a startlingly terrible film, just dull and badly done, and goes on quite a bit too long. A disappointment, since most Korean thrillers are usually much better.

....since I last saw such an engaging thriller. Korean filmmakers really know how to get your heart rate up. The story is a piece of candy and the whole plot and development just draws you in. I've seen a few comments which are badmouthing the specific pace of korean movies and scenes which seem to be pointless, but let me tell you this: they really don't try to explain everything like it's for a 10 yo child, we have enough american thriller cliches to do that. So if you're a true movie fan who was on a lookout for a piece of cinema to linger on your mind then watch this

Excellent film. Question everything. That's the best way to describe this story and character study.

I think people see stagnant but jesus put your phone down and watch the movie

Unreliable Protagonist trope everybody, however this time this is in Korea.

As any would guess it, yes you are correct.

Lengthy movie with scenes on scenes that are chock full of actions.

Quite good of the filming style. Its alright after all, though the ending might depends entirely on how we interpret it.

Most people compliment this movie because they think it's clever with its plottwists revealing the main character to be an unreliable narrator, but it is not he who is. But instead it's the movie which is the unreliable narrator. There are several scenes where the main character is completely absent and where we only things from the point of view of the other suspected killer, where he kills 2 women at different occasions, which leads the viewer to believe he is the killer. This is just the movie cheaply trying to trick the viewer without putting the proper effort into it and stuff like this happens many times in the movie.

The end result is that the movie is confusing and makes no sense, and can only be considered a failed copy of Memento, which actually makes sense since that movie makes sure it's the main characters unreliable narrative that tricks the audience and not the movie's own inconsistent narrative.

An amnesia ex-serial killer try to find the current serial killer for sake of save his daughter... The challenge part is that current serial killer is a cop and ex-serial killer is amnesia patient... Very unique serial killer base movie... All are acted soo well.. Must watch movie..!

An amnesia ex-serial killer try to find the current serial killer for sake of save his daughter... The challenge part is that current serial killer is a cop and ex-serial killer is amnesia patient... Very unique serial killer base movie... Must watch movie..!

An amnesia ex-serial killer try to find the current serial killer for sake of save his daughter... The challenge part is that current serial killer is a cop and ex-serial killer is amnesia patient... Very unique serial killer base movie... Must watch movie..!