Throwing multiple genres into a single stew can often yield a bitter taste, but nobody decided to tell writer, director, and producer Park Hoon-jung of the risks when he decided to combine elements of action, thriller, sci-fi, fantasy, and horror to concoct The Witch: Part 1. The Subversion.
It’s probably a good thing that they didn’t, to be fair, because the resulting dish was nothing short of delicious. Completely unhinged in the best possible way, the instant Korean cult classic would go on to secure respective Rotten Tomatoes scores of 89 and 86 percent from critics and audiences, recoup its budget almost five times over at the box office, before eventually winning a smattering of awards for its deranged brilliance.
The story focuses on Kim Da-mi’s Ja-yoon, a high school student who suffered trauma during her childhood that left her with memory issues. During her quest to uncover the truth, though, she ends up being drawn into a world of crime and much more besides, which culminates in the awakening of some dark secrets that sees the blood flow and the bodies pile up.
The Witch: Part 1 might be outlandish, one-of-a-kind, and absolutely insane to an infinite degree, but it pales in comparison to its even more unhinged successor Part 2: The Other One. That’s intended as the highest of compliments, because watching them back-to-back makes for a double bill unlike any other.
Sadly, it’s only the opener that’s managed to sink its claws into a new crowd on streaming, but the fact FlixPatrol has named Part 1 as a Top 10 hit on Max in 20 countries around the world does at least indicate there’s a ravenous viewership ready to see how the story continues, and if there’s any justice in the world a threequel will end up materializing sooner rather than later.