The Soul Guardians
74
6
Story
8
Cast
7
Fun
9
Subs
7
Overall
Peter Zsurka
August 30, 2000
Movie poster for The Soul Guardians - Review | KFCC
Country South Korea
Year 1998
Running Time 97
Distributor Winson Entertainment
Director Park Kwang-Chun
Scene from the movie The Soul Guardians - Review | KFCC
Scene from the movie The Soul Guardians - Review | KFCC
Scene from the movie The Soul Guardians - Review | KFCC
Scene from the movie The Soul Guardians - Review | KFCC
Synopsis

A cult committed a mass suicide, the only survivor was a pregnant women. She died on the operating table but the doctor was able to save the child. Twenty years later several people are found dead, the police believe it is the work of a serial killer. The only link between the victims is a missing finger. Three people with supernatural power believe the devil has returned for the child that was saved twenty years ago, they track her down and try protect her from the forces of evil.

Scene from the movie The Soul Guardians - Review | KFCC
Scene from the movie The Soul Guardians - Review | KFCC
Scene from the movie The Soul Guardians - Review | KFCC
Scene from the movie The Soul Guardians - Review | KFCC
Review

You could say this movie takes some elements from End of Days, Stigmata and Terminator. It is exotic blend of elements that gives this movie its feel. This film revolves around a supernatural theme that places it in the horror genre but unlike American horrors this one has quite a different style. The movie is based on a story that was posted on the internet, it was so popular that the rights were boughts and the movie was soon made afterwards. The story is not all together complicated but you do have to pay attention as you might miss some details.

The story was mainly focused around the girl and her three guardians, there is quite a bit of developments from start to finish. There is a decent amount of build up for the characters before the story really kicks in yet they manage to leave the mystery behind the characters. The actors put up a very good and convincing performance. But the only problem we found was that we were waiting for something from these great characters with those special powers, but unfortunatly they don't pull out the show that we were waiting for. It's doesn't mean that they are uninteresting, it's just that the filmmaker's didn't show enough of what they can do.

There are not many actions scenes, most of the action is in the thriller form and only a few fight scenes. What is interesting is that the guardians have special powers that add a certain little spice, in this type of movie it is not something that is often seen. There is a good amount of gore in this movie but it is limited to blood and bodies. There aren't any scenes with explicit violence but gore amateurs should be satisfied. The horror element is not extreme, there are a couple of surprised but don't expect to scared out of your wits. This is more of a fantasy with horror elements but it is hard to categorize. They were also a couple of nice CGI effects in the movie and they were not cheesy unlike other movies of its kind. As for the music, it was really good! Even probably better than the whole movie itself.

The subtitles were good but in the beginning you will find that there is a lot of text and it goes pretty fast. This is a good movie but we have the sense that there is 15 minutes missing from the movie, maybe its just because its the Hong Kong version. The negative thing about the movie is the various scenes were thrown at you too fast as if everything was happening at once. Especially at the end of the movie which really came fast and went down without a bang. The theme of Satan being reborn is not new but they manage to pull off one of the best versions in this movie. Also the Korean perspective on this classic tale was very interesting.

Scene from the movie The Soul Guardians - Review | KFCC
Scene from the movie The Soul Guardians - Review | KFCC
74
Story
Cast
Entertainment
Subtitles
Overall
Peter Zsurka August 30, 2000
Media Review
Media Review by
Peter Zsurka
Distributor
Winson Entertainment
Media Format
DVD
Region
All Region
Encoding
NTSC

For the image quality, it was excellent, it had a higher quality than the standard from Hong Kong. There was also an excellent Surround Sound. For the extras there is nothing other than the scenes selection but the English subtitles on a Korean DVD can be considered as an extra as they are very rare.