Gokseong (2016)'s activity

Though it starts as a murder investigation in some lush, verdant, rural part of South Korea, The Wailing eventually turns into that country's equivalent of The Exorcist, and as for the mystery, it's a supernatural kind of whodunit - not just who is causing a plague of rage, madness and evil, but who in the village might be the ghost or demon. Everybody seems to comment on the length, and yes, I does feel a bit long (there, I've done it too), but it does allow for the kinds of twists - in story as well as genre - that elevate the film (and indeed, many of the best Korean films, a national output that often succeeds in confounding expectations). Personal stakes for the lead, a shlubby country cop, when his young daughter starts to go Linda Blair. Conflicting answers from ghosts and ghost breakers. Sin attracting sin, but nothing as simple as that. And luscious cinematography that nevertheless keeps things grounded in an every day reality that allows us to be non-believers like some of the characters in the drama. We perhaps get lied to once too many times, but the I think about The Wailing, the less than matters to me.