Ghastly (2011)

Well, that was a cheap movie.

The idea was quite interesting. Married couple, driven by their greed and the need to be accepted by the family of the husband, kills an innocent child in a ritual that will make the woman bear her own kid, followed by all the consequences of such a horrible act. There were so many amazing ways this story could have been presented and shot, and yet the writer and director decided to go with the worst of them all. I gave the story 4 only because of the huge potential I had seen and all the countless ways this movie could have gone in my head after I finished it.

The movie is filled with bad editing, random, seizure inducing sequences of "scary pictures", side characters and plot lines that are not explored enough or at all. The acting itself is also questionable. Except for a few supporting characters, it was not a natural and convincing one.

The characters were extremely frustrating too. Seo Ni is shown as this mother figure for Bin and good parenting role, but she also neglects her own younger sister numerous times. Cheol Woong's role is pointless. The whole detective role means nothing to the plot, he is not part of Bin's story and almost never shares the screen with the main cast.
Yoo Rin at the beginning was introduced as this rebellious teen that lies to her sister to go clubbing, but that part was never explored too. If they made Seo Ni find out about it at some point, it could be the perfect reason for the lack of trust she had when Yoo Rin mentioned Bin is weird.
Seo Ni's husband is even more of a mess. Why they introduced the sub-plot line of him having hots for Yoo Rin was beyond me, since it NEVER led to anything. The more I think about it, the more of a mess this movie is.

There was also one thing that bothered me extremely. They cast T-ara’s member and then have a whole scene of Hyomin and other members dancing in the club to roly poly. It right away took me out of the movie. Normally it's hard enough to forget the idol image of the actor/actress that is also a singer, but when you promote it in a movie too, it kills the character they are playing. For me, from that moment, she was not Yoo Rin but simply Hyomin.

Overall, don't waste your time.

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