IMPETIGORE **** Indonesia/South Korea 2019 Dir: Joko Anwar. 106 mins
A young lady, Maya (Tara Bosro) is working in the city as a toll booth assistant, she is attacked at work by a man she had witnessed stalking her over the course of the day. She is surprised to learn that her stalker knew alot about her and her family home. Because of this and the fact that the old family home is now empty and she could expect some inheritance she and her best friend Dini (Marissa Anita) travel back to the remote village Maya was born in to find her fortune. Once there however they discover much more. Tales of a curse and infant death, family betrayal and murder are what they have stumbled upon but can Maya’s presence help the village return to normal?
This very effective, creepy and captivating movie has a really great supernatural element to it but not quite in the way you first think. Once they get to the village and see the house you are kind of led to believe that this will be a creepy yet simple haunted house movie. You have a little groan and roll your eyes a bit but you still think it could be good but then it soon becomes apparent that this is not the case at all, in fact after you see some of the events unfold you think that staying in the house would have been the better option!
Simple it most certainly is not. It has a great story from get go with multiple twists, turns and unsavoury characters you never really know who to route for. Backed up with awesome visuals of viscera and dread and a poverty striken village setting with some truly desperate individuals. It is one of those movies that gets quite exhausting to watch at times. Expertly acted by all involved it also has a wonderfully haunting score. The only slight downside I felt it had was that the spoken language was Indonesian which goes along at quite a pace so the subtitles too run along very quick, speed reading is an advantage. I still don’t know exactly how to pronounce this movies title whether its more of an IM-PET-EEE-GORE rather then IM-PET-EYE-GORE I honestly have no clue so I just end up saying both versions in the hope that one of them is correct. However it is pronounced, IMPETIGORE is currently showing on SHUDDER right now so please go check it out as soon as you can, you wont be disappointed.
Review by Sarah Budd
IMPETIGORE is available on Amazon