An Ethics Lesson (2013)

Synopsis

No two synopses of this movie agree on what’s happening. After watching start to end, here’s what I think goes on: Jin-ah (Ko Sung-hee) is a college student with big problems. She’s is debt to loan shark Park Myung-rok (Cho Jin-woong). She having an affair with her professor, Kim Soo-taek (Kwak Do-won). Former boyfriend Han Hyun-soo (Kim Tae-hoon) is stalking her. And next door neighbor Kim Jung-hoon (Lee Je-hoon), a traffic cop, has planted microphones and cameras in her apartment to fuel his obsession.

And yeah, she ends up dead pretty quickly. It’s not a murder mystery. We know from the beginning whodunnit. Everyone else knows or figures it out pretty quickly … except for the police. They have a compelling circumstantial case against professor Kim, who spends the balance of the movie being interrogated and driven progressively batty in police custody. When his wife Kim Sun-hwa (Moon So-ri) finally shows up, she’s more interested in exacting a humiliating confession than helping him with an alibi.

Meanwhile, the loan shark sets off in pursuit of his money. The stalker ex-boyfriend, consumed by guilt, tries incompetently to make amends. The eavesdropping next door guy needs to remove his tracks from the dead girl’s apartment. This sets them in collision with each other, leading to a finale, with a surprise final participant, that plays out with stylish bloodiness.

See It

Close call. Maybe this qualifies as a guilty pleasure. Or maybe I’m giving it too much the benefit of the doubt. I’ve described what happens, near enough. But that’s not what The Ethics Lesson is about.

Let’s say it’s a dark comedy, populated by characters whose perverse obsessions compel them to purse everything but justice for Jin-ah. Midway through, in a cringe-inducing scene in the backseat of a car, loan shark Park engages in a long soliloquy about anger being the emotion that most drives human beings, bolstered by some Greek mythology whose provenance I have not bothered to verify.

Writer/Director Park Myoung-rang provides some familiar vibes. The early scenes of Lee’s eavesdropping has a Hitchcockian Rear Window vibe, followed quickly by echoes of Blow Out as Jin-ah is meeting her feat. The finale, with its eye-opening twist, is stylish (and yes, also ridiculous) in a way that even Quentin Tarantino might admire.

Be forewarned: The Ethics Lesson has plenty of ick-inducing moments. Still, the unexpected turns, the brief chuckles, the stylish showdown, and the ambiguous finale (did Jin-ah really like rice cake or was she really gluten-intolerant?) … if these are your type of thing, it could be worth a spin.