Cello

As an avid movie lover, foreign horror movies are one of my favorites so when I stumbled upon Cello I thought I’d be getting something unique, something along the lines of Audition. It wasn’t. Cello is a 2005 South Korean horror movie. The main character, Hong Mi-ju is down on her luck, her best friend was killed in a terrible car accident, and everyday something horrible seems to go wrong. Hong Mi-ju was a devoted cello player but because of her best friend’s death she does not play anymore. One day she buys a cello for her autistic daughter. The rest of the movie follows mysterious circumstances that surround this cello.

There was an extreme amount of problems with this movie. The storyline made me upset instead of terrified. Hong Mi-ju has two daughters, one of which serves as comic relief and the other is autistic. Let’s just say that one of them dies, which one is up to you to see. Hong Mi-ju’s family and friends are succumbing to these supernatural circumstances and instead of being terrified these circumstances pull at your heart. I thought this was a horror movie?

Cello is also plagued by numerous clichés. In pivotal scenes there is slow motion effect making the scene seem like time was standing still when not using the effect at all would’ve worked much better. These effects were used to trigger an emotional response but it was very silly. For example, Hong Mi-ju’s daughter sees the cello for the first time and everything just slows down but it slows down in such a way that it comes off as cheesy and unnecessary.

With the cliché’s come the bad special effects. The special effects circulating supernatural circumstances around the cello can be compared to the special effects in SYFY original movies. The special effects surrounding the ghost are cringe worthy. Some transitions going from scene to scene are also done so poorly that it seems like a scene was cut out.

Eventually we find out that our main character was not so good at playing cello and the supernatural circumstances surrounding her cello are really the doings of her dead best friend. This is another Asian horror movie that deals with jealousy. It’s tired and true, we have seen this before. The pacing of the movie up to this point is also extremely slow. It builds and builds with really no place to release. Then there’s the uninspiring twist. The end pacts a twist that almost makes up for the whole movie, unfortunately it falls extremely flat displaying clichés that have seen before…again.

For a movie that could’ve been something so much more it winds up being extremely disappointing. I am not recommending this film. The promotional posters are more intriguing than the actual film.

2 stars out of 5.