#50 -- The Red Shoes (2005)

Director: Yong-gyun Kim

Rating: 3 / 5

In 1944, a dancer (Keiko) finds her husband having an affair with with another dancer (Oki). Enraged, she kills Oki, cuts her feet off and steals her red shoes. 

In the present, a woman finds the red shoes (which are actually pink) on the subway and takes them home. Soon, both she and her daughter become obsessed with them. She and the little girl fight over the shoes, somewhat physically. The woman's friend visits, sees the shoes, and also becomes obsessed. She steals the shoes from the little girl (who had stolen them from her mother) and leaves. She is killed moments later, seemingly by a ghost. Or just an unseen source. 

It seems that anyone who wears the shoes will become incredibly greedy and go completely bonkers. The main character (Sun-jae) was a little bonkers to begin with, I think. She was, in fact, just like Keiko, in that she found her husband cheating on her. She killed him and stuffed him in a freezer. We know this because Tae-su, Sun-jae's daughter, said that her daddy came to visit, and that he was cold and needed to be let out. Sun-jae and her interior decorator speak to an old woman (who happened to be present during the murder in '44), and she said that the shoes should be returned immediately.

They return the shoes, give Oki a proper burial and pay respects to the deceased. But, somehow, the shoes keep coming back.

There is a nice twist at the end of this one, and it shows us what the shoes really are, and what they are capable of doing. The imagery is beautiful, as with almost every Asian horror movie out there, and that is partly why I love them so much. Even with the horrifying images being shown, or perhaps partly because of them, it is beautiful. Even though most Asian horror focuses on ghosts/spirits fueled by revenge, they each seem to create their own unique story that is interesting and intriguing. A spirit possessing a pair of shoes, and in turn possessing those who wear the shoes - The Red Shoes is a good example of that. While it's not the best in the genre I've seen, it is an interesting watch, and definitely should be sought out by all Asian horror fans.