New on M.O.D. Blu-ray from Well Go USA
One of last year’s biggest surprises was the incredible supernatural horror film Exhuma, written and directed by Jang Jae-Hyun, which married an action-packed ghost story to localized spiritual themes. The film is distinctly South Korean in its analysis of religious practices, ritual traditions, and age-old superstitions: a country rooted in Shamanism but commingled with influences of Christianity and Buddhism.
If you’re hungry for more religious horror films in the same vein, you might be interested in 2015’s The Priests from the same writer-director, newly available on Blu-ray from distributor Well Go USA. It’s a relatively straightforward exorcism movie, but similarly finds its most interesting for its Korean exploration of religion, albeit with a fictionalized bent, as well as its trio of stars.
The Priests is the story of the two clergymen who come to the aid of a young girl possessed by a demon (Park So-Dam, who later came to international prominence in Parasite). The elder, Father Kim (Kim Yeon-seok, The Chaser, Escape from Mogadishu), is a renegade priest who moonlights as an exorcist, unsanctioned by the Church. Assigned as his understudy is a newbie, Deacon Choi (Gang Dong-won, A Violent Prosecutor, Peninsula), fresh out of seminary and the bottom of his class.
Choi doesn’t seem like your typical religious student, and has his own personal motivations for joining the ministry. But it’ll be up to these two misfits of the cloth – both recovering from personal traumas – to intercede for a girl desperately in need of divine intervention.
I like the odd coupling of the grumpy older priest and his immature younger helper. It’s perhaps a little formulaic (a somewhat humorous exaggeration of a trope that goes back to The Exorcist), but in this way it’s actually not dissimilar from a tried-and-true cop movie dynamic: the veteran and rookie partners, paired together and trying to crack a case.
The film is definitely sensationalized in taking fictional liberties with its portrayal of religion, but it does so in clever and interesting ways . For example, there’s some natural humor that arises out of the priests keeping a pig with them during the exorcism, in order to have a vessel to transfer the demon (alluding to the Bible passage in which Jesus did the same). Another scene juxtaposes Catholicism against Shamanism, as the priests are preceded by a harrowing shaman ritual.
The Priests ultimately isn’t as great as Exhuma, but still definitely worth a look for fans of Korean and religious horror.
The Package
Lately Well Go USA has pivoted part of their Blu-ray releases to more cost-effective MOD duplication (meaning the discs are burned rather than traditionally pressed, and don’t carry the usual Blu-ray insignia). The Priests is part of the new lineup. It’s still professionally printed and packed in a standard blue Elite case with artwork, just differently manufactured.
The film is presented in Korean with English subtitles.
Special Features and Extras
There aren’t any on-disc features or extras, aside from a handful of trailers.
- The Priests Well Go USA Trailer (1:28)
- Additional Well Go USA promotional trailers
- Dark Nuns (1:17)
- Harbin (1:47)
- Revolver (1:37)
A/V Out
Get it at Amazon: The Priests Blu-ray
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