WillSushyMedia This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

Mandeep Tyson The acting in this movie is really good.

Celia A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

Candida It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

Paul Magne Haakonsen As much as I enjoy Asian movies and as much as I wanted to fully get into this 2010 South Korean thriller, I have to admit that what brought the overall enjoyment down was the length of the movie. It was about 20 minutes too long, because it felt like the movie was prolonged by too much filling by director Sang Man Kim.The story is about a famous night time radio DJ who finds herself at the mercy of a stranger who is holding her family hostage in own home. And if she doesn't follow his instructions to the letter he will kill her family."Midnight FM" (aka "Simya-ui FM") was saved and made watchable by the acting talents in the movie, despite having a limiting script to work with. The two lead talents Soo Ae (playing Go Seon-Yeung) and Ji-Tae Yu (playing Han Dong-Soo) were well-cast and really carried the movie phenomenally.In my opinion, the storyline was too generic and never really had the audience in its grip, because there were nothing too thrill or excite the audience in the entire movie. It was as if the movie was put on a one-way-path following a mainstream how-to-make-a-thriller manual.There are lots of good thrillers coming from the South Korean cinema, however "Midnight FM" could muster to raise itself only to mediocrity. A shame really, because it had potential to be so much more.

David Traversa I had a fascinating experience watching this South Korean movie spoken in Korean (Hangugeo, Chosönmal) a language I don't even know how to say Yes or No with, even if my life would depend on it. I saw the whole movie without subtitles (more than two hours). It was a thriller, extremely well done, that kept me most of the time on the edge of my seat, panting with anxiety and fear for what I was suspecting was going to happen next (It didn't, something different did).After the movie was over I went back and saw it with subtitles. And you know what? I enjoyed it much more when I couldn't understand A WORD of the storyline! The actors were so good, the story was told so clearly thanks to a superb camera work and editing that verbal explanations were unnecessary to enjoy the film.Of course when I saw it the second time with subtitles I learned some things that dressed up the story a bit, but it wasn't anything that couldn't be understood without. That --I think-- proves that silent pictures were so successful because the image alone could tell you the story.Now, the movie as a movie: Excellent, I found it superb, one of the best thrillers I have ever seen. Absolutely enjoyable from beginning to end without a single moment where you could start feeling bored, so well structured and produced is this film.My recommendation: A 10.

DICK STEEL The momentum for Korean Thrillers is picking up slowly but surely, with recent films like The Chaser and Man From Nowhere getting critical acclaim and scoring at their home box office with their very edgy treatment and storytelling, putting the audience at the edge of their seats with aplomb. The next such film to hit the screens here is Midnight FM, and director Kim Sang-Man had proved that this film belongs to the same echelons as the films mentioned, where a celebrity DJ has to deal with a violent, psychotic stalker.Soo-Ae of Once in a Summer fame plays Ko Sun-Young, a highly popular DJ whose shift in the graveyard hours is coming to an end soon. On her final day, she finds herself being blackmailed by an unknown person who had gained an upper hand at being inside her home and holding her loved one hostage, before demonstrating that he's a huge deranged fan of hers, posing questions based on her show's past to play a sick game where every wrong answer would mean that something violent and gruesome got to be inflicted on the hostages.In some ways this film seemed to have two separate phases, with the first phase taking place in very confined spaces, such as the DJ's booth and console, and that of Sun-Young's house where you have children and her teenage sister having to hide from a home invader. It's almost like David Fincher's Panic Room with a cat and mouse game of hide and seek gets played out in a swanky apartment, which makes for some nice touches of suspense and thrills, given the claustrophobic space in which to play a deadly quiz. It's like a ping pong game of desperately trying to gain and regain the upper hand from each side, knowing that with that comes bargaining power.Then there's the utilization of space, as the narrative takes place outside of the confined spaces, shaking you out of your comfort zone just as you thought everything will shuttle back and forth between the locations, and becoming a full fledged action film complete with car chases to boot. A number of support characters got introduced here, from bland, ineffective cops to fellow co-workers now into the scheme of things to assist Sun-Young, although their presence do not distract you from the main players, offering only slight support to fulfill their one role function before disappearing into the background again. More obnoxious characters enter the scene such as various levels of bureaucracy at the radio station to come disrupt proceedings since Sun-Yong had veered really off course in her programme, which adds another layer of complexity for Sun-Young to battle against.Soo-Ae cuts a confident figure on the top of her game as Sun-Young, before the threat turned her into quite the nervous wreck hell bent on rescuing her daughter at any expense. Like a chameleon, Soo-Ae handles both sides to her character with skill, making you root for her along the way even though she mercilessly rejects the advances and help of yet another stalker who decides to stake out at her office since it's after all, her final day there. As the antagonist, Yoo Ji-Tae is the man you'd love to hate, personifying pure evil in his dastardly plan that comes with layers and enough Plan Bs to keep him off the law enforcement radar and long arm of the law. His Han Dong-Su is the ultimate stalker complete with shrine and audio recordings at his hideout, and Ji-Tae's creepy portrayal makes the character someone not to be messed with for his penchant for violence. A nice little backstory to link up seemingly disparate events to debunk the myth of randomness was a nice touch, but could be done without.With the bulk of the film taking place within two hours of Sun-Young's final shift at work, Midnight FM is by and large one of the better thrillers out there this year, being intense and edgy from the time the antagonist enters the picture to begin his deadly game. Kim Sang- Man crafted a film that is paced expertly, knowing when to speed things up with high octane action, and slowing things down yet keeping a pulse on the frenzied state of mind of its characters, making this film way above average thrillers and is well worth experiencing on the big screen. Highly recommended!

KineticSeoul Okay, so I was in the mood for some good thriller movie from Asia and decided to check this movie out, plus it has Su-Ae in it who is a pretty and yet elegant actress. So I thought it wasn't going to be a big waste of time, in fact by watching the trailer I thought this movie was going to be similar to the movie "P2". Which is another thriller and has a smart female protagonist that uses her wits without going overboard to try and survive the nightmare from a crazy stalker. Anyways I thought it was going to be like that movie. And from the trailer it looked pretty intriguing although nothing much happens in the trailer, which is for the most part a good thing in this case. This movie has suspenseful scenes but unlike "P2" a lot of the parts takes place outside of the building the protagonist resides in. Su-Ae played her role in a very balanced way where it didn't come off like a annoying victim in a movie. Although there are annoying characters in this movie but it's intentional, and yet very annoying, luckily she isn't one of them. Yoo Ji-Tae also does a fine job playing the villain, he always seemed to play the psychotic character pretty well and it's the same for this movie as well. Although this movie is full of incompetent and annoying characters that constantly get in the way, I did like the stalker helping fight another stalker aspect of it. Overall this was a pretty good Korean thriller that is put together really well near the end.8/10