The 12th Suspect: This Pen Writes in Red Ink

The 12th Suspect starts off as an old-fashioned Agatha Christie mystery. The fatal gunshot is announced early on by a nattily attired detective (Kim Sang-kyung) after he crashes a sad, literary coffeehouse, leaving us — and him — the rest of the movie to discover which of these eight or so customers is the guilty one. Unless, of course, the husband-and-wife owners (Heo Sung-tae and Park Seon-yeong) are responsible for offing that loner poet.

Unlike Christie, however, writer-director Ko Myoung-sung's takes a moment for poetry, too. Not the cinematic variation. The literary kind. You can do that when so many of your primary suspects are poets! As for a motive, can you think of a better one than good ol' literary rivalry? Yes, yes, love-gone-wrong is presented as a potential reason but whoever thinks Choi Yoo-jeong (Han Ji-ahn) is the femme fatale has shifted from Christie country to the realm of Raymond Chandler. In actuality, The 12th Suspect shifts to John Le Carre territory as it mines the drama of anti-commie militarism played out in front of a post-Korean-War backdrop. So what's the true cause of the eventual bloodbath? Does the why even matter? Whodunit's really are a guessing game!