Last Updated on October 6, 2020 by rob
Student Jung-Hoon (Yoo Seung-Ho) arrives late for class to find the body of hated rival Tae-Gyu (Jo Sang-Keun) stabbed to death. Before you know it he’s gotten blood on his shirt and picked up the murder weapon (the fool!) And then in walks fellow classmate Da-Jung (Kang So-Ra), a quiet, nerdy girl and fanatical mystery novel buff who despite her shock susses right away that Jung-Hoon can’t be the killer. Together the pair set off to solve the mystery knowing they have just 40 mins to clear Jung-Hoon’s name before the next teaching period begins and the body is discovered.
A smart idea (corpse in a classroom, two teens turned detective and the space of one teaching period in which to find the killer) executed with workmanlike efficiency and quite entertaining to watch. Sin Dong-Yeop’s screenplay is part-mystery, part-thriller and part teen-romance aimed at a young audience and on that level it delivers. The main players are quickly introduced, a variety of red herrings – as well as one genuine clue to the murderers identity – are established, there’s some comic relief in the form of a visit by the local Schools Inspectors, then the corpse turns up and we’re off to the races. Supernerd Da-Jung turns out to be one smart cookie. Figuring that the murder must have happened after class began when the rest of the pupils were off doing sports practice, meaning the killer would therefore be late too, she uses crowdsourcing, sending out a text message to the rest of the school and posing as a Schools Inspector, asking them to identify anyone – pupils or teachers – who were late to class for the current period. Clever!
A break-in to the computer lab (with lock-picking skills learnt from Da-Jung’s crime novels) provides further info re the missing laptop and it begins to look as though the killer might just be one of the teachers. Although the film does stumble a bit with a far too long chase sequence mid-way through in which our two heroes are pursued by a teacher up and down the school corridors for what feels like forever, everything else – from a sweetly budding romance between hero and heroine, plausible character motivations and simple but effective plot twists (and this is coming from someone who finds the plotting of South Korean genre fare sometimes annoyingly incoherent) – works tolerably well. Also right on the mark is the way the film retains its menacing edge with Jung-Hoon and Da-Jung in peril right up until the end.
