Memories of Murder is a story of detectives trying to solve a string of cases by a very elusive murderer. This plot line has been used so many times in contemporary asian cinema, but it never seems to get old. Joon-ho Bong, who you may know from The Host, shows that he is able to do more than one type of entertaining genre. Re-casting Kang-ho Song as on of the main detectives, one can see the same quality of acting and diverse array of characteres as in his later film.
While there is not too much especially interesting or excellent in this film, it doesn't do anything wrong. Even at over two hours, it doesn't seem long. Nothing seems unrealistic, except maybe for the amount of perverts running around. But even this is real, because the story is based on a true case in South Korea, 1986.
Memories of Murder is sure to entertain anyone who has enjoyed the same genre before, as it does very well everything it needs to in this genre. Although it lacks the genre melding and exceeding quality of The Host, this certainly is not a detrement to its own success.