Handsome Guys movie review: Gong Seung-yeon and Kim Dong-hoon starrer is a laughter inducing genre bender

The basic premise has two threatening-looking bumpkins try to help an unconscious girl. But they are mistaken for killers by her friends, who off themselves trying to rescue her. This horror comedy features a house in which accidents keep occurring, and a woman turned demonic goat.

The day the dim-some twosome, Jae-pil (Lee Sung-min) and Sang-goo (Lee Hee-jun), move into their dilapidated dream house, they discover a basement with an inscription of the Sigil of Baphomet on the wooden floor. The basement is also full of symbols and artifacts that signify horror including a portal to hell from which a powerful dark force enters the house.

A group of six students accidentally run over a black goat on the way to a vacation near the house. It’s left to Jae-pil and Sang-goo to take the dead goat and bury it on their property. That’s what gets the haunting kick-started.

We get the back story from popular golfer Seong-bin and Mi-na as they chat together…the house was his grandfather’s property and the basement was where an exorcism of a young girl possessed by a demon who ran around like a goat had gone wrong. Seong-bin’s cousin Yohan, a witness to the exorcism by the American Pastor, had also lost his life. Seong-bin’s grandfather even paid ten million won for a talisman to keep the demon goat away from him.

This South Korean film is basically a remake of the 2010 Canadian film “Tucker and Dale vs. Evil”. The attempt to transplant American horror elements to a new local South Korean background is quite successful. This film is also funnier than the original. It lampoons ‘Evil Dead’ and similar films in its effort to keep the funnies coming -notwithstanding the horror. The film pulls out all stops to use horror for laughs and its good going for a while. The special effects don’t curry favor though. The comic performances by Lee Sung-min and Lee Hee-jun make it entertaining. Gong Seung-yeon, Park Ji-hwan and Lee Kyu-hyung give off a confident vibe. Sang-goo’s pet dog steals the show though.

Director Nam uses the lethal carpentry tools and other available things around the house to make it look threatening. Bodies pile up and demons and exorcism come in on the breaks. The missionary’s six-shooter that dispatches demons with silver bullets gets in on the act too. The narrative is largely derivative but also comes into its own in a way. Most of the set-ups and bloody results make for stirring entertainment. Nam is quite assured in his takes. His execution of the material, shot composition and timing lead to an enjoyable couple of hours.

The film dials down the level of gore effects and dials up on the buffoonery. This Korean version is far more enjoyable and it gets goofier towards the end.

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