Asian Home Cinema: A.P.T residence on the DVD

A.P.T or Apartment is the recently horror project from the Korean director that has brought us the very entertaining horror movie “Phone”, Ahn Byung Ki. Now the movie was available to the market for all the fans of Asian horror movie to collect it on DVD or other home cinema format.

The story is revolves around Se-Jin a single career woman with no friends and family to speak of, forced by loneliness she spend her endless nights starring out the window of her apartment in Seoul suburb. She notices that some apartments in the block of flats opposite hers, always turn off the lights every evening at 9:56 PM, next thing happen is someone is found dead. One day after leaving her job, and is about to take the subway home, she encounters a strange woman in red dress who commit to suicide in front of the moving train, and tries to drag Se-Jin with her. After the incident she’s start to feels that the spirit of the woman haunting in her place. The series of happening start to draw her deeper and deeper into the mystery surrounding the apartment, she tries to tell the neighbors and the police, but no one seems to believe her. When she spends some time with a paralyzed orphan girl who’s take care by neighborhood volunteers, she realize that the neighbors are only want to torture the girl not to help her. But every time the girl got tortured, the one who did that always be the victim of 9:56 happening. When everything going to uncontrollably and nobody seems to paying attention, Se-Jin must to reveal it all by her and soon finds out a terrible secret that they all have been share about the orphan girl.

Ahn Byung-ki put A.P.T as another copycat of Asian Horror Movie again, it seems he believe that the long haired ghost formula still has the power to terrify the audiences. But haven’t we as the audience felt a little tired with all this repetition. Not only by the ghost’s appearance, but Mr. Ahn also think that is necessary to dress up the ghost with the same movement and sound like we already seen in The Ring or Ju-On. A.P.T finally end with the really predictable results, the way it scares is not too surprising anymore, even it really has freaky moments at some point. And the climax can’t give the plus point to the entire story like every horror movie needed, as the way to make the audiences remember it for a long time. I think what Ahn Byung-ki has done in his previous movie “Phone”, still not been reach by this new project.

The Korean DVD release is similarly tolerable but unremarkable either. The transfer is anamorphic and in the suitable aspect ratio but notably soft and marked by a few flecks and spots of dirt on occasion. The sound comes in 5.1 and DTS options with English subtitles. And as the film itself the presentation of the DVD is not bad enough but not good enough either. Some of the features from the DVD such as: