Welcome back to Movie Recaps. Today I will show you a crime,
thriller film from 2021, titled Midnight. Spoilers ahead! Watch out and take care.
It's late at night when a young woman finally leaves her workplace after doing extra hours.
A group of guys take the taxi she saw first, so now she's stuck walking home.
As she takes the dark road, she's approached by a van, and its driver, Do-shik, offers to take her
home. The woman refuses, not wanting to get in a car with a stranger, but after walking a bit more,
she hears some weird noises. She turns around to find the van door open and the sound of someone
crying and asking for help coming from it. When she comes closer and takes a peek however,
she finds a bunch of clothes and the body of a dead man, because the one making the noises
had been Do-shik, who now grabs her and drags her inside to kill her before she can escape.
Moments later, after having called 911 and changed into clean clothes, Do-shik receives two police
officers while pretending to be incredibly distressed. He points at the place where he
left the bodies and pretends he found them there by accident, saying he saw a group of workers
stab the woman. Some days later, Kim Kyung-mi is working at her usual desk in customer service.
She's a deaf young woman so she is in charge of taking the calls from other deaf and mute
customers by talking to them using sign language through videocalls. Just like regular customer
service though, there are rude customers that call her names and give her the finger. After work, she
goes to a company dinner even if she can't be part of the conversation. All the men at the table take
advantage of her deafness to talk in a rude and inappropriate way about her, but they don't know
she can read lips, so in return, she signs back a bunch of insults that they think are compliments.
Afterward, she goes to pick up her deaf mother from her own work, a tailor's shop, saving her
from almost getting run over by a bike thanks to the sound sensor on her car. Her mother is very
happy because she's been paid well this month, and now the two of them can have that vacation
at the beach they wanted. In another part of the city, Choi Seo-jung is getting ready to go out,
but her brother, security guard Jong-tak, has been very over-protective since their parents' death,
so he argues with her over what clothes she's wearing and what time she's allowed to come home.
She promises to be good, but later, she ignores her brother's texts while she's on her date and
doesn't go home as early as she promised. Since she doesn't pick up her phone either, Jong-tak
decides to go out and look for her. It's late at night when Do-shik goes out to find another
victim. He sees Kyung-mi leave her mother near an alarm post while she searches for a spot to park
and chooses to go after her, but at that moment, Seo-jung appears walking down the same street,
so Do-shik decides she shall do instead. He runs and quickly jumps on her, going unnoticed because
Kyung-mi's mother is walking the other way and can't hear anything. After she's done with her,
he moves to check with the mother, but his plans keep getting interrupted: first, Jong-tak stops
by to ask the mother if he's seen his sister, leaving after getting a negative answer, and then,
Kyung-mi returns from the parking lot. On her way to meet her mother, she sees a white shoe suddenly
coming out of a dark alley, and there's also someone calling out for help too even if she can't
hear it. After a second shoe comes out, Kyung-mi decides to enter the alley and finds a crying,
bleeding Seo-jung asking for help. Before she can do anything, Do-shik appears with an ax and jumps
on Kyung-mi to kill her, but Seo-jung pushes him off, giving Kyung-mi the chance to run. Kyung-mi
returns to the street and when she sees her mom, she chooses to run the opposite way to
protect her. She goes back to the parking lot and hides among the cars as she makes her way to the
back door, which has a very squeaky handle. As she begins opening it as carefully as she can,
Do-shik hears the noise and goes after her, but thankfully Kyung-mi opens the door just
in time. The door is chained on the other side so she can't open it completely, but the gap is
enough for a petite girl like her to go through and leave a bigger man like Do-shik behind.
Kyung-mi makes it to her car and calls her mom to tell her to wait for her by the alarm, but right
after she hangs up, Do-shik appears on the back seat with a knife in his hand. He makes her drive,
but instead of taking him out of the building, she drives toward the wall, stopping right before they
crash and using the opportunity to escape. Another running chase begins, and Kyung-mi manages to make
it to his mom before Do-shik can catch her. But because Kyung-mi presses the alarm button,
Do-shik can't come closer anymore, so while the women wait for the police, he returns to his van.
After hiding Seo-jung's body in it, he changes clothes and hairstyle to look like a normal
businessman, then approaches the women with a carefree expression. Kyung-mi doesn't recognize
him because the killer had been wearing a mask and a hat, so when this man says he's looking for
his sister, Kyung-mi believes him. She's about to take him to the dark alley when the police arrive,
but the officer finds the alley empty. Kyung-mi requests to see the security cameras, but the
guard at the parking lot shows them they've been turned off by kids that hang there to smoke.
The three of them are taken to the station so they can make a proper report. In the elevator, Do-shik
keeps looking at the weapons in his bag before glancing at the women, and this is noticed by
Kyung-mi's mother, who thinks he doesn't look very sad anymore. To keep up his cover, he retrieves
a black phone from his bag and tells them he's relieved to have received a text from his sister,
which means the body wasn't hers. Moments later, Kyung-mi has finished giving her statement,
but the officer can't do much without a body or a physical description of the killer. Do-shik wants
to help with that, but the cop scolds him for interrupting other people's statements,
and the hobo that has been sleeping on a nearby couch takes the chance to insult him for it too.
Seeing this as an opportunity, Do-shik goes to the water cooler and while picking a cup, he insults
the hobo in a low tone so the officer can't hear them. This enrages the man, who immediately jumps
on Do-shik to hit him, and during the struggle, Do-shik drops a white phone on the floor that the
mother picks up. The cop pulls the hobo away and takes him to another room, so Do-shik takes his
phone back and goes to see Kyung-mi's statement as an excuse to check her personal information.
While he reads, the mother signs to Kyung-mi that is suspicious for the man to have two different
cellphones, and when he notices them talking to each other, he demands to know what it is about.
Kyung-mi only writes "nothing" for him, so Do-shik approaches the mother and starts going through the
weapons in his bag, thinking of what to do next. At that moment, a cop appears with Jong-tak,
who is trying to report his missing sister. The officer tells him to show the picture to the other
three since the description matches Kyung-mi's statement: Do-shik pretends he hasn't seen her
before, but Kyung-mi immediately recognizes her and gives him her statement to read.
While she tries to give him more details, the cop leaves the room to take care of the
hobo that tried to re-enter the place, so Do-shik takes that chance to tell the mother not to move
or he'll kill Kyung-mi. Then he shows her what is inside his bag as he takes a knife and moves
towards her daughter, but the mother manages to make a loud noise that alerts the others.
Jong-tak turns around just in time and stops the knife, so the two men begin fighting as the women
go outside and call the cops over. Do-shik admits having hurt Seo-jung, which enrages Jong-tak.
He begins beating up Do-shik furiously and even grabs the knife to put it on his neck,
demanding to know the location of his sister, but they are interrupted by the cops. Do-shik pretends
to be a victim and because of the compromising position they're in, the officers believe him, so
they arrest Jong-tak instead. Do-shik gets to walk free, and the women stay with Jong-tak while the
cops check the security cameras and see they were telling the truth. While Jong-tak goes back to the
streets to search for his sister, the police take the women to their apartment, which has a bunch
of lights that blink if they detect movement. While mother and daughter are having some tea,
the lights warn them of someone at the door, which worries them because it's really late,
but it turns out it's just the mother's coworker who's come to pick up some bags. The two elderly
women leave together, leaving Kyung-mi alone in the apartment, unaware that Do-shik has
now arrived and broken the sensor outside the door so the light won't give out his location.
His steps inside are detected though, so when Kyung-mi leaves her room to investigate,
Do-shik makes an alarm clock ring to make her think that's what triggered the lights.
Afterward, once she is back in her room, he finishes turning off all the other sensors
in the house while she texts Jong-tak, who had given her his card in case she needed anything.
Do-shik grabs his ax and gets ready to strike, but at that moment, Kyung-mi notices a toy on the
dresser is activated yet the lights don't react to it, so she turns around just in time to dodge
Do-shik's attack. She runs to another room and puts a dresser in front of the door before sending
a text to Jong-tak to tell him the murderer is here. Then she texts her mom to tell her
not to come back, but as the door stops shaking, she gets a text saying she's already there and
found the door open. Thinking her mother is in danger, Kyung-mi begins moving the dresser back,
but as more texts from her mom asking for help arrive, she realizes they have perfect
spelling when her mother usually doesn't type so well. It's then that she realizes Do-shik
has her phone and she stops moving the dresser just in time for him to appear at the door gap.
He tries to grab her hand, but Kyung-mi manages to pull it back and lock the door on his face.
This doesn't stop him for long however, Do-shik begins destroying the door with his ax to make his
way inside. Not having another way out, Kyung-mi jumps off the window, but Do-shik grabs her by
hair as she falls. She struggles against the hold and manages to make him let go, causing
her to fall safely on a pile of trash. Kyung-mi begins running again and Do-shik goes after her,
soon Jong-tak finds them and joins the chase too. After running through dozens of blocks, Do-shik
corners Kyung-mi in a closed area, and he's about to attack when Jong-tak arrives. To stop
him from hitting him, Do-shik puts his own knife against his neck and threatens to kill himself,
which means Jong-tak would never know where his sister is. With Jong-tak frozen in place, Do-shik
sends a text to his phone with Seo-jung's location and makes him choose between the two girls.
Jong-tak apologizes to Kyung-mi and runs away in search of Seo-jung at the address he was given:
Kyung-mi's house. Obviously, Do-shik lied and the place is empty, and Jong-tak only
comes across the mother when she comes back. Meanwhile, Kyung-mi tries to use a chair from
the trash to defend herself, but Do-shik takes it from her and uses it to pin her to the ground.
While he uses the phone to talk to Jong-tak and call him a bad person for having left her there,
Kyung-mi grabs some dirt and throws it at Do-shik's face to use the distraction to
push him off her and start running again. When she reaches the street where his van is, he sees the
door open and Seo-jung coming out of it, asking for help with a knife in her hand. As the mother
and Jon-tak reach the closed area and find it empty, the two girls hide in an alley, right
behind a trash container. Kyung-mi wants Seo-jung to call 911, but she refuses because she can hear
Do-shik nearby, who has discovered there is no body in the van, so Kyung-mi decides on a plan.
She writes on her phone a message to Seo-jung, telling her to call her brother because he's
nearby, before giving it to her and grabbing the knife in return. While Do-shik is turned around,
she leaves the alley and hides, only coming out again when the murderer is about to find Seo-jung.
She makes a weird noise with her mouth and shakes a nearby metal shutter, and once he has Do-shik's
attention, she puts the knife against her neck, threatening to kill herself and robbing him of
the pleasure. Do-shik goes after her, and after pressing the alarm on the pole once more, Kyung-mi
begins running, restarting the chase around town while Seo-jung calls her brother to ask for help.
He and the mother go to rescue her with an ambulance, and Seo-jung lets them know
the direction Kyung-mi has run toward to save her. This time, Kyung-mi runs towards downtown,
hoping to have more people around will make it harder to be caught. She crosses the busy street
with lots of difficulties since she can't hear the cars, but after a few dangerous moments,
she manages to reach the other side and go into a commercial area. She tries asking people for help
but since she can't talk, they ignore her. Do-shik is coming closer so she has no other choice but to
take out the knife to defend herself, making everyone step back in a circle around them. A
man in the crowd tries to call the police but Do-shik stops him by saying that's her sister
who has issues and the cops would scare her into hurting herself - Kyung-mi uses this moment as a
distraction to run away. A moment later however, the police find her and take her back to Do-shik,
believing the sister story - they also give the knife back to him. Once they're gone, Kyung-mi
starts crying and with the few sounds she manages to make, she begs her not to kill him because she
still has so much left to do. Not wanting to do this in front of people, Do-shik takes her
to a nearby ally and after telling her she almost convinced her but it wasn't enough, he gets ready
to stab her. Thankfully, Jong-tak arrives then and stops him just in time. The two men begin fighting
and Jong-tak manages to grab Do-shik with a hold around his neck to choke him. He lets go once he
passes out and goes to check on Kyung-mi, letting her know that Seo-jung is safe at the hospital and
her mom is nearby. He's suddenly interrupted by Do-shik, who only pretended to pass out and is now
hitting Jong-tak with empty bottles and various others pieces of trash. Kuyng-mi gets him to stop
by picking up the knife, so Do-shik decides to leave the alley and go after the mother instead.
He finds her in the middle of the commercial area and approaches her, asking her to follow him into
a dark alley, but at that moment Kyung-mi sees them and comes after him with her knife in hand.
Do-shik makes fun of her because she's failed to stab him and only managed to hurt his hand instead
however, that's part of the plan: she's put the knife in his hands and stabbed herself, making
it look as if it was him. The crowd steps back, effectively believing the trick and not listening
to him when he says it wasn't him. The police arrive then and shoot at the air as a warning,
but Do-shik won't stop moving, so they shoot him on the body a couple of times. This is still
not enough, especially because Kyung-mi provokes Do-shik by giving him the finger, but when Do-shik
is about to try again, Seo-jung arrives and tackles him to the ground where he finally dies.
Many days later, Kyung-mi and her mother go to the beach to have the vacation they dreamed of.
Seo-jung and Jong-tak join them as well, and after showing them how
they've been learning some sign language, the four of them take a picture together.