22 of the Best Korean Horror Movies to Watch Right Now

If you love a good zombie movie, “Train to Busan” should be at the top of your watchlist. The film stars Gong Yoo (“The Silent Sea”) as Seok-woo, a divorced father who buries himself in his work. He and his daughter take a trip to Busan to go see his ex-wife, and we meet a diverse cast of characters on the train, including a man named Sang-hwa and his pregnant wife Seong-kyeong, high-school basketball player Min Yong-guk and his cheerleader girlfriend Kim Jin-hee, business executive Yon-suk, and more. One of the passengers is a sick woman who turns into a zombie and bites one of the other passengers. The infection spreads like wildfire, causing complete chaos on the train.

“A Tale of Two Sisters” is a psychological horror film based on a Korean folktale about two sisters who are mistreated by their stepmother. The film begins with a teenage girl named Su-mi being released from a mental institution and returning to her family’s home in the countryside. She reunites with her younger sister Su-yeon and her widowed father, who has gotten remarried to a woman named Eun-joo.

The sisters try their best to put up with Eun-joo for their father’s sake, but just when things seem to be going back to normal, strange and inexplicable events start happening in the family’s home. You won’t see the film’s end coming.

Soon after a stranger arrives in the village of Gokseong, a mysterious disease that causes people to become violent and kill their families begins to spread. The police initially believe this change in behavior is caused by wild mushrooms, but Officer Jong-goo begins to suspect that the newcomer could be responsible for the chaos after a woman accuses him of being a ghost. After Jong-goo’s daughter gets sick, the cop goes directly to the stranger’s home in the mountains to investigate. “The Wailing” has ghosts, exorcisms, and demons, making it a must-see film for horror lovers.

Fans of Bong Joon-ho’s “Parasite” should watch his 2006 monster film, “The Host.” According to the LA Times, Bong based his movie around a real-life scandal from 2000, when a U.S. military mortician ordered his employees to formaldehyde down the drain – which eventually ended up in the Han River.

The beginning of “The Host” depicts a similar incident, with Bong putting his own twist on the story: the chemicals in the river cause an amphibious creature to mutate, become violent, and kidnap a girl. The creature is also the host of a deadly virus, causing anyone who comes into contact with it to instantly fall ill.

“Monstrum” is a period film set in 1527 during the reign of King Jungjong. In the film, rumours of Monstrum, a bloodthirsty creature lurking in the mountains, run rampant. Determined to get to the bottom of the mystery, King Jungjong asks general Yun-kyum to form a team of hunters – including his daughter Myung, a skilled archer; his friend Sung-han; the King’s messenger, Hur; and a number of other soldiers – to find out whether the beast is real. Yun-kyum soon realizes that the rumours were true, leading to a bloody confrontation with the creature.

Based on the 2002 novel “Fingersmith” by Sarah Waters, “The Handmaiden” is a psychological thriller set in the 1930s. The film tells the story of a con man named Count Fujiwara, who is determined to marry a wealthy Japanese woman named Izumi Hideko to obtain her fortune. His plan involves hiring pickpocket Nam Sook-hee to become Hideko’s handmaiden and encourage Hideko to marry him. If his plan succeeds, Fujiwara will send Hideko to a psychiatric hospital so he can get her money. However, his plan proves to be more difficult than anticipated.

If you’re a fan of found footage films that take you directly into the POVs of the main characters, you’ll enjoy “Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum.” The movie centres around a crew filming a web series at an abandoned psychiatric hospital rumoured to be the location where a number of patients were killed by the hospital’s director. At first, the crew fakes scary scenarios in order to get more views for their livestream. However, the deeper they explore the building, the more disturbing and unexplained occurrences happen. According to a report from Movie Flicks, the haunted asylum is based on a real-life hospital where a director would perform experiments on her patients.

“Alive” is another film centering around a zombie apocalypse. It focuses on a video game streamer named Oh Joon-woo who is forced to remain inside his apartment after a mysterious infection begins spreading outside, causing everyone to turn into zombies. He tries to find help, but when he starts to lose phone and internet access, as well as food and running water, Joon-woo’s hope for survival begins to waver. However, things change when he notices another survivor living in the apartment building across the street from him. The two meet up and then cook up a plan in order to make it out of the apocalypse together.

“Oldboy,” which is based on the Japanese manga of the same name, stars “I Saw The Devil” actor Choi Min-sik as a man named Oh Dae-su who gets arrested for walking around drunk. His friend picks him up from the station, but as soon as he’s out, Dae-su is kidnapped and imprisoned inside a hotel room. While watching TV, he learns that his wife is murdered, and he’s the prime suspect. Dae-su is kept in isolation for 15 years until he’s suddenly released one day. His captor calls him and challenges him to figure out the reason for his imprisonment, leading Dae-su on a wild chase to discover the identity of the mysterious figure.

Fans of director Park Chan-wook who love his works like “The Handmaiden” and “Oldboy” will likely enjoy his horror film, “Thirst,” as well. The movie centers around a respected priest named Sang-hyun who volunteers to participate in an experiment in order to find a cure for a deadly virus. The experiment goes wrong and Sang-hyun ends up catching the disease and dies. However, he’s miraculously brought back to life after undergoing a blood transfusion, but the procedure turns him into a vampire. Sang-hyun questions his faith as he deals with this newfound bloodlust, as well as his attraction to a woman named Tae-ju (who also happens to be his friend’s wife) despite his vow of chastity.

“Bedevilled” follows a woman named Hae-won who decides to travel to the island of Mudu in order to visit her childhood friend Bok-nam. We quickly find out Bok-nam is living in an abusive household, and the only thing that keeps her going is her love for her daughter, Yeon-hee. When Bok-nam begins to suspect her husband, Man-jong, has been sexually abusing Yeon-hee, she begs Hae-won for help. However, Hae-won refuses to get involved, forcing Bok-nam to try and escape with Yeon-hee on her own.

Bok-nam sadly gets caught by her husband, who attempts to punish her. Yeon-hee tries to intervene, but is accidentally pushed and killed by Man-jong, who pins Yeon-hee’s death on his wife. Bok-nam snaps and begins killing everyone on the island and even goes after Hae-won, who she blames for Yeon-hee’s death.

“Into the Mirror” is one of the most chilling Korean horror films you’ll come across. It centers around a former policeman named Woo Young-Min who quits his job after inadvertently causing the death of his partner during a hostage situation. As a result, he begins working for his uncle as the head of security of a shopping mall. However, things take a turn when a number of the mall’s employees are found dead. The police suspect a serial killer could be on the loose, but Young-Min does his own investigation and discovers the deaths may actually be linked to a parallel word inside mirrors.