Gwoemul (The Host)

Bong Joon-ho's 2006 monster tale,  The Host, brings a level of sophistication to the monster film genre with a combination of several genres all working to develop  the narrative and its characters.  It's about a family that becomes torn through this huge fish-monster crawling out of the water and killing/taking people back to his short of sewer-lair. The story follows a snack car employee Park Gang-Du , his father  Hee-Bong , daughter Hyun-Seo ,sister Naam-joo ,who's an archer , and Gang-du's brother Nam-il , an alcoholic who has not done much since graduating.  The monster takes his daughter Hyun-seo seemingly killing her until Gang-du recieves a call from Hyuen-seo informing him that she was in fact still alive but trapped in the monster's sewer-lair.  Gang-du and his family set out to save his daughter but they face strong opposition from the government.  The leads are good,  particularly the young girl, Park Hyun-Seo played by Ah-Sung ko, who is very convincing and strong in character.    The other characters continually walk that fine line between comedic and serious performances.  That raises another interesting aspect, instead of following a standard route with the characters, their development follows the unusual turns of the film itself and we're treated to surprises and failures when we don't really expect them.  The monster is really well-designed and doesn't look like any other screen monster that i have seen.  The animation of it is excellent too , and the creature does almost feel like it's alive!  The strongest aspect of this film has to be it's cinematography.  The audience gets to visually see a dark world created in Korea as a result of a Foreign monster who creates a domestic threat to Korean life.