A woman returns to her apartment in a bad part of town. She is on the phone with her boyfriend, talking about moving and a neighbor she is leery of. She believes he is watching her and possibly entering her apartment, and sets up a camera on her computer. After briefly leaving her apartment to check the hallway, she takes a look at the footage. We see someone quickly enter and hide in the apartment, and before long the woman is dead.
The scene is freaky and effectively sets the stage for what is mostly a suspenseful and engaging movie. Following the woman’s death we meet a man and his family: Sung-soo (Hyeon-ju Son), his wife and their young son and daughter. They live in an expansive and beautiful, modern apartment in Seoul, far from the rundown apartment building that was home to the aforementioned victim. He learns that his brother was kicked out of the building and is now missing.
Though he hasn’t seen his brother in years, Sung-soo decides to try and find out what happened to him. He talks to some of the building’s residents, but they aren’t much help. It’s the kind of place that houses people looking to stay in the shadows. Meanwhile, someone is following and watching the man, showing up wherever Sung-soo goes. Sometimes they just watch from a distance, but there are also close encounters.
The mystery person could be the missing brother. Sung-soo had a falling out with him decades prior, and there’s definitely good reason for the brother to hold a grudge. Whoever they are, they are creepy and dangerous, wearing dark clothes and a black motorcycle helmet, and occasionally attacking without warning.
There are several scenes that match the potency of the opening, including an attack in the missing brother’s old apartment that reveals a hidden passageway to the apartment next door. The scenes build slowly and involve numerous close calls (elevator doors shutting or not shutting just in time, etc.), and they are extremely tense and sometimes deadly.
After an outstanding first hour, Hide and Seek does stumble a little in the home stretch. There is a big reveal with about 30 minutes left, which kills some of the well-constructed tension. The final confrontation is drawn out and drags a little, though in fairness it does feature a few suspenseful moments (while proving that even in a luxury apartment with extensive security in a nice part of town, people are still vulnerable).
All things considered, Hide and Seek is a solid flick. It contains its share of genre clichés, but it’s also incredibly well-made and downright scary at times. When it’s over, you just might want to check under the bed or in the closet.
