Some things I liked some I did not.

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

Just intense enough to provide a much-needed diversion, just lightweight enough to make you forget about it soon after it’s over. It’s not exactly “good,” per se, but it does what it sets out to do in terms of putting us on edge, which makes it … successful?

The urban myth in this modern Honk Kong thriller simply makes my skin crawl, and the film effectively pulls you along for an unnervingly captivating ride. However this dark concept is only a stepping tool for the premise to move along, then to focus upon it. Susan Chan's well-oiled story keeps the tempo tight, is held together by a strongly stimulating script and constantly stays busy with its cat-and-mouse layout. These do make up for the predictability of the film's material, and a silly surprise towards the end. Like the other user-comments have mentioned, the many twists that the framework throws up are pretty much foreseeable and some quite questionable, but director Chi-Leung Law still manages to competently construct slabs of unbearable psychological tension and grisly violence that teases the viewer. His direction might be economically executed, but he crafts out a stylishly bold and at times visual feast of perfect timing within his suffocating set-pieces. Going a long way to cementing a creepy atmosphere of despair, and uncertainty is that of a beautifully layered music score, which always packed a sudden sting and the sublime staging of Chi Ying Chan's crisp, moody cinematography. What really is the key of the success are the magnificently flawless lead performances of Angelica Lee and especially Karena Lam. Both bring humane, provocative turns that are truly convincing, and moving in every detail and the hazy relationship between the two characters is truly a complicated web. A very well made and professionally acted film, where from the get-go its faults seem immensely minor to disrupt a very entertaining, worthwhile story.

Surprisingly pedestrian rendition of an premise handled far better in Stephen Frears "Dirty Pretty Things". Don't be misled either into thinking its a 'horror' film has it seems to have far more in common with the sexual revenge and contamination fears of 1980s classic Fatal Attraction. Indeed a boiled bunny might have made for a passing distraction more pleasant than the 88 minutes of increasingly grudging attention I was forced to expend on this hack work.One can see why a combination of plastic oriental exoticism and hitchcock/ shining pastiches would appeal to fans of contemporary throw away horror, such as 'Saw' for example, but plastic characters, a dull visual palette and plotting mean there's little to warrant recommending it over any episode of CSI. Which is a poor recommendation indeed.

Traditionally, Asian films have been sticking more to the classic horror styles and elements. What I'm saying is that in general, they are deeper, more frightening, and overall much better than American horror films. But I found something odd about "Koma." It seemed to be a combination of a slasher film, a psychological horror film, and a family drama. True, this has worked before, in much better films such as "The Silence of the Lambs", but there is something different about "Koma." It almost seems as if the filmmakers wanted to make an "American slasher flick" rather than an "Asian horror film", and to be blunt, they found something in-between.It is hard not to notice some American influence in the film. There are several shots ripped straight out of "Fight Club" and "The Evil Dead", and the musical score is taken directly from M. Night Shyamalan's "Signs" (Though it is a computerized version of the music, not the original studio recording), with only minimal original music.But still, it manages to tell a rather absorbing (If not genre-confused) story about friendship, betrayal, and redemption, all revolving around the idea of kidney-theft. (Yum!) Unfortunately, the movie is only 88 minutes long, and all of the interesting ideas are condensed into lesser versions of what they could be. Perhaps if the movie was longer, and took more time to explore it's characters and stories, it would have been better. Hey, it might have even become a modern classic... But because of uneven direction (Zooming cameras and quick cutting in the beginning become long, steady shots as the movie progresses) and a compressed story, what we get is marginal.Sure it is memorable, but that is only because of it's odd vagueness in what it wants to be, transforming it into a mish-mash "referential" horror film. Overall, even though it is only "pretty good", and there are much better films out there, but be sure to at least give this one a shot, you might like it.

I saw this film on cable in a hotel room while I was in Taiwan. It had subtitles in both Traditional Chinese and English. The ads for this film made it look like it was going to be a horror film in the Japanese style that is so popular nowadays. It turned out to be a stylish and slick thriller instead. The production values were quite high, and the plot was interesting enough to keep one's attention. Basically, the plot has been expanded from the common urban myth about waking up in a bathtub full of ice cubes, with one's kidney removed. (Well, I hope it's an urban myth!) I would certainly recommend this film. Well acted and entertaining.