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The Isle

Play trailer Poster for The Isle 2002 1h 29m Drama Play Trailer Watchlist
Watchlist Tomatometer Popcornmeter
76% Tomatometer 34 Reviews 73% Popcornmeter 5,000+ Ratings
A man (Seo Jeong) becomes violently obsessive about the woman (Kim Yu-seok) who saved him from committing suicide.

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The Isle

The Isle

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Critics Consensus

A compelling and oddly haunting combination of brutal and beautiful imagery.

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Critics Reviews

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Nick Schager Lessons of Darkness May 4, 2005
B-
A creepy, gruesome, gorgeous and flabbergasting treatise on romantic obsession and violent, nasty male-female relationships. Go to Full Review
Mark Jenkins Washington Post May 21, 2004
Spring, Summer fans should only have their appreciation of that film expanded by seeing this rougher take on similar themes. Go to Full Review
Roger Ebert Chicago Sun-Times Jan 31, 2003
3/4
Beautiful, angry and sad, with a curious sick poetry, as if the Marquis de Sade had gone in for pastel landscapes. Go to Full Review
A.S. Hamrah The Baffler Sep 16, 2020
The Isle is sick, but it is not empty spectacle. Go to Full Review
Jason Gorber Film Scouts Jun 21, 2007
A-
In the (genius) Coen Brother's film The Big Lebowski, Julianne Moore's character Maude is an avant garde artist who describes her painting as "strongly vaginal." Until The Isle, I thought that was simply a funny joke... Go to Full Review
Cole Smithey ColeSmithey.com Jun 1, 2007
4/5
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Audience Reviews

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Qasim R @RT84584345 Apr 3, 2026 It's very disturbing movie but with good visuals. It should have a clear ending that would be great. If you are looking for a thriller movie,you can watch this. See more Quezia C @Quezia733 Feb 11, 2026 I can’t even think what to say… If you love cinema, good production, storyline, don’t watch it! Don’t waste your time in this thing that I even don’t know how to name it! Nasty and disgusting scenes. All without a good history to tell. The woman is probably a psychopath… everything with no sense. I can’t understand what was in the mind of Kim Ki Duk when he wrote that. See more Juan T @RT04284203 Jul 21, 2024 DO NOT SEE THIS FILM. A dog being hit and abused multiple times is just unacceptable. It wasn't acted. Everyone involved in that should go to jail, starting with the director. See more Courtney K @c0urtn3y Nov 9, 2021 gosh... i knew what i was getting into before watching this one - & it did deliver all the disturbing imagery it promised - but the rest of the film just wasn't good. the mute girl played her part well, but everyone else was kind of just ridiculous. not sure if that was purposeful or not, but i thought it took away from the story they were trying to tell. idk. it more or less just seemed like a random movie with random gross happenings. she had no real reason to take an interest in yellow-boat-house-guy & he had no real reason for being there anyway. & he waited like 3 days to ask her if there was a bathroom? didn't you have to go the first day you got there? & what are all these people eating? idk. i like the premise, but i thought it was sloppy & gross. See more Aug 25, 2020 The moment I listened to this movie, my thoughts seemed to be seeing the world of mankind destroyed by zombies. It is a film in a dreamy fantasy world that looks like watching a post-apocalyptic movie. Or it's like a science fiction movie. The movie Waterworld came to mind. See more Jan 7, 2018 I remember this as the first film of Kim Ki-Duk that I watched. Been a fan of his films since then. And perhaps this would still be my favorite out of his portfolio. It's a touching and weird love story. The visual storytelling is superb. Even without an audio, you'd understand, and that is the nirvana state of any filmmaker. See more Read all reviews
The Isle

My Rating

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Movie Info

Synopsis A man (Seo Jeong) becomes violently obsessive about the woman (Kim Yu-seok) who saved him from committing suicide.
Director
Kim Ki-duk
Distributor
Empire Pictures
Production Co
Myung Films
Genre
Drama
Original Language
Korean
Release Date (Theaters)
Aug 23, 2002, Wide
Release Date (Streaming)
Dec 29, 2014
Box Office (Gross USA)
$21.1K
Runtime
1h 29m
Sound Mix
Surround, Dolby SR, Dolby Digital, Dolby A, Dolby Stereo
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