Look at Me in the Eyes

Detective Park in Memories of Murder has a unique way of trying to uncover truths in his small town. His ways of trying to solve the murder are so unprofessional and because of that he is not successful in finding the murderer. Because of his lack of success a detective from Seoul is sent to help with the investigation. Detective Park’s ways of trying to solve the murder include tampering with evidence and beating false confessions out of people who are not actually involved. The weirdest ‘method’ of investigation was the way he always said, ‘Look at me in the eyes and tell me that you didn’t kill them’. This is absolutely the worst way to try and find a murderer or any person who is suspected of any wrongdoing, however he keeps asking it from every suspect. I knew right from the beginning there was something special about that line, but I couldn’t exactly pin anything on it except for the fact that it was unprofessional. After doing some research into the film (typing ‘Memories of Murder killer’ into Google) I came across many interpretations but the one that I believe to be the most accurate is the idea that when Detective Park looked into the eyes of Park Hyun-Gyu, he did not see a murderer, which is why Hyun-Gyu was let go. But when the detective returned to the scene of the second murder years later, a girl tells him that a boring and ordinary person was here some time back. When the detective breaks the fourth wall and looks into the audience, he is looking into our eyes, but he is also realizing that he was right in the beginning: Hyun-Gyu is the murderer, and the look in his eyes, the look of a normal person, was what the detective saw that night. It gives me chills to think about it. No other interpretation of the film involved those words, but they were so key to the story it’s almost impossible that they are not involved.