Sean Parker
Is there anything worse than noisy neighbors? I’m sure there is, but first-time feature director Kim Soo-jin pushes the envelope in his Fantasia debut Noise (Noijeu) to suggest otherwise. The Korean-made Noise takes a page from many horror favorites in crafting a story about a rundown tenement building where some of the tenants have stayed well after their lease on life has expired. Ju-young (Lee Sun-bin) lived in one of the apartments with her sister Ju-hee (Han Soo-a) before moving into a work dormitory, a better situation than calming her sister’s fury for the sounds of heavy steps, dragged furniture, and crawling that seems to be driving her mad. When Ju-hee disappears one evening, Ju-young becomes determined to find out what happened to Ju-hee and begins by revisiting the origins of her sister’s sound sensitivity.
Sound design is an art form in a film like Noise, comprising a strong cacophony of sounds ranging from subtle, soft tones to ear-drum-piercing shrills to make an effect. Ju-young is a bit insulated from her sister’s troubles, having lost her hearing enough that she requires hearing aids to use the remainder of that sense, and relying on an audio transcription app on her phone that auto-processes speech whenever her hearing aids are out of power. In due time, the film uses this mechanic to bone-chilling effect.
Ju-young returns to her sister’s last known location after receiving a call from the police that Ju-hee’s work has not seen her in four days. Other than leaving her room a bit untidy, there are no signs of struggle or even that she may have run away, though her phone and wallet are still in her room. A note taped to the door of Ju-hee’s apartment from the apartment below her asking to keep the noise down quickly extrapolates into a confrontation and a violent threat for Ju-young, despite the place likely being empty for the last four days. Each day, the man returns, and each encounter becomes increasingly disturbing.
Receiving a knock on the door one morning after one such incident with the neighbor, Ju-young is reluctant to open her door until she hears the commotion outside between multiple residents. Ki-hoon (Kim Min-Seok) has come looking for Ju-hee because the two had been seeing each other, and he had not heard from her. Finding Ju-young instead, he joins her personal investigation, offering help wherever he can, including with the downstairs neighbor. The film becomes a fairly standard horror investigation procedural, in the vein of The Ring, The Grudge, and Dark Water, until Ju-young can unravel the mystery of what is happening in the apartment building.
Embedded beneath the storyline is an agoraphobic idea about living alone and not knowing who your neighbors are, especially for women. The film’s most threatening aura comes from the sleepless man who lives below Ju-young, and some of Noise’s most unsettling scenes are when he appears. Besides that, there is also class division among the snobby residents who own their apartments and those renting, especially when the smell of trash begins to permeate from an old, locked-off basement trash pile, and the homeowners start blaming the renters. There’s hardly a growing community within the complex, but a Mean Girls vibe prevails in the HOA.
Generally speaking, I’m pretty good at being able to tell where a film is going. I can usually find the red herring and decipher a movie mystery within the first half hour. But Noise doesn’t play by the rules, and I can certainly appreciate that as a moviegoer. Kim Soo-jin has you looking in all directions for logical answers, but the viewer has to contend with supernatural elements, which sometimes makes them wonder whether some earthly person had anything to do with Ju-hee’s disappearance, or if she didn’t just Pulse out of the room into a mess on the floor. Regardless, strong clues hint toward where the film is heading, but any person who thinks they can figure out all of Noise’s moving parts quickly is likely to end up disappointed.
And, speaking of moving parts, this is probably the part in the article where I should tell you that Noise is littered with them. There’s a plot about tearing down the building and gentrifying the space, a possible murder in the apartment, the man downstairs, and Ju-hee’s investigation. While everything sort of bleeds together, it’s a challenge to keep track of at times. The story becomes heavily convoluted, and while there are moments of terror, including a few jump scares, finishing the movie is likely to leave you wanting more from it. Noise, at only ninety-three minutes, is hardly long to get through, though with every little thing the viewer is keeping track of, it feels much longer than it is. The ending is fine, a bit of the perfunctory finale often seen throughout East Asian horror, but it still doesn’t do enough to satisfy entirely.
Noise has some innovative moments. If you were a fan of any of the horror films I’ve mentioned in the article, you’re likely going to want to add Noise to your Letterboxd watchlist. However, I think many of you, like me, will find the film is a little too stuffed at points and meanders at other times. It’s a film that fits right in the middle, worth a watch, but treads a lot of similar ground of investigative procedurals, like The Ring, while incorporating elements from Hush and A Quiet Place.
Noise played at the 2025 Fantasia International Film Festival on Thursday, July 17. Check out the film’s page on the Fantasia website for more information.
Noise (2025) 노이즈 Movie Trailer 3 | EONTALK
The third movie trailer with English subtitles for “Noise” 노이즈 (2025), brought to you by EonTalk.
