Shadows in the Palace picks up on trends in Korean pop culture in many fields since 2000. Chun-ryung, a medical maid in the royal court starts to investigate the murder case of a maid in the palace of a royal concubine. With the popular ‘investigator’ character like ones in CSI and Byolsungum, this film presents the figure of the career woman in the Chosun dynasty like the characters of Daejanggum, Damo and Hwangjinee. But it is different from other ‘working female’ costume dramas set in Chosun dynasty. It gives the pleasure of diversion while it transfigures the suppressed women’s life into the fantastic space as horror in the male-dominated history. Even more it intentionally supports women’s desire to bring this fantasy to the screen. These differences make for the most powerful ‘woman ghost’ in 50 years of Korean horror films. Also in the women’s fantasy space, the patriarchal system’s privileged space of the palace is ridiculed. This film converts the clichéd associations of categories, and the binary division of modernity/science/reason/man vs. pre-modernity/superstition/ignorance/woman. Science and reason support fantasy and the unknown in this film. The imaginative production design and director’s powerful directing makes this film all the more rewarding. (Jay SOHN)