Marvel you probably know, Misfits possibly not. Hi-Five is a bit of both – the superhero powers go to a bunch of high school kids in this soaraway South Korean actioner that’s obviously good from its opening moments. And it pretty much stays that way to the end. Pacy, witty, with likeable characters and a story arc you can see from space – it’s all going to end up in a fisty showdown.
The magical blah at the beginning sets up the story neatly. Opening scene of an ambulance rushing through the streets. At the hospital it’s bad news for whoever was in the back of that vehicle. They’re dead. But their organs have been harvested and have gone to thankful recipients. Not without a struggle though. The doctors doing the harvesting complain about the difficulty of getting the organs out. That soft tissue really put up a struggle against their sharp metal instruments. Hmmm.
It seems the dead donor was a superbeing of some description. And though it/they are no more, various bits and pieces have found new homes. A heart to Wan-seo (Lee Jae-in), a motherless sweetie whose helicopter dad (Oh Jung-se) worries about her exerting herself too much (worry no more, dad). The lungs to Ji-sung (Ahn Jae-hong), a supernerd who now has hurricane-force breath. The corneas to jockish braggart Gi-dong (Yoo Ah-in), who can suddenly control electronic machinery at will. A kidney to Seon-nyeo (Ra Mi-ran), whose superpower isn’t at first apparent (but will surely reveal itself at a crucial moment).
Meanwhile, on the other side of town, a rich and elderly leader of a religious cult is back from near-death. Yeong-chun (Shin Goo) is suddenly also looking a bit younger than he used to. Eventually fully rejuvenated (and now played by Park Jin-young), he decides to go the whole hog and find the other recipients of the bits and bobs that have worked so well on him. He sets off on a mission to re-harvest those harvested organs. But not if daughter Chun-hwa (Jin Hee-kyung) – who was lining herself up to take over from her dead dad – can get there first.
There is internal beef on both sides. Marvel-style Iron Man/Captain America levels of bickering between the relentlessly showboating Gi-dong and the dweebie Ji-sung. Quieter but more serious tension between Yeong-chun and daugher Chun-hwa. But a lot of the fun comes from watching the youngsters discovering their powers, which are at odds with their only semi-formed personalities. With great power comes great opportunity for laughs, and Hi-Five has clearly watched the British TV show Misfits, which made much of superpowers in the hands of fragile teenage egos.
This is not a big-budget film and you can play spot the special-effects shortcuts all the way through. That said, it gets a long way on those shortcuts – ingenuity at work. It also does two things no Marvel movie would ever do. It has a go at organised religion, saving its most brutal criticisms for the acolytes of cult leader Yeong-chun, whipped into an ecstatic frenzy seemingly by anything. And it has an interest in the power of collective action – it’s a semi-communist pooling of superpowers that wins the day.
What, the good guys win? Was it ever in doubt? The joys of this film are the joys of watching people we like doing things we want to see done, while behind the camera the big idea is don’t get in the way of the vibe.
Hi-Five did well at the South Korean box office, where for a while writer/director Kang Hyoung-chul’s charming film gave the final Mission: Impossible a run for its money. But will it return for the sequel that’s obviously set up in the film’s final minutes? I doubt it. But what do I know?
Hi-Five – Watch it/buy it at Amazon
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© Steve Morrissey 2026
