Mrs. Shim Is a Killer

About

Mrs. Shim has lost her husband, her job at the butcher shop, and her ability to keep her children fed. When she answers a vague job advertisement for the Smile Detective Agency, she discovers that her decades of butchering experience translate surprisingly well to her new line of work — which involves, as it turns out, a different kind of carving entirely. Kang Jiyoung's darkly hilarious Korean thriller takes a middle-aged widow and drops her into a world of crime that treats her domestic skills as lethal assets. The comedy is jet-black; the social commentary — about what happens to women when the safety net disappears — is razor-sharp. Mrs. Shim is practical, resourceful, and terrifyingly competent at everything she does. A thriller about a woman who discovers that the skills that made her invisible are the same ones that make her dangerous.