This South Korean film is about a Chinese taxi driver named Gu-nam in Yanji City, the crime-ridden region between North Korea, China and Russia. He owes money to the criminals that obtained his wife's visa to work in South Korea (which the characters simply refer to as "Korea"). He hasn't heard from her in a while nor received any money from her, so he assumes she's cheating on him and/or prostituting herself. Kind of like Lucky Number Slevin (though far less humorous), he's offered a job to kill a man in Korea to wipe his debt and he can look for his wife in the meantime. Things don’t go as planned and he has to improvise.
Gu-nam is laconic and out of his element but surprisingly resourceful, and I was impressed with how he managed to locate/identify his target and plan the assassination. In some ways it reminded me of Taken in that the main character is in a foreign land with only one lead to go on, and manages to make a full mission out of it. It also reminded me of I Saw The Devil in its action and violence, but it’s even more so: lots of knives and hand-axes. Also there is one crime boss who proved himself to be so hard that I found myself cheering him on in every scene that didn’t have him in opposition with Gu-nam. Even when they were squaring up for confrontation I was excited with how cool the coming fight was going to be! The film stock quality was good and the ambient music was conducive to the film. There was one car chase scene near the end that looked noticably grainier, but the acting and directing for that scene was also noticably impeccable for making it clear what was going on.
If you’re squeamish around blood and violence, then this movie is not for you. If you need a lot of dialogue and character development, then this movie is not for you. And actually, if you’re a fan of law enforcement at all or just hate to see the boys in blue act as completely ineffectual bumbling idiots, then this movie is not for you either. But if you just want to see some resourcefulness, action and badassery, then you’ll really dig it. While the start was a bit slow for my taste and Gu-nam’s lack of vocal response when someone is talking to him grated on my American cultural experience, the later parts of the movie were non-stop awesome. The protagonist was really cool despite his lack of characterization and the villain was great. I’d give the movie 4 stars.
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