Released in 2022, the latest Korean blockbuster for Netflix by Na Hyun (The Prison, 2017) takes a prosecutor interpreted by Park Hae-soo (seen in The Track and Squid Game both on Netflix) and a bloody spy (Sol Kyung-gu seen in Murderful Memory). Sometimes elegant and violent, but often too generic as most productions Netflix.
Shenyang, spy nest
Prosecutor Han Ji-hoon is dismissed after attacking a Korean billionaire. To get out of the closet where he was put, he has to go investigate a Korean spy, Ji Kang-in, in northern China, in Shenyang.
This city close to the two Koreas, Russia and Japan, is a spy den where the team led by Ji Kang-in seems to be on a freewheel. In fact, all this is to try to exfil a North Korean double/triple agent trapped by the Japanese.
Not top secret
Under a falsely complicated intrigue, we are facing a fairly classic action film with its lot of shootings, explosions, pursuits and body-to-body fighting. And this is the problem: if the staging is relatively functional, and sometimes even elegant, as soon as the action scenes arrive the wound...
Some frames are raced, but quickly wiped out by an anarchic montage that also destroys the dynamism of some beautiful camera movements. Too bad, since the budget is there to fill the eyes and the relatively original and powerful choreographies. Remains some nice but not enough pieces of bravery to take away the piece.
« James Bond, mission impossible! What the fuck is this? »
Justice and the Righteous
On the scenario side, if the use of the prosecutor's character as a means of introducing us into this universe of secrecy is quite clever, it unfortunately does not lead to much; The whole being already seen and reviewed in Korean cinema, usually more skilled for espionage and geopolitics.
Here, not wanting to fry anyone, the film is quite lukewarm. Even the reflection on justice and the classic « the end justifies the means » made in the heat. The charism of Sol Kyung-gu, who, in the role of the badass spy, works well. Pretty skinny, right?
In conclusion, if the film is not shameful, I suggest you take a look at The Berlin File (The Agent) by Ryoo Seung-wan, who, on a close subject, avoided a better intrigue and talented action scenes.
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