SYNOPSIS:
Ex-detective
pimp Jung-ho is angry because his girls keep disappearing
without clearing their debts. One night, he gets a call from
a customer and sends Mi-jin. But when Mi-jin meets the customer
matches that of the calls the missing girls got last. As something
smells fishy, he searches for her. During his search, Jung-ho
dents a car in the alley. When Jung-ho spots blood splattered
on the driver’s shirt, he sense the man, Young-min,
is the suspect. After an intense pretense as a cop, they are
both taken to the police station. At the station, he bluntly
tells the policemen that he has killed the missing women,
and the last girl, Mi-jin may still be alive. As the Police
force is obsessed with a random search for corpses, Jung-ho
is the only one who believes Mi-jin is still alive. With only
12 hours left to detain the serial killer without a warrant,
Jung-ho’s hunt begins.
MOVIE REVIEW:
Remember the good old days when movies were about 90 minutes
long? In recent years, the average duration of a movie is
about two hours, and gasp, there are self important epic and
blockbusters which can stretch up to three solid hours. This
isn’t a problem when there is something to look forward
to in the picture, but when you start fidgeting in your seats
after the first hour, you know things are going to get annoyingly
exasperating.
Especially
for a cat and mouse chase (pardon the title pun here) movie
like this one, we’d think 90 minutes is more than enough
to keep us engaged, but by its 125th minute, we find ourselves
totally engrossed in it. And why is that? We think it’s
the characters we have grown to care about.
Based
on a string of brutal and cold blooded serial killings in
Korea, this movie tells the story of a seedy detective (not
your usual self righteous one) who loses his job and becomes
am equally seedy pimp. He runs into money problems as several
of his girls disappear without a trace without clearing their
debts. While tracking them down, he realizes that the same
client has been calling his girls up. And further investigation
leads to a climaxing finale which, we daresay you won’t
easily forget in a short while.
The
two main characters are played excellently by Kim Yoon-suk
(Running Wild) and Ha Jung-woo (Breath). The chaser (Kim)
and the one being chased (Ha) display such great emotions
that you feel the adrenaline rush just by watching them. Kim’s
angst ridden determination to hunt the baddie down is nicely
contrasted with Ha’s cunning and crafty mannerisms.
It’s a show where you know who the bad guy is from the
beginning, but the execution of the movie is so powerful that
it keeps your eyes glued to the screen throughout. Watch out
for the movie’s last half an hour where the poor victim
played by the fragile Seo Young-hee (she who is being chased
by Ha) – the frustration and fury set up by first time
director Na Hong-jin will leave you breathless.
Although
this is Na’s debut film, the story penned by Korea’s
up and coming filmmaker is a typical but engaging one. This
is what chase movies should be all about. Great characters,
great setup, and personalities you can actually care about.
Let’s see what our friends over at Hollywood (Warner
Bros. have already bought the remake rights) will do to this
winning thriller drama in their adaptation which supposedly
involves William Monahan, Leonardo DiCaprio and Martin Scorsese
(the gang from The Departed, i.e. the Hollywood remake of
Hong Kong cinema’s revival movie Infernal Affairs).
SPECIAL
FEATURES:
This Code 3 DVD contains varying promotional sequences ranging
from a Teaser Trailer, a Main Trailer
and a TV Spot. There are 21 minutes
of Highlight scenes taken straight from the
film. The 10 minute Interview section has
the movie’s three stars talking about how emotionally
draining it is to film the movie, how the action sequences
were the most difficult to shoot, and how the film is a blazingly
cold one. In Making Of, we get 20 minutes
of behind the scene footages of how cars were crashed, fights
were executed and how riotous it is filming the violent scenes.
The palette is rounded up with a Photo Gallery.
AUDIO/VISUAL:
The disc’s visual transfer of the movie
makes the dark alleys look maddeningly helpless and the violence
extra potent. It is presented in its original Korean audio
track.
MOVIE RATING:
DVD
RATING:
Review by John Li
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