Assassination came in with Korea’s second-highest box office in 2015 for a locally-produced film, preceded only by the worldwide smash, Avengers: Age of Ultron. They’re both action films featuring a large cast of talented fighters/killers, but beyond these very general similarities and their overwhelmingly positive reception in Korea, the films couldn’t be more different – especially in that you really need to see Assassination.

Set mainly in 1930s Japan-occupied Korea, Assassination, from director Choi Dong-hoon, is a complex, fast-paced weave of multiple espionage plots. Captain Yen organizes three pro-Korean-independence killers to assassinate the commander of Japanese troops in Korea and a Korean tycoon who has devoted himself to the Japanese government; at the same time, Yen gives two guns-for-hire the assignment to assassinate three pro-Korean-independence killers. This very minimal, introductory plot description offers only a glimpse of the byzantine twists and turns to come.

Driving the action are the five hired assassins: “Big Gun” and Hwang Deok-sam, sprung from a Japanese prison, are hired to accompany An Ok-yoon, a sniper in the Korean Independence Army known for her stellar sharp-shooting abilities, hampered only by her need for glasses, and the two professional hitmen, Hawaii Pistol and his mustachioed sidekick Pomade, ride in on a tandem motorcycle. All five are especially talented with guns, hand-to-hand combat, and deceit, and all are compulsively watchable in action.

Assassination’s fight scenes are suspenseful and beautifully choreographed and feature the understandability and intimacy of relatively little CGI. This is particularly important in that the action sequences re-ground the viewer in the midst of character identities and plot lines that are somewhat difficult to follow. Shifting political allegiances and mistaken identities involving twins further complicate matters, but these also provide the dramatic weight that propels the action forward at a steady yet lightning-fast rate; don’t let the 140-minute running time scare you away – it barely feels like the average hour and a half.

Some of the aesthetic choices are less convincing, including shifts in lighting and focus and swells in the musical score that are melodramatic enough to almost read as camp, but not quite. The film in general veers in that over-the-top direction; if it inched just a tiny bit further it would be a real masterpiece. If it weren’t an action film, the sincerity would be less of a hamper. But in that vein, the film features scenes reminiscent of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade and a style that some might liken to Inglourious Basterds, Kurosawa’s samurai films, and any number of action classics, and the plot comes together in way that offers the grim satisfaction of a le Carre adaptation – all touches that action movie (whether from western, Asian, or Korean filmmakers) connoisseurs will savor.

CONCLUSION: Assassination is a must-see Korean action film with the intense fight scenes, socio-political drama, throw-back aesthetics and gunshot wounds to make for an edge-of-your-seat ride through its uniquely serpentine plot.

A-

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