No Tears For The Dead(2015)
Writer/Director: Lee Jeong-beom
Starring: Jang Dong-gun(Tae Guk Gi:The Brotherhood, My Way), Kim Hee-won(The Man From Nowhere, Running Turtle, My Way) Kim Min-hee(Helpless), Brian Tee(Fast & Furious: Tokyo Drift, The Wolverine, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2)
"...Please don't cry. Don't you cry, Jin-gon."
Last year my friend linked me to the trailer for this movie because he knew how big a fan I am of Lee Jeong-beom's The Man From Nowhere. I was super excited, but after seeing some early reviews that were unfavorable my anticipation kind of died down. I recently decided to give it another chance.
The story is pretty straight forward. It's about a hitman, Gon(Jang Dong-gun), born in South Korea, raised in the U.S. who botches up a job by a kid by killing a kid. He decides to retire, but his boss sends him to South Korea for one last job which turns out being the kid's mother, Mo-kyeong(Kim Min-hee). There's a reason why, but that's spoiler territory + I didn't really care for the rest of that story. And that's not me being an action whore it's just that it's not that interesting of a sub-plot. Once Gon gets to S. Korea he meets his liaison(Hee-won) to get info on the target and starts on recon. When he meets his liaison he curses him out and I didn't notice this until later, but this movie is really vulgar film. That's not a complaint, it's just that it's was so over-the-top I found it funny.
This is definitely a thriller, but not entirely. At times t's morose enough to pass for a drama alone. For a good third of the film Gon spends a lot of time sulking or stalking the mother and not killing her. On top of that we see Mo-kyeong's side of it with her grieving over the death of her child. She doesn't say it explicitly, but you can tell she blames herself. It's weird connection the two have. Gon's mother abandoned him as a child, Mo-Kyeong in a way feels like she abandoned her child. It's not unusual for an action-thriller to have some plot-foddering melodrama, but that's not the case here. It's genuine emotion and the acting is brilliant. One thing I've always noticed in Korean cinema is the balance of thrill and drama. What's unfortunate is that here the balance is achieved by mucking up the film's pace as a thriller.
When Gon stops sulking and finally goes to kill Mo-Kyeong he stumbles onto her attempting suicide and actually saves her after he tells her about his mother abandoning him. He's not a good guy at all and they don't try make him one at any point. So why he saves her after connecting her attempted suicide to his mother leaving him is kind of an oddity in his character arch, but not a big deal really. After Gon saves Mo-Kyeong, his boss back in the states decides to send another one of his men, Chaoz(Tee) whose life Gon once saved, to finish off the target and take Gon out. Finally all hell breaks loose. High volume shootouts. Though the camerawork is a bit erratic at times during, the hand-to-hand combat/knife fights are well choreographed. It's almost non-stop action brimming with blood and bullets. There's a moment amid all the action where Chaoz & Gon come face-to-face, Chaoz asks Gon why he's doing what he's doing and it's a very slight scene, but Tee plays it so well. You instantly feel the connection between the two, a bromance akin to something out of a John Woo movie that later leads to a very visceral final fight between the two.
The film's climax is more emotionally charged than what you're ready for and it comes to an extremely sad conclusion, but in a good way. It's a bittersweet ending that perfectly caps off the film's motif. It's easy to get caught up in the blood soaked goodness of the action once it takes place, but this is more a dramatic story of redemption for a hitman who's dead inside and finds a release through unfortunate means. It's toted as an action-thriller, but to me the plot and action takes a backseat emotional aspect of the film. It's not as good as The Man From Nowhere, but not bad at all. Worth the watch, just manage your expectations going in.
On Netflix instant now
