NO OTHER CHOICE Reviewed by GREG KING
Director: Park Chan-wook
Stars: Lee Byung-hun, Son Yi-jin, Kim Woo-seung, Choi So-yui, Lee Sung-min, Yeon Hye-ran.
The latest film from Korean director Park Chan-wook (Oldboy, etc) is a pitch-black comedy that explores themes of corporate greed, dehumanising corporate culture, ambition, tradition, dysfunctional family, masculinity, and unemployment, which give the material a topical relevance. Chan-wook deftly mixes black comedy, violence with domestic drama and bloody murders, and there is some slapstick humour.
Man-su (Lee Byung-hun, who appeared in the director’s action thriller Joint Security Area) has worked with Solar Paper, a papermaking company, for 25 years, but when an American company takes over, he loses his job. His wife Miri (Son Yi-jin) and two children (teenage stepson Si-one and neodivergent young daughter Ri-one) struggle to cope with the sudden loss of income. Miri, who works as a dental assistant, instructs the family to cut back on some luxuries, like tennis lessons and even Netflix.
For thirteen months Man-su tackles a number of low paying menial jobs to try and make ends meet. He hatches a desperate scheme to ensure that he lands a contract with Moon Paper, a new paper company. He sets up a phoney recruitment agency to attract applications from the three other likely applicants so that he can learn personal information about their identity and personality. Then he sets out to kill them, justifying his actions by telling himself that he has “no other choice” if he wants to land the job. But his plan does not always go smoothly.
The film has been adapted from The Ax, a 1997 novel written by American author Donald Westlake (The Hot Rock, etc), about a man on a violent quest to land a new job. The Ax was previously filmed in 2005 by Costas-Gavras, to whom this film is dedicated. Chan-wook cowrote the script with Lee Kyoung-mi (The Truth Beneath, etc) and Jee Ja-hye (a script editor on the director’s 2022 drama Decision To Leave) and David Cronenberg regular collaborator Don McKellar (Crimes Of The Future, etc). The film mixes some gory violence with some madcap moments and deadpan humour. But it is overlong, with several digressions and subplots that distract from the main narrative; especially those stretches of domestic drama which are not as compelling or involving.
The film has been gorgeously shot by cinematographer Kim Woo-hyung (tv series The Little Drummer Girl, etc). It has been tightly edited by Kim Sang-bum and Kim Ho-bin.
Byung-lee gives Man-su a coldness that makes him a less than likeable protagonist and anti-hero.
Chan-wook’s pacing is uneven, and with an overly generous running time of 139 minutes No Other Choice ultimately outstays its welcome.
★★☆
