'Decision To Leave' Review: One Of 2022's Most Impressive Thrillers Is Also Its Most Intoxicating Romance

TEXAS, USA. In a movie with enough stunning visual ingenuity to fuel a college course, one shot serves as the most elegant and compelling exposition of the conflict at the heart of Park Chan Wook's latest crazy film, Deciding to Break. . We look at the suspicious face of Detective Jang Hae Joon (Park Hae Il) behind his phone screen, a text invitation from the women suspected of her husband's death who are in the opposite perspective as everyone else. Lance He Zhong learned to see through the world.

Although the audience has not been in this world for a very long time, our foothold has become so fragile that their performance is controlled. When Hae Joon is called in to find the killer of a mountaineer who mysteriously fell to his death, common sense leads him to the victim's wife, Song Seo Rae (Tang Wei), whose history of abusing her dead husband brings her in for questioning. room. .

So far, humor aside, the procedural police thrive on the first date when Hae Joong orders expensive sushi for the two of them, and sunlight pours over the police station. It turns out that hearts don't close as easily as things do, and soon Seo-Rae becomes the object of passion and mistrust.

Such complications become for Park a place where the sensuality of a blossoming romance with dazzling formal goals is contrasted with the stoicism of police work. Hae Joon immediately spots Seo Rae under the cover of night; the next day, he appears to be in the same room as her, a clever sequence that emphasizes the contemplative basis of the work. The camera itself has its own personality; Worn by Kim Ji Yong, it finds those lewd angles from which we only notice the couple sneaking glances and absorbing each other's desire in situations that require both to stand upright.

Paradox makes the opening scenes both sexy and hilarious, with an energy of desire not balanced by Puck's mischievous tendency to find play in every scene. The decision to leave then takes an existential twist, focusing on the heated race between practicality and emotion that makes up the worst dilemmas that await them in Park and Jung So Kyung's story, which is actually two murder investigations and more serious twists and turns. self-blame

Turning out to be more grand than terrifying, this first This Park movie might seem counterintuitive given that the Korean director has been building a legacy in his blood since the early 2000s before cementing it with 2016's delicious twists. Virgo". By comparison, The Decision to Leave has little gore and pretzel plot. But by choosing to craft a story in the typically virtuous spirit of his craft, Park embraces the crazy emotions we expect from his films and infuses The Decision to Leave with a dark heart that awakens in him hopes for himself.

It is also argued that while we see a generally credible researcher dismiss his instincts, Park does not let go of his fascination with gender structures or his desire to dispel them. Whether or not The Decision to Leave can be seen primarily as a detective-procedure film or a doomsday novel, it harks back to a more classic film era, when clueless leads were new and obsessions were the most destructive of all. movies . Required. Set in the blue-green urban area of ​​Korea, you'd think Seo-rae and Hae-joon's romance would be doomed before their paths even crossed.

The drama “Decision to Leave,” really its suspense and comedy, thrives as he watches Seo Rae tie up Hae Joon repeatedly and wonders just how consciously he rejects his nature for the woman he loves and never notices. Each exchange of messages and lingering glances is a new crack in his hardened identity as a brilliant young detective, content with what his wife has been hiding for a long time without explaining why. For his part, Seo Rae for Hae Joon is not just an object that reflects his desire, but a character that prevents it from breaking. He may act out of selfishness, but can't the same be said for criminals and lovers?

If crime stories distract us from hope for a worthy solution, The Decision to Quit draws its luster (and angst) from the persistence of ambiguity in an increasingly desperate second half. . so deep that it seems that it can only come from pure intentions. This is partly due to the magnetic work of Puck and Tang, who are tasked with playing characters experiencing the first wish and disorientation of an unresolved story. Like Paul Thomas Anderson and Quentin Tarantino, Park is a master at getting his actors to get the right kind of breakthrough, as well as making them feel in tune with the mood he creates...however crazy it is, it's Mood.

It also comes from the clear focus of Pak's storytelling. It's not a time travel movie, but it's still impressive how The Decision to Leave oscillates between past and present, revealing new details, not revealing what was hidden, but setting up emotional waves to become its own type of magnification. Love is uplifting and turns into The Decision to Leave, so it's easy to forgive a story that may not fit together as well as in The Girl or with the same seismic force. In fact, it's surprisingly fitting for this story; a certain degree of obsession blurs the evidence, and the answers become clear only after the questions are forgotten.

The "decision to exit" is not checked. Stream on MUBI now. Duration: 2 hours 19 minutes.

With Park Hae Il, Tang Wei, Lee Jong Hyun and Go Kyung Pyo

directed by Park Chan-wook; written by Park and Jung So-kyung