‘Kill Boksoon Review: A Stylish But Airless Korean Hitwoman Saga That Proves Theres No Rest For The ‘Wickesque

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As we all know, the modern assassin is under tremendous pressure to have it all: an executive job at a prestigious assassination firm, a muscular young lover, a colorful gallery of killer friends to chew on. , a house with a greenhouse, a bright wardrobe and a healthy relationship with a teenage daughter who reluctantly comes out as gay. Writer-director Byun Sung-hyun explores these very relatable themes with verve, if not certain originality. What could be the Korean little sister of the John Wick franchise combined with A Long Kiss Goodnight, Netflix's Kill Bucksun is a silly, flashy, CG-assisted and even silly 2 hours and 17 minutes. . But it has glimpses of strange appeal for a film whose philosophy is "if you're going to die a natural death, you might as well be alive."

This pearl of wisdom is dropped by Gil Buxon (Jung Do-yeon, superb in a very different role from Lee Chang-dong's Secret Sunshine, which won her Best Actress at Cannes) as she prepares to tattoo a yakuza thug. Baeksun is the mother and super-assassin of Jae-young (Kim Si-ah), a 40-year-old slob (Kim Si-ah), the top employee of MK Enterprise, an assassination organization run by the ruthless and loveless Cha (Sul Kyung-gu ) and his cunning, perverted and bloodthirsty sister of Min-kyu (Esom). Less important than who killed the yakuza boy is the baroque and ritualistic manner in which Buxon takes him out, first handing the unarmed man a sword for self-defense and then picking up a cheap ax to improve his home. During the ensuing grind, he often laughs at his or his opponent's particularly accurate moves. She is a woman who loves her work.

The best and worst of the movie is on sale now. Cho Hyun-rae's slick and deft cinematography makes the brutal action feel fluid and engrossing, sometimes reflecting it through the reflection of a pond or the shutter movement of a passing train. We see the various outcomes of the battle, only to step back and realize that Baksun was running through possible scenarios in his head; Bayun then theorizes that Baksun is dying several times without necessarily killing him.

But he also fights quite easily. CG blood sprays cleanly into the air, at worst, the missed burst lands neatly on Baksan's high cheekbones. The music plays by the numbers, synthesizing a tension that never feels quite natural. And the settings can be very ordinary: the first encounter is in a closed section of a partially built highway, a place so anonymous that one wonders if it was a dream, a video game, or a video game.

The physics of the fight are unpredictable, not a single moment of contact occurs (Jeong Do-yeon is a great performer, but there isn't much power behind his punches). But it doesn't matter that hundreds of such moves are combined in each fight. It's a school of fight choreography that pits quantity over quality, and that extends to CG, which is used not only to enhance blood splatter, but also for exhibitionist and impossible camera moves, such as when a target walks through a closed door. A few times, just because he could.

All of this serves to further distance "Kill Boxun" from any sense of reality. Despite a plot about a dastardly local politician, Baksun never makes much sense to interact with the civilian world. Even the messy and contrived central fight, when his fellow assassins are attacked by a jealous Min-kyu, takes place in a restaurant where of course no one but them eats, so none of the passers-by are in danger of a quick barbecue. . Hanging blades, pots of boiling oil or deadly rods.

It's a shame, because on the rare occasions when the film explores the irony of Baksan's divided existence, it manages to inject some sharp black humor. At lunch Boksun, dressed in pink Chanel with other school mothers, has her boyfriend on the balcony overlooking the observation pyramids on the hill, hiding behind a respectful smile and a plate of cake, thinking about her last "holiday". Or another flashback, the new student killer Box playing on the "This Guy's in Love With You" soundtrack gleefully poses against the convulsing, dying silhouette of his brutal father. Or Buxon has a heart-to-heart with her boyfriend (Koo Kyo-hwan) as she walks around with her shoes on trying to fake a crime scene. Strange moments like these ultimately hint at something more than the film: Kill Boxson, like its heroine, learns that there's more to life than acting at peak skill.

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