All the President's Men (and Women)

Regular readers of this site might recall how Im Sang-soo's last film, 2003's A Good Lawyer's Wife, reduced Filmbrain to a bowl of quivering, whimpering jelly. It's an incredibly powerful film that still manages to leave him weak in the knees, even after multiple viewings (and there have been many!) Naturally then, it was with great anticipation that Filmbrain awaited Im's follow-up. Well, it's arrived, and has turned out to be one of the most controversial films out of South Korea in some time -- a political satire that easily ranks among the best of the genre. The President's Last Bang is an unabashedly leftist take on a dark period in Korea's history. Set (almost) entirely on the day of President Park Chung Hee's assassination in 1979, the film is an out and out attack on his regime, and paints the former president as a drunken lech with an unhealthy obsession with the Japanese. A (very) brief bit of history: the eighteen years of Parks's military dictatorship was a period where the rich got richer (especially corporations) and human rights violations soared. Torture was not uncommon, and it was all done in the name of fighting communism. Horrible labor laws were enacted that resulted in a large percentage of the population earning sub-standard wages, and corruption abounded in all areas of the regime. In 1979, Kim Jae-kyu, the head of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency (KCIA), assassinated President Park in order to "restore liberal democracy without any self-interest or desire to seize power." (Quote taken from his trial.) The film was somewhat of a scandal in Korea, and in an unprecedented move (in recent years, at least) Im was forced by the courts to remove documentary footage that bookended the film, with their rationale being that people might not be able to discern truth from fiction. (Park's son was instrumental in having the footage removed.) It was responsible for opening up old debates and arguments between the right wing, who view Park as a hero who successfully fought Communism and created an economic miracle, and the left who cite the nearly endless civil- and human-rights violations that took place while he was in power. Yet if you put politics aside for a moment and consider The President's Last Bang simply as film qua film, you're left with an almost flawless work -- one where every element comes together in a cinematic harmony that is all too rare. From Kim Woo-hyeong's cinematography, with its warm brown tones and breathtaking tracking shots, to Kim Hong-jib's lush score, which sounds like a cross between Astor Piazzolla and Ryuichi Sakamoto, the film is a feast for the eyes and ears. Im once again proves that he is a tremendous director of actors, and the performance by Baek Yun-shik as KCIA Director Kim (recently seen as the abducted and tortured businessman in Save the Green Planet) is every bit as remarkable as Moon So-ri's in A Good Lawyer's Wife. Told primarily from his perspective, we sense his weariness from the opening moments, but Im portrays him neither as hero nor brilliant political strategist -- his decision to kill Park is a spur-of-the-moment decision (and one of the film's funnier moments) and his slow burn up to that point is a wonder to behold. One memorable scene has Kim sitting in the garden of the President's pleasure palace at sunset, quietly having tea as he hears of a plan to raze the universities in order to quell the student uprisings. The beauty and serenity of the scene contrasted with the flippancy of the minister who champions the idea is the kind of absurdity found throughout the film. Im's magnificent screenplay also includes some richly developed supporting characters, including a tough-talking, gum-chewing KCIA agent (Shiri's Han Suk-gyu, in perhaps his best performance), a thug for a security chief, and the iconic ever-present, all-seeing and knowing butler. Not simply comic relief or filler, they are all essential elements in re-creating the mad world of the Park regime. The humor is decidedly black, and razor-sharp throughout, but is distributed in very controlled doses, and often arrives at unexpected moments -- during a lengthy tracking shot of people being held in prison cells we see a man being tortured for owning a Picasso (he was a communist after all); or a shot of high-school students wondering if they are allowed to cross the street while the national anthem is playing. However, the controversy surrounding the film has less to do with the humor than it does with the scathing portrayal of Park and his henchmen as degenerates who have nothing but contempt for the average Korean citizen. Most offensive to some was Im's emphasis on Park's adoration of Japan, but there's a great deal of truth to it. Park, who began his military career in the Japanese army, often spoke Japanese, and fancied himself a modern-day samurai. He worshiped the Meiji era, and on the night of the assassination, he is shown getting drunk with a few of his ministers and two young actresses, one of whom specializes in singing Japanese enka. Im skillfully frames most of this sequence like something out of a period Kurosawa film -- plenty of low angles and wide, centered shots through doorways. The second half of the film concerns the events that take place after the assassination, and it is here that the film begins to resemble a more classic political satire, though it's no less perfect than everything that comes before it. Amidst the chaos of those first few hours after the assassination, the focus still remains on Kim, though Im isn't interested in romanticizing the character, nor does he pour on the adulation. (Kim had plenty of blood on his hands even before the assassination.) Instead, he becomes a somewhat tragic anti-hero, and the film's rather abrupt ending avoids any attempt at interpretation. At the same time, the farcical nature of the film provides Im with a certain distance from the actual events. One of the few films to already grace Filmbrain's "Best of 2005" list, The President's Last Bang is a triumph of acting and directing that allows Im Sang-soo to rub shoulders with the likes of Kubrick, Mamet and Altman, and a cutting satire that works even if one is limited to a rudimentary understanding of the events portrayed. Filmbrain can only pray that this finds US distribution, but it seems unlikely.

Comments

[Darcy]

Hi Filmbrain,

Loved your review. Just thought you'd be interested to know that the NY-based distributor Kino International has picked up this film. They're apparently planning a release in October of this year.

--Darcy

[Pingae]

Filmbrain,

Park was not a corporate pawn. The first thing he did when he took control was throw Korea's top corporate chieftans in jail. He gave the orders. He made them reinvest their profits in infrastructe -- at gunpoint.

While Park enjoyed a good scotch and a lady of the evening (he was a Korean man after all), he did not have the tacky tastes of most dictators. He lived in relatively humble quarters and preferred home style Korean food to filet mignon.

Yes, he was iron-fisted with unions. He did not want wildcat strikes messin' with his foreign capital. But Korean wages rose ten-fold during his reign. Korea's GDP was lower than that of Ghana when he took over from a corrupt pawn. He laid the foundations and built the infrastructure that allowed Korea to become the very wealthy country that it is as we speak. At last count the 13th economy in the world and climbing.

The left in Korea is very xenophobic and socially conservative. They paint their enemies as foreigner-lovers and libertines and thus tainted. Park was evil and he liked Japan. He liked Japan and he was evil. He was evil so he liked Japan. What is the message of this movie?

Park was probably not a great man. But I am sure that few third nations would turn down a leader like him. Park promised Korea he would develop the country. He kept his promise. For that he deserves a modicum of respect. Or at very least, a more balanced movie than this piece of garbage, which Koreans wanted nothing to do with.

[Dan Dredger]

In your review of 'A Good Lawyer's Wife' you said, 'The opening scene of the lawyer ("Good" due to his genuine concern for his clients) moving the carcass of a large dead dog blocking the motorway works not only as metaphor'...

I'm curious about how it works as a metaphor? I guess I just don't see it, but I'd really appreciate hearing your thoughts. Thanks. I, too, love the film, though much of the subtext is lost on me.

[Filmbrain]

Pingae --

I'm certainly no expert on Park, but I've read in several recent articles that his labor practices drove a tremendous number of people into poverty.

As for his obsession with Japan, given the history between the two nations I think you're white-washing it a bit by saying he simply "liked" Japan.

Lady of the evening? Didn't he have taxpayers pay for "Security House" which was little more than a brothel?

And are you speaking for all Koreans when you say they wanted nothing to do with the film? In the first two weeks of its release there were 1,058,000 admissions.

As for the message of the movie -- have you seen it?

Park may have turned Korea around, but at what cost? Do you approve of his decision to take compensation funds from the Japanese that were intended for victims and use them on infrastructure projects? Is the quashing of all dissent and use of torture justified in order to create an economic miracle? Perhaps we disagree on these points?

[Filmbrain]

Dan --

I don't want to go into too much detail here for it would give too much of the film away. The dead animal on the road, blocking his car, is a domestic animal, not wild. The combination of death and domesticity (both literal and figurative) runs through the whole film. (Not to mention a later road incident that will have an unforeseen result.)

Then there is the simple humor of the scene -- a man who is having an affair calls his wife to say he'll be late because of a dead animal in the road -- a clever excuse that just happens to be the truth.

[Adam]

FilmBrain,

In case you weren't aware, Koreanfilm.org just posted an interview with IM Sang-soo that Italian critic Paolo Bertolin did at Cannes - http://www.koreanfilm.org/imss.html

Adam

[Filmbrain]

Thanks for that Adam. Very interesting interview.

And Darcy, thanks also for the comment, and the wonderful news about Kino.

[Jolla]

You seemed to have forgotten to mention that Park Chung Hee's son was and probably still is a druggie with a smack habit in the land of a drunkers.

[nkw88]

SHIN Sang-Ok's 'Cheung-On The Testament'(1994) may be helpful to understand the Park Regime.
It may be unavailable in North America.
The film, which is actually Shin's personal filmic vengeance to Park, showed the process of
corruption of his regime.

[nkw88]

Sorry, It's not 'Cheung-on the Testament' but 'Cheung-bal The Missing'.

[Ed]

What ever happened to Erzsebet Foldi? I guess that's for her to know and for us to find out! Her performance in "JAZZ" was spectacular!