NO OTHER CHOICE is a refrain that will echo throughout Park Chan-wook’s film of the same name. It is more than just the desperation of a man fired from his job overseeing the manufacture of specialty papers at a paper mill. That is merely the framework for Park to contemplate the changing economy, the difference between a job and a profession, and the relative morality of putting those you love most ahead of everything and everyone else. It makes for an acidic black comedy and deft social satire that defiantly goes in unexpected ways as it never quite lets you make up your mind about the relative morality on display.
Our hero is Man-Su (Lee Byung-hun), a man who sees the writing on the wall when his paper company is purchased by an American conglomerate. By the time he tries to unionize his workers, it’s too late, and the prospect of losing his cushy upper-middle class life looms as his sensible wife Miri (Son Ye-jin) puts the family on a strict budget that sees their Netflix subscription being cancelled, and the family’s two beloved dogs farmed out to allergic in-laws to save on kibble. Racing against a foreclosure of the home in which he was born, a tooth that requires dental intervention, and securing the expensive music teacher who can guide his daughter, a 10-year-old prodigy cello player into a life of independent despite her autism, Man, ahem, has no other choice but to do whatever it takes to find a job that will pay the bills after 13 months of unemployment. And whatever it takes involves murder.
It’s a flippant joke by his wife that sets him on his path of solvency by any means necessary. Instead of hoping for a freak accident, though, to take out his competition for a job, Man devises a plan to do the job right. He doesn’t aim for a subordinate’s position, but rather for a managerial post already filled. Getting there will require the initiative of Richard III setting his sights on the English crown, and twice the ruthlessness. With, further ahem, no other choice to save his family, he quietly draws up a list of competitors for that job and, with an ingenious plan, sets about picking them off one by one before the coup de grâce that will land him that managerial job and restore his status quo. There are a few problems, of course, not the least of which being Man’s highly developed empathy, which no good serial killer should have, and the instincts, but not the stomach, for getting the job done.
Son is perfectly cast as the hapless breadwinner. With a face that is impassive but infinitely expressive, he evokes Buster Keaton as he negotiates the absurdity and pathos of Man’s machinations while keeping his beloved wife in the dark about his peculiar hours. It’s a thespian gift that offsets the story’s moral ambiguity in a way that a cold-blooded killer couldn’t and also provides the comic relief required to make us both gasp and guffaw. The way his face subtly changes after that flippancy from his wife speaks volumes about the revelation and the paradigm shift Man undergoes. It’s a small moment, but lands like a clap of thunder.
The story unfolds with sharp direction and slick editing. The vein throbbing on Man’s forehead during an interview that is not going well, the intercutting between a crime-in-progress and one about to be literally uncovered, even the classic grab for a gun becomes a tilt-a-whirl of cross-cutting that is both slapstick and terrifying. Park even makes a large glass of beer a harbinger of doom with a close-up and an extreme Dutching that mirrors Man’s paradigm shift, and all coupled with sound design that is naturalistic and yet also the sound of catastrophe. Moments merge and the difference between reality and fever dream occasionally dissolves leaving us breathless, confused, yet totally engrossed.
The writing is deadly. Suspicions boil into a fierce argument, the kind that kills relationships, between Man and Miri boiling down to how attractive they each are and how much they love one another. Victims provoke almost insurmountable sympathy, but not quite enough to deter Man from his mission, only make the struggle to persevere more intense. Yet, it’s more than enough to give us pause as this nice guy with an unfortunate sense of humor perseveres with a drive that is, in and of itself, somehow admirable. In fact, it is the ingenuity and initiative that any forward-thinking corporation would cherish, which begs the question of what it means to work in that culture.
NO OTHER CHOICE finishes up not with a tidy ending, but one that pricks not just at our conscience, but also long-term rewards of Man’s adventures. Security may be a pipe dream, but whether it is worth the struggle, and the body count, is not something Park answers directly. Park gives us a Rorschach Test, making us walk on a razor’s edge as he considers the question of how to live an ethical life in an unethical world. Or worse, a world that is indifferent one way or the other.
Your Thoughts?