The story of resistance fighter Ahn Jung-geun (Hyun Bin), and his plan to assassinate Resident-General Itō Hirobumi (Lily Franky), the Japanese governor of occupied Korea.
Set against the Korean resistance to Japanese occupation, Harbin was mMade before the recent impeachment, but feels charged with a nationalistic pride in the indefatigability of the Korean people against oppression.
While elements of the film play with genre, particularly the thriller, its focus is not what you would expect.
The film’s most unique feature is that it is centred around a central character who is faulted for his empathy.
That embrace of empathy and belief in people is the film’s guiding star.
There are only a few action sequences, but the film is less concerned with using these scenes to create a sense of excitement.
The opening sequence foregrounds the inhumanity and horror of combat. The battle turns into bodies writhing about in mud, their uniforms completely obscured, rendering them indistinguishable from each other. There is no sense of glory here.
That scene is the only time our protagonists are shown in victory. The later setpieces (the fight on the train, the ambush at the safehouse) are essentially escapes from danger.
Our hero’s greatest strength - his belief in people - is framed as a weakness. In a world where anyone can turn out to be a traitor he is a liability.
That theme of radical empathy is an interesting idea for what is basically a war movie, but it is somewhat less cathartic in execution.
The film makes a lot of use of flashbacks in its third act, to reveal character motivation, and build a sense of empathy and moral ambiguity, but their inclusion does come off a little clunky, if not a little deflating in terms of maintaining tension.
An enjoyable film, although it feels like its themes are teasing a more interesting one.
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