Each year, the biggest distributors and sales agents out of South Korea secure prominent slots at the Toronto International Film Festival for one or two of their biggest upcoming blockbusters. And even in the context of a huge, celebrity-driven festival like TIFF, fans of Korean popular culture stood out, showing up en masse to get a glimpse of the stars of Kim Sung-soo’s latest crime opus, “Asura: The City of Madness.” The rowdy experience at the historic Elgin Theatre is, in hindsight, oddly appropriate, as the film is as much a centerpiece for its cast as it is a stylistically flamboyant directorial showpiece. While not quite in the league of fellow internationally renowned fellow countrymen Kim Jee-woon and Na Hong-jin, “Asura” is nonetheless an above average, carnage-driven Korean crime drama.
A kind of Korea film noir, Kim’s film follows Detective Han (Jung Woo-sung), a beat cop moonlighting as an enforcer for the crooked Mayor Park Sungbae (Hwang Jun-min), who has ambitious (and lucrative) development plans for the regional city of Annam. Operating counter to the politician are Special Prosecutor Kim Cha-in (Kwak Do-won) and his gruff partner (Jung Man-sik), who coerce Han to help bring down Park. Complicating matters further is neophyte officer Sunmo (Ju Ji-hoon), sent by Han to serve with the mayor in his place and is brought out of his naivety by Park’s bribes and forked tongue. Of course, this is a Korean actioner, and “Asura” is clearly destined to end in an orgy of bloodshed that would make even John Woo wince—in a generally gory TIFF slate, this film still manages to shock.
Hwang Jun-min chews the scenery as irascible Mayor Park, wearing the same permanent grin that served him well in last year’s Korean box-office juggernaut “Veteran” (and further back, Kim Jee-woon’s influential “A Bittersweet Life”). The real scene-stealer of the film, however, is Kwak Do-won, hot off Na’s summer smash “The Wailing.” Kwak’s bumbling performances in these films are reminiscent of the earlier work of global star Sang Kang-ho, a comparison which portends a very bright future for the actor. Female characters are virtually nonexistent; Han’s hospitalized wife is little more than a plot point, exploited as blackmail by both Park and the prosecutors. “Asura” is unabashedly an explosive display of masculinity, and the four principals bounce of each other in exciting ways. Indeed, the inevitable tête-à-tête with the mayor and the prosecutor is reminiscent of the diner scene in “Heat,” even if it spirals out of control from there, and lacks Michael Mann’s rigor.
The most intriguing allusion in the film is the use of Tom Waits’ “Way Down in the Hole” — the theme song for “The Wire” — at two key points. The obvious function of this reference is to overstate “Asura” as a story of corruption that tangle the various facets of society — government, law, media — that occupy each season of the classic HBO series. The first instance plays over an absurd brawl manipulated by the mayor at a public presentation of his plans for Annam. Here Kim tips his hand, acknowledging the influence of and an admiration for “The Wire,” but using the song ironically; where the television show is dead serious and has real-world implications, “Asura” is over-the-top and exists in a decidedly cinematic universe. The film’s press kit makes no claim to real-world references, and the verve of the cinematography (low-key lighting, dutch angles, bold color) suggests that Annam is closer to in spirit to Sin City than Seoul. When the song returns over a montage of revenge killings, the track breaks free of reference and feels far more suited to the playful energy of the film.
Like any self-respecting Korean blockbuster, at almost 140 minutes the film is a good fifteen to twenty minutes too long. The climax at a periphery character’s funeral is dragged out to tedious levels before circling back into thrilling spectacle. Multiplexes in the film’s native country must not be too concerned with squeezing in additional showtimes, and it won’t matter for the film’s Western release, as CJ Entertainment will be releasing “Asura” themselves shortly after its Korean debut in a diaspora-targeted platform program. There are coded aspects to the film that can be perceived as heightened clichés, particularly the fetishization of drug usage and infidelity, which are far more grievous of crimes in South Korea. Alongside this summer’s indie breakouts “The Wailing” and “Train to Busan,” “Asura: The City of Madness” reinforces that sturdy (if not outstanding) Korean genre cinema is a force to be reckoned with. [B]
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