The President's Last Bang
Director: Im Sang-soo
Year: 2005
Production Company: MK Pictures
Running Time: 104 minutes
In 1961 Colonel Park Chung-hee led a coup to overthrow the civilian
government in Korea and installed himself as the ruler for the next 18 years.
Earlier in his career he had graduated from a Japanese military academy in
Manchuria and had fought in their army against the Chinese. After the war
he joined leftist elements that were fomenting rebellion, but after being
caught he ratted out his colleagues and was allowed to stay in the military.
After the coup, he was coerced by the U.S. government into re-introducing
democracy and was elected in 1963. During his years in power Korea began
its dynamic economic growth as a major exporter of goods – but he also clamped
down heavily on personal freedom with brutal methods that led to a growing
protest movement among the youth. In 1979 he was shockingly assassinated
by his own director, Kim Jaegyu, of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency.
This film is about that assassination.
The director received a fair amount of flack for his portrayal of Park –
not so much for recounting his repressive tendencies but rather for his sexual
proclivities, his fondness for all things Japanese (when he established relations
with Japan in the 1960’s it led to rioting in the streets), his opaque dullness
and his questionable intellect. Mind you, this is not a political thriller
– instead it more closely resembles a dark slapstick comedy that chortles
constantly at the characters. Everyone in the film is basically portrayed
as a nitwit and it’s as if The Three Stooges were behind the assassination.
At one point during the assassination the gun jams and the killer has to
run around trying to find another gun to finish the job.
The reasons for the Director of KCIA (Baek Yoon-shik – the CEO in “Save the
Green Planet”) to kill the President (Song Jae-ho) is never coherently addressed
– he simply can’t seem to stand the fellow for his sexual activities, his
height and his annoying personality – and so decides to shoot him at a small
dinner party with the help of two of his men (Han Suk-kyu being one of them
in a marvelously muddle-headed turn). But they haven’t really thought it
out at all and have no plan for the aftermath as they just hope things will
fall happily in place for them. They don’t. I have no idea how accurate or
realistic any of these portrayals are – could idiots like this run a government
(well clearly so with Bush and company) – but either way this film makes
for a fairly amusing and at times outrageous outing that unfortunately rather
fizzles towards the end – but then so did their plot.
Rating: 7.5
Trailer
Reviewed: 01/06
Previous films from Director:
A Good Lawyer’s Wife (2003)
Tears (2000)
Girl’s Night Out (1998)
