Directed by: Yun Je-gu (윤재구) Starring: Cha Seung-won (차승원), Song Yoon-ah (송윤아), Ryu Seung-ryong (류승룡), Kim In-kwon (김인권), Park Won-sang (박원상), Oh Jung-se (오정세) Release Date: December 3rd, 2009
I love a dark and dingy Korean crime noir with gangster & thriller elements. They’re chock-full of the right kind of shady characters shadowy environments that make for some of the most hair-raising and immersive experiences cinema can offer. From Oldboy (2003) and I Saw the Devil (2010) to A Bittersweet Life (2005) and The Man From Nowhere (2010), I would only be beating a dead horse at this point to go on about how Korean cinema has carved out a uniquely bleak and unforgiving yet stylish and engaging area of the world cinema landscape for itself. One such film, Secret, while it may not be a leading representative of the genre, stands out for its clever writing, intriguing performances, and superb cinematography by Lee Seong-je (The Chaser, The Yellow Sea) that perfectly encapsulates the essence of the Korean thriller.
After losing their daughter in a horrific car crash, homicide Detective Kim Sung-yeol (Cha Seung-won) and his wife Ji-yeon (Song Yoon-ah) have being going through a rough patch to put it lightly. With Sung-yeol having been at the wheel on that fateful day, Ji-yeon not only blames him for the accident, but suspects her husband to be keeping disturbing secrets about the events of that day to himself.
One day, a mysterious man who was taken to the hospital after being critically injured in a car accident is found with the photo and business card of Detective Sung-yeol (Cha Seung-won) in his wallet. When Sung-yeol arrives for questioning, he’s frightened by the injured man’s dying words—claiming to be a hitman and knowing intimate details about the detective’s private life. But before the injured man is able to confess his final assignment, he passes out and gets carried away for treatment.
Meanwhile, back at the precinct, Detective Choi (Park Won-sang), rejoins the force after his two year suspension for firing his weapon and killing a suspected rapist and murderer during a detainment. His return reignites a long held rivalry with Detective Sung-yeol, now more soured than ever after Sung-yeol came forward as the key witness leading to Choi’s suspension. When the latest call comes in summoning the detectives to examine the scene of a homicide, Sung-yeol immediately begins to see clues of his wife having been at the scene. In a panic to protect her, Sung-yeol makes an effort to conceal the evidence that would point towards her.
Further complicating matters, the victim’s brother, a feared and eccentric local gang boss named Jackal (Ryu Seung-ryong), vows to catch the murderer before the police in order to enact his own sense of justice. As the evidence trail gets hotter and hotter as it leads towards Sang-yeol’s wife, Sang-yeol takes drastic measures to redirect the investigation down false leads while he gets to the bottom of the matter between his wife and himself. But when his wife goes into seclusion and refuses to speak of her involvement, Sang-yeol puts it all on the line as solving the case will require him to crack open a dark cloud of secrets that when burst, will alter the course his life forever.
A film like Secret would not work without the power of its secrets, and the potential for their explosiveness if revealed. To the film’s credit, director Yun Je-gu crafts an intricate and clever enough script so that the secrets in Secret carry just enough weight to drive the film steadily forward towards its eventual devastating collision course with the truth. And the lasting power of Secret can be measured in just how impactful the severity of the wreckage caused by the big reveals in the climax is.
Both Sang-yeol and his wife have dark secrets they keep from one another. With Sang-yeol’s secret unable to remain buried in the past, his neglect to come clean with his wife on the circumstances surrounding the accident leading to their daughter’s death has festered for far too long. Now, with a poisonous cloud of uncertainty and doubt surrounding their marriage, Sang-yeol’s wife Ji-yeon spawns a sinister secret of her own. As the audience will quickly learn the secret that haunts Sang-yeol, Ji-yeon’s secret remains withheld until late into the third act. This makes her character extremely ambiguous and she fuels the mystery of the investigation as to why she was at the scene of a murder.
Ji-yeon remains emotionally distant from her husband since the death of their daugther, but as a character, she is written to be almost too much in the shadows. With minimal amounts of both dialogue and screen time, I wanted more from the character as well as the performance by Song Yoon-ah (Wedding Dress, Arang). According to the special features on the DVD, the filmmakers did end up cutting at least two scenes of her character meeting with a therapist to discuss the marriage and their daughter’s death. If these scenes had been left in, they may have helped fill this gap of wanting more from the character. But with Secret already clocking in at runtime of 110 minutes, the filmmakers ultimately decided to scrap these scenes out of pacing considerations.
Cha Seung-won (Night in Paradise, Man on High Heels) delivers a solid performance in the role of the hardened detective, Sang-yeol. It’s one of those roles that make it difficult to generate sympathy for since the character’s actions are so wrong at almost every step. Whether he’s tampering with evidence, knowingly putting an innocent man in jail, his extra marital affair, or selfishly pursuing the case on his own, Sang-yeol is a flawed character to say the least. But he is written to have his heart in the right place. He still wants wants best for his wife, regardless of what he’s put her through, and there is a small sense that he wants to right his wrongs. As a character, Sang-yeol is given some of the best opportunities for development but it still feels lacking at times with some rushed fades to black during key scenes.
I personally enjoyed the scenes where Sang-yeol goes out of his way to do something nice for someone else. Like when he brings a cake to the mother of the innocent man he knowingly put behind bars to protect his wife. SPOILER: There is another important scene that was cut according to the deleted scenes on the DVD that saw Sang-yeol attend the funeral of the same man who is killed later on. There, he talks with the mother who actually gives him the key to the locker where the bag of drugs is being kept. This scene was well done and even the director says during the commentary that he kind of regretted doing away with it. Without this scene, it is somewhat unclear as to how Sang-yeol attains the key.
With all the different groups after closing in on Sang-yeol by the climax in Secret, I didnt feel the pressure ramp up as much as I would have hoped for though. But Secret entertainingly channels its inner A Bittersweet Life (2006) during its explosive finale with a sleek gangster warehouse brawl featuring dozens of men versus a single car. All in all, I believe that the award given to director Yun Je-gyu for his writing (Chunsa Film Festival) on Secret was very well deserved. Especially after seeing his latest work Perfect Proposal (2015), there is an admirable quality to the complexity of the premises he comes up with as well as the layers in which he conceals various twists and character motivations that can’t help but be admired.
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