The South Korean film universe never ceases to provide surprises with almost every movie I see. ‘Joint Security Area‘ was created by Chan-wook Park in 2000, three years before directing ‘Oldboy‘, the film that made him famous and propelled him to the attention of film viewers and critics around the world. Under the pretext of an investigation into an incident at the armistice line between the two Koreas that resulted in the death of two North Korean soldiers, Chan-wook Park is making a film about the absurdity of war and the brotherhood between soldiers who are apparently dead enemies. good tradition and maybe inspired by classic films like Stanley Kubrick‘s ‘Paths of Glory‘.
The story in the film takes place in the demilitarized zone, one of the most tense places on the planet, a place where the armies of South and North Korea are facing each other, in an uncomfortable armistice of a war suspended over 65 years ago , armistice sprinkled with incidents that sometimes result in victims. But the armies are made up of people, many of them young people sent to do their “patriotic duty” towards the respective countries, and in this case belong to the same people fractured by history. The film describes an unlikely human fraternization that is disapproved and repressed by the superior officers on both sides of the conflict and ignored by the neutral observers whose mission is to prevent incidents and investigate them when they happen. Nobody in this film seems to be interested in revealing the truth about the incident that tragically concludes the micro-coexistence attempt of the soldiers engaged in a macro-conflict. It is an action movie with elements of criminal investigation film, but what remains in the viewers’ minds are the human aspects of the encounter between four young people who refuse to be enemies.
I liked the story and the message, even if some details and even the whole situation are not completely credible. The actors, especially those who play the roles of soldiers, are well-chosen and fit perfectly into the roles. The film suffers from an excess of rhetoric, but the sincerity of approaching such a delicate subject manages to prevail. In 2000, the vision proposed by this film was considered radical by some of the viewers, but it attracted the curiosity of South Korean viewers. In this country ‘Joint Security Area‘ sold more tickets than ‘Titanic‘ and launched the career of one of the most famous South Korean directors! We can understand why.