The Front Line
Owing largely to the fact that the tension
never really dissipated between North and South Korea following their
three years of bloody conflict (1950-1953), the Korean War continues to
exert a singular fascination on the South Korean psyche. To this day
the US military maintains a controversial presence in the border region,
all South Korean males are required to undergo two years of military
service and the intermittent threat of invasion from the nuclear
barbarians of the North has given rise to numerous bouts of panic and
fearmongering over the past six decades.
The latest Korean film to mine this
ever-popular thematic territory, The Front Line is an unashamed
epic of Saving Private Ryan proportions that is proud of both its
scope and bombast: in lieu of a tagline, the box cover simply states:
’45,000 bullets fired. 14,000 actors. 150 Stunt People. 24, 000
explosions.’ Enough said, in my book: I’m not sure how many explosions
were in JSA and Brotherhood, but I bet it was way less
than 24,000.
Whilst not quite as beguiling and
emotionally charged as those two films, owing largely to the lack of the
inimitable Song Kang-ho and a preponderance of the stock characters
(prankster, loose cannon, grizzled old timer, brash upstart etc) without
which no war epic would be complete, The Front Line is still a
remarkably accomplished and hugely ambitious exploration of this
singularly calamitous era. It’s also been remarkably well-received both
at home and abroad, winning Best Picture at Korea’s version of the
Oscars, the Grand Bell Awards, and garnering almost unanimous praise
from foreign critics.
The storyline is simple, and like Joint
Security Area takes a single incident - in this case the capture of
a strategically unimportant hill that will later be used to indicate the
demarcation line between the two nations - and uses it as a symbol for
the entire war. The performances, if not the characterisations
themselves, are almost uniformly strong, and the literally (and
liberally) explosive battle sequences begin a mere 8 minutes in,
director Jang Hun evidently having learnt from Spielberg not to faff
around with too much in the way of exposition. It’s a worthwhile
entrant into the canon of great Korean war movies, and a potent,
pointedly dramatic one at that.
Bonus Features
A fairly detailed and enjoyable Making Of
Featurette, a Highlight Reel, and several Trailers.
