“A scathing and provocative satire that is unrelenting in its vision.”

“For capitalism, war and peace are business and nothing but business” – Karl Liebknecht

The temptation to begin a discussion on No Other Choice with a quote by one of the many great anti-capitalist thinkers like Karl Marx or Slavoj Žižek is almost too great to not at least acknowledge – but it’s a statement by a lesser-known (but still highly influential) thinker that perhaps best describes the ideas that Park Chan-wook set out to explore in his adaptation of Donald Westlake’s The Ax, one of the most fascinating and outright challenging attempts at capturing the spirit of the modern era. The premise is extraordinarily simple – after being fired from a job he has held for decades, a mild-mannered family man resorts to serial murder, targeting his competitors to ensure that he has a chance to find another job, an extreme measure but one that he finds not only reasonable, but entirely necessary. The novel was previously adapted by Costa-Gavras (to whom Park dedicates the film), and is redefined to reflect both the cultural specificity of the changed setting, and also contemporary perspectives on a subject that has changed remarkably little in the nearly three decades since it was published. The result is a subversive dark comedy that is as unsettling as it is outrageously funny, a return to a style of filmmaking that we have not seen from Park in quite some time. It is a welcome addition to a career that has always been defined by his tendency to march to the beat of his own drum, even when working with pre-existing material, which he reconfigures to reflect his own incredible skill and unique perspective.

Park has had a remarkably diverse career, working in several different genres over the years and infusing his own perspective into each of them. However, he’s proven more than once that satire is one of his specialities, and while most of his films do contain some degree of humour, this is his first explicit comedy in many years. It would have been wildly inappropriate to approach this subject matter in any other way – Westlake’s novel is not only bitingly funny, but has an unusual quality that lends itself to this kind of offbeat dark comedy, where the violence and deep despair present in this story of someone driven to murder for the sake of providing for his family can only be captured through the most uncomfortable, bleak form of black humour, the kind that provokes as much thought as it does existential despair. Much like any effective satire (including those by some of his contemporaries like Bong Joon-ho, whose Parasite kickstarted a recent rise in popularity for these scathing class critiques), No Other Choice is built around taking a simple concept and dissecting it from every conceivable angle – it’s not enough to reiterate that capitalism is a system that oppresses more than it liberates, since that’s been discussed enough already. Instead, it leaps through several ideas that are all marginally related to exploring social structure and the harm it can do when left to its own devices.

However, while the ideas are extremely clear, Park’s own political leanings are kept ambiguous, which is the best possible outcome for this film. No Other Choice benefits from not having an obvious opinion, since it allows the film to be far more interesting and layered, rather than merely an opportunity for an artist to repeat his own personal views. Many themes co-exist with the more obvious discussions around capitalism, which is where this film not only deviates from the original text in terms of setting, but also in how it comments critically on social issues outside economics. Park is as intrigued by the idea of someone being pushed to violence as a result of becoming a victim of an unfair system as he is by the more intimate, domestic side, which was expanded considerably in this version, the home life of the protagonist being as important as his professional pursuits, if not more. The focus here is on exceptionally strong characterisation, which has always been one of the director’s strengths. This allows Park to find the perfect balance between a number of themes, and he’s greatly helped by Lee Byung-hun, whose performance as the down-on-his-luck protagonist anchors the film, giving No Other Choice a powerful perspective and a deep sense of resonance. Both of these are achieved by the director and his star making a concerted effort to avoid cliché, turning You Man-su into a far more complex protagonist than he would have been in the hands of a less-skilled pair of artists.

Park had the responsibility to not only adapt this novel to a new context but to do so in a way that felt fresh and original, something that he achieves primarily through certain narrative and directorial decisions. The film plays like any other social satire – a recognisable scenario that gradually erodes into chaos as a result of certain events that drive the protagonist to the brink of madness, the tone oscillating between irreverent and bleak depending on the scene. The filmmaking itself is extremely impressive – clean, clear-cut cinematography coupled with visually striking production design (the home that is central to the narrative becomes a character all on its own, something that is common in many similarly themed works), establishing a clear setting without needing to spend too much time emphasising its importance. Each decision made in bringing this story to life is logical, and despite running a lengthy 140 minutes, No Other Choice moves at a rapid pace, primarily because there is very little time wasted on trivial matters. The structure is clear and well-conceived, getting from one elaborate setpiece to another without wasting an instant of time, which seems like a rare occurrence for a genre that sometimes lends itself to more bloated, indulgent techniques. Perhaps it’s too on the nose to refer to the filmmaking as being economical, but it’s certainly an appropriate description, with the purposefulness of the direction matched beautifully by the underlying themes that make No Other Choice so incredibly compelling.

No Other Choice is perhaps Park’s best film in over a decade, a scathing and provocative satire that is unrelenting in its vision and deeply unsettling in how it not only holds up a mirror to contemporary society, but also places the viewer in the precarious position of having to make a choice between two options. One is laughing at the absurdity of a reality we can all recognise. The other is being plunged into a state of existential dread at the realisation that this film speaks truths none of us are willing to admit are deeply resonant. The refusal to either justify or vilify the protagonist’s actions allows the film to dwell on a kind of moral ambiguity that immediately makes it far more interesting, the deconstruction of the characters and their actions creating a fascinating subversion of common themes. A film that Park had been developing for over two decades, No Other Choice exudes the energy of a true passion project, crafted from a deep fascination and extreme incredulity towards social structure and oppressive institutions, systems that claim to be for the good of the people, but have no reluctance in exploiting them for their own gain. In the process, we find that it playfully subverts expectations through redefining common themes and introducing new ideas into an ongoing conversation that Park certainly does not claim to resolve, but is more than willing to contribute his own delightfully demented perspective.