Asura: The City of Madness

Han Do-kyung is a police officer. He also works for the mayor Park Sung-bae; he gathers evidence, closes cases and is paid for it. His wife is ill and the treatment is expensive. The prosecutor's office is after the mayor and catches Do-kyung; he will either inform or go to prison. Both sides use him. Do-kyung looks for a way out and puts a young officer in his place. That man enters the same order. Then there is a killing and nobody stays clean. Kim Sung-soo writes and directs. Jung Woo-sung, Hwang Jung-min, Ju Ji-hoon and Kwak Do-won are in the cast. It is a Korean production. The matter it treats is having no way out; the film offers no character a deliverance and shows no good side. The narrative takes the link between local government and crime as a direct subject; the mayor is drawn not as a politician but as the head of a gang. The violent scenes are long and unbroken; the cutting does not hide the blows. Its last section takes place at a funeral and the narrative comes entirely apart there. The mayor played by Hwang Jung-min is what is most cited. The film did not take the expected box office on release and its standing rose later. Its limit is the watching; the narrative is bleak, the violence dense, and none of the characters is likeable. Who it is for: viewers who like Korean crime films and hard narratives of corruption. Who it is not for: the violence is very explicit, there is no hope, and the characters repellent.