An elegant noir about a detective who falls in love with the suspect: Park Chan-wook’s melancholic, sensual film received the Best Director award at the 75th Cannes Film Festival.
An amateur climber has fallen off a cliff and is found dead. Was it an accident, suicide or murder? Detective Hae-jun (Park Hae-il) comes from Busan to investigate the case and suspects the wife of the climber, Song Seo-rae, an immigrant from China who does not seem to grieve her loss. The sullen and diligent Hae-jun starts tailing Seo-rae, but falls in love with her while trying to solve the mystery. Will he want and be able to get out of the trap of desire?
Structurally, Decision to Leave is composed of two parts: the first explores the investigation of a mysterious death, the second is a noir following a femme fatale. Both mysteries are for Hae-jun to solve. The conscientious police officer, who is also married, has more than one reason to fight his infatuation with Seo-rae. Park Chan-wook’s main focus in the film is on how his protagonists love, how vulnerable their feelings make them, and how shattering their realization of their vulnerability can be. The tension between the characters is conveyed without a single scene of intimacy: the story of desire is told through their eyes, which sometimes meet and sometimes don’t.
Decision to Leave
Director: Park Chan-wook
South Korea, 2022, 138 min
18+