A young Korean man surpasses his difficult childhood by becoming a powerful prosecutor, but soon learns that real power comes at a price.
Acting
Zo In-sung's transformation from hungry nobody to hollow somebody.
Direction
Han Jae-rim makes bureaucracy feel like a knife fight.
Editing
That decade-spanning montage hits harder than most action sequences.
Director
Han Jae-rim
Zo In-sung
Park Tae-su
Jung Woo-sung
Han Kang-sik
Bae Sung-woo
Yang Dong-chul
Kim A-joong
Lim Sang-hee
Ryu Jun-yeol
Choi Doo-il
Kim Eui-sung
Kim Eung-su
Jung Eun-chae
Park Si-yeon
Kim So-jin
Ahn Hee-yeon
Hwang Seung-eon
Jeon Hee-sung
Lee Ju-yeon
Cha Mi-ryun
Han Soo-yeon
Head Hostess
Ko A-sung
Miss Kim
Jo Woo-jin
Investigating Officer
Keum Sae-rok
Hee-sung's Friend
So Hee-jung
Ji-min's Mother
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
The film explicitly references the 1997 IMF crisis and real prosecutorial scandals that rocked Korea, making it a time capsule of late-90s/2000s political anxiety.
Jung Woo-sung based Han Kang-sik's mannerisms on actual prosecutors he observed, down to the specific way they'd hold cigarettes during 'informal' meetings.
KR
