Set during the 1930s (during the Japanese occupation of Korea) and it concerns two assassinations that our protagonists plot against pro-Japanese targets. The hit team consists of a sniper, a jailed military school graduate, and an explosives expert.The first thing to understand about this movie is that it has an outstanding cast, which yields great performances across the board. Ji-hyun Jun is the lead actress; her popularity exploded when she starred in My Sassy Girl (2001), but she's also been on a scorching hot streak lately with films like The Thieves (2012) and The Berlin File (2013), as well as a hugely popular K-drama television series named You Who Came from the Stars (which finished in 2014). I love this actress. I'll watch her in anything. She starred in the sexiest tea commercials of all time, by the way. Assassination also stars Jung-jae Lee (Big Match, The Face Reader, New World) and Jung-woo Ha (Kundo: Age of the Rampant, The Terror Live, The Berlin File, The Chaser, The Yellow Sea, etc.). There are also some very recognizable faces in supporting roles as well. The cast is just loaded! And it's great watching everyone interact.The plot is quite complicated, but it is interesting and does a good job of creating a web of conflicts between the characters which comes to a boil later on. It may be a little too convoluted for its own good, which seems to be a trend with some recent Korean thrillers like The Berlin File and The Suspect, but it does force the viewer to pay close attention and watch the movie multiple times to get all of the little details. There are also a few wicked twists and unexpected moments.Production values are top notch: the period set designs that are showcased are excellent. You really feel like you're back in the 1930s. Action ramps up near the midpoint and is nicely staged in a realistic manner. It's always cool seeing 1930s technology utilized during shootouts and chases. The entire second half is exciting.

"Assassination" or "Amsal" is an engaging and epic mixture of an espionage action film and a historically inspired drama. Both genre parts are equally balanced and the modern special effects aren't so overloaded that they feel out of context in a movie set more than eighty years ago. The film convinces with an intellectually appealing script, diversified and great characters and acting performances and a solid mixture of historically inspired storytelling, personal drama parts and tense action scenes. There is no doubt that this is one of the best movies of the year.Over the course of almost two and a half hours, the film tells the story of an assassination attempt on a Japanese governor and a pro-Japanese Korean business tycoon by Korean resistance activists during Japan's colonial rule of Korea. The movie is set at different times and even the perspectives slightly change which makes the movie a little bit hard to follow in the beginning. The film takes all the time it needs to introduce the different characters and the historical settings which adds a lot of depth to the characters, details to the historic elements and emotions to the story. These are the reasons why the slightly long introduction that might be hard to sit through for wider audiences is absolutely essential to the rest of the movie.The first slow-paced hour builds up to the furious last ninety minutes of the film. The final two thirds of the film feature a stellar acting performance, a smart use of camera angles, costumes, locations, soundtrack and special effects by the director and a clever story with many predictable but also unpredictable twists and turns in form of different conspiracies.Especially the fate of female sniper Ahn OK-yun who is portrayed by an absolutely stunning Jun Ji-hyun in the best performance of her career is a key element of the movie. Most viewers will probably care a lot about the twisted ups and downs of this engaging character.The showdown of the movie is one of the best directed action scenes in world cinema this year and in the history of Korean cinema in general. It's not as memorable as the fighting scenes in "Oldboy", "The Man from Nowhere" or "The Admiral: Roaring Currents" but it gets quite close and has a breathtaking choreography. The coda of the movie which takes place almost two decades after the actions of the main plot is an excellent way to end a great movie on a high note.Due to it's complex story and high number of directional ideas, I would recommend watching this movie several times. This emotional action-drama is definitely worth your attention and one of the cinematic highlights of the year. I can't wait to revisit this great film and buy this movie on DVD or Blu-ray next year.

I actually think Korean cinema is going backwards on its quality. The latest blockbuster smash hit is directed by Donghoon Choi who made top notch popcorn flicks with his latest outing being Thieves. Thieves was an entertaining film but there were signs that it was making a formula which can just be recycled.Now here comes Assassination and it really indulges itself in that formula Choi created for himself. Characters are given quirky nicknames (Hawaii Pistol, Big Gun), the cast is composed of A-listers who try to compete each other for screen presence, and the story is as generic as it gets with few twists to add shock value but riddled with holes nonetheless. What is new is the sense of cheesy patriotism being shoved down our throats. Yeah as sadistic as it sounds, Koreans just love it when lots of Japanese soldiers die on screen. Sure they are bad guys so they deserve to die! We are fighting for our country so it's okay!While Thieves boasted at least some great stunt action sequences rare in Korean cinema, this film doesn't even try. Action scenes are not only scarce but they're also quite generic bang bang shootouts and nothing really sticks in your mind. The camera movements are so full of itself and actually looks like it thinks the action that's taking place is the best ever.As usual in lame Korean movies like this Oh Dalsu is the best thing in it. His character has a ridiculous wig, Pringles mustache, smokes a big cigar and wields a machine-gun to blast the baddies. He also packs natural humor and is charismatic here.What it all comes down to is that this is basically a cartoon that has been stamped with forced patriotism which Koreans love with blind passion. A film designed to make money (it did) and entertain (it didn't). Try harder.

It's another amazing film from Korea. There was a lot of stuff to take in, that could be overwhelming for someone like me who has to use subtitles to keep up. A lot of sub stories were going on around the main story of Japanese occupation of Korea.Lucky for me the film making was very visual, the best way to weave a movie so it was not hard to understand everything that was going on and there was a lot, but it all fit together beautifully. The cinematography was well done as well as the costumes designs and I loved the action sequences. There was scenes that used CGI, but they did not over use it which is done too much in pictures.Very impressive.