The Man Standing Next film

At 139 (and counting) seen Korean films I think I can safely say I am a fan of Korean cinema.

My Korean films journey started with Korean thrillers, one my favourites being Confession of Murder. Since I was pretty new to the genre and I was not used to these types of films with a lot of twists and turns, I was surprised in the best way possible and I jumped right into watching more Korean films.

My favourite genres are drama, thrillers (d'uh) and action (especially cop or gangster), but what I like the most is the comedy in these films. It's almost impossible to not have any comedic relief in Korean movies, and most of the times it is hilarious.

I don't only watch those genres, sometimes I feel like watching something like a historical film or a romance one.

The Man Standing Next (dir: Woo Min-ho) fits the historical category.

Synopsis

In the 1970s, Korea is under the absolute control of the President Park who controls the KCIA, the organization with an edge over any branch of government. The director of KCIA, KIM Gyu-pyeong, is the seemingly most prospective second-in-command. In the midst of reign of fear, a former KCIA director, PARK Yong-gak who knows all about the government’s obscure operations, exiles to the U.S. where the investigation of ‘Koreagate’ is underway. As the tension escalates, the stifling political maneuvering by the all second-in-command’s unfolds.

[letterboxd]

Review

I don't often watch historical films, sometimes I find out it's a historical one only after I've watched it, but most of the times I like the film a lot.

Since this is a film, it's obvious that certain events have been changed in order to make it more interesting, but since I don't know how the events actually unfolded (I only read a little about it on Wikipedia), I am focusing on the cinematic aspect of it rather than the historical accuracy.

Before I go further, I have to come clean and say I watched it because of Lee Byung-hun. He is one of my favourite actors (or whatever scale I have when it comes to actors) and I am happy to report that, as usual, he delivered an awesome performance.

The cast of The Man Standing Next is great. There are plenty of well known actors that I already watched in a lot of other films—such as Lee Sung-min, Kwak Do-won and Kim So-jin—so it is not a surprise the film was really captivating. Everyone was really great.

As I said, I don't know how accurate the film is from an historical point of view, but when it comes to the cinematic aspect, it was awesome. I liked the colours, I loved the shots, the scenes (especially the park one, the rain and the last dinner scene) and a few times I hit rewind just so I could watch the same bit again and again.

The Man Standing Next is also emotional to a certain degree. I was glued to the screen, I even talked to the characters to either reprimand them, laugh at them or comfort them. I know, that's useless, but it says something about how much I enjoyed watching it.

Overall the film is highly entertaining, especially so if you are passionate about Korean history, or history in general. If you are planning on watching this, enjoy!