No Other Choice is a resonant, darkly comic thriller from Park Chan-Wook
Courtesy NEON
Park Chan-wook’s newest movie, No Other Choice, is a late-stage capitalist thriller that weaves middle-class panic with absurdist satire. I promise that’s not as pretentious as it sounds. Park’s film about a laid-off middle manager obsessing over his job search to the point of homicide proves to be a laugh-out-loud absurdity that hits close to home.
No Other Choice is the latest not-so-subtle critique of capitalism to hit screens recently, alongside movies like The Menu and Parasite. The 13th feature from famed writer/director Park–also responsible for 21st century classics like Oldboy, The Handmaiden, and Decision to Leave–focuses on what drives self-identity in a world where technology amplifies every aspect of life, from comfort to envy.
Man-su (Lee Byung-hun) has achieved his dream life by climbing the corporate ladder. An award-winning employee at a paper manufacturer (a literal paper pusher!) has achieved the upper-middle-class dream. In addition to his professional successes, he’s restored his childhood home and is the breadwinner for his picture-perfect family.
When an American private equity company buys the Korean papermaker and enacts mass layoffs, Man-su and his family must make dramatic changes to stay afloat. Man-su starts to see his job search as closer to a humiliation ritual, and devises a plan to assassinate his competition and secure a stable job in the only profession he’s ever known. Male fragility, neurotic obsession, and an identity crisis begin to haunt the household, while Chaplinesque murders take place in the background.
Dozens of industries can see their reflection in the cutthroat world of artisan paper. Consolidation, efficiency, and obsoletion slowly knock out job after job, leaving vocational scraps for leftover employees to fight over like ravenous dogs. Man-su is one of these metaphorical dogs, desperate to maintain what he perceives as ‘value’ in his life. As each luxury gets taken away, his madness multiplies, and he becomes more frenzied.
The movie rides the mental descent by utilizing an observable amount of rack-focusing, bouncing from two thematically linked objects, and not letting the audience’s eyes stay at rest. This restless camera further adds to the tension by the constant, calculated movement on the most surprising of subjects, lingering on mangled limbs, limp bodies, or awkward conversations (I don’t know which is worse). Held within the frame of uncomfortable zooms lurks the catalyst for the outward expression of human insecurity within the story: the not-so-humble smartphone.
The protagonist wields social media like a double-edged sword; both being taunted by his employed competition’s glamorous online life and simultaneously a tool in the occupational extermination of that same life. A recurring visual is the reflection of subjects within screens, leaning into the performances given through the pseudo-mirror of an iPhone. Instead of dramatic self-realization, though, these characters (especially Man-su) deliver exaggerated comedic performances. One scene plays like Park’s dark-comedy equivalent of Oldboy’s infamous hallway fight scene.
Unfortunately, many people will relate to this movie. Not because we fantasize about murdering our coworkers (right?), but sometimes corporate America can make you feel complicit in ‘killing’ the competition–helping to further create a world that you complain about on Bluesky. Maybe the pack of ravenous dogs should stop fighting each other and demand better scraps? Instead of ravenous dogs, maybe try to personify the picture-perfect golden retrievers in this movie, Ri-too and Si-too.
I’m not sure if there are any takeaways from No Other Choice that can offer hope in our efficiency-obsessed landscape; then again, maybe the real shareholder value was inside of us all along. Is this movie suggesting that we reflect on our own fragile insecurities and reject the capitalist survivalism society has instilled in us? I don’t know, I’m too busy doom-scrolling on Instagram. Let’s keep working until we die!
See No Other Choice in theaters starting tomorrow. If your employer is cool, they should let you take the afternoon off. Or else.
