Action films are the specialty of director Ryu Seung-wan. As he proved early on with <Berlin> (2013), he knows how to weave the inter-Korean division into genre filmmaking. His new film <Humint> reconfirms that spy action is his primary forte. Along with sleek, exhilarating ‘Ryu Seung-wanstyle action’, it also delivers an unexpectedly heartrending melodrama, making it a crowd-pleaser well-rounded on all six sides.

The stage is the North Korean border area of Vladivostok, Russia. National Intelligence Service black operative Manager Jo (Jo In-sung) detects signs that drug distribution and trafficking of North Korean women are taking place here, and heads to Vladivostok. Humint (HUMINT·Human Intelligence) refers to human intelligence sources. Manager Jo carries trauma from a previous operation in which he lost his humint source. After making Chae Sun-hwa (Shin Se-kyung), a server at a North Korean restaurant, his new source, he hopes for one thing: that Chae Sun-hwa does not fall into danger.

On the North Korean side, an investigation begins into what is effectively the same matter, the ‘missing women case’. When Park Geon (Park Jung-min), a section chief at the North Korean State Security Department, is dispatched to Vladivostok, Hwang Chi-seong (Park Hae-joon), the North Korean consul general there, grows tense. Trying to seize on a weakness before Park can expose his own dirty laundry, Hwang notices a suspicious undercurrent. Reputed to be cold-blooded, Park Geon shows a subtle expression upon seeing Chae Sun-hwa. There must be something between the two, he feels, and his intuition sharpens.

Director Ryu no longer frames South and North Korea solely in antagonistic confrontation. As in <Mogadishu> (2021), which depicted staffers of the South and North Korean embassies escaping civil-wartorn Somalia and, while each seeking survival, coming to cooperate, the gun barrels shouldered by Manager Jo and Park Geon in <Humint> are not aimed at each other. Rather than loyalty to the state, both men, driven by the personal motive of ‘wanting to protect a source or the person they love’, set the safety of Chae Sun-hwa as their top-priority objective. They simply do not realize for a while that their goal is the same.

The actors reportedly received basic training, including firearms practice, at the actual National Intelligence Service. Action scenes that reflect real pistol-grip methods used in the field and were filmed while keeping count of each weapon’s rounds are plausibly spectacular thanks to this attention to detail. In particular, an early sequence in which Jo In-sung, as Manager Jo, storms a cramped room and subdues multiple intruders with gunplay flows with such poise that it feels like watching a fearless yet perfectly synchronized work of art.

Park Jung-min and Shin Se-kyung let viewers imagine a melodramatic arc through glances alone, without physical contact. They were lovers in the past, but she vanished; fearing that she could be put in even greater danger because of him, the man pretends not to know her. Because Hwang Chi-seong is lying in wait to pounce on Park Geon, the two never have the leisure to speak at ease, yet they express yearning through the looks they exchange. Since last year’s Blue Dragon Film Awards and the ‘Good Goodbye (Good Goodbye)’ stage with singer Hwasa, many have been waiting to see Park Jung-min in melodrama, and this offers a glimpse.

Although Chae Sun-hwa is little more than a functional character who propels others to act, Shin Se-kyung’s committed performance in each scene lets viewers understand her context. The distinctive villain turn by actor Park Hae-joon is also unmissable. Sly and irritating yet leaving the impression that ‘you would be in serious trouble if you crossed that man’, Park Hae-joon’s Hwang Chi-seong radiates intense energy.

Only after firmly establishing the four characters does the film then sprint decisively into action scenes accompanied by large-scale gunfights. After the press screening on the 4th, Director Ryu said, “If the relationships among the characters are not densely built, the action has no explosive power. No matter how much you beat up, smash, and blow things up, no emotional excitement arises, so both action and melodrama were important in the film.”

This is a Korean film that makes it worth returning to the big screen. It is a large-scale production with a net production budget of $17,625,000 (23,500,000,000 KRW), excluding marketing costs. <Humint> opens on the 11th, targeting the Lunar New Year holiday window. Advance bookings have surpassed 170,000, raising hopes for strong box-office performance.