인정사정 볼 것 없다 (Nowhere to Hide). 1999. Written and directed by Lee Myung-se

Film

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인정사정 볼 것 없다 (Nowhere to Hide). 1999. South Korea. Written and directed by Lee Myung-se. With Park Joong-hoon, Ahn Sung-ki, Jang Dong-gun, Choi Ji-woo. In Korean; English subtitles. In Korean; English subtitles. 108 min.

Lee Myung-se’s stylistic tour de force opens in monochrome with occasional flashes of color before employing slow-motion, jump cuts, step-printed slow motion, and layered images to create a disorienting visual experience. Detective Woo, an instinct-driven workaholic who routinely defies regulations, leads a manhunt for drug lord Chang Sung-min following a brazen murder in Incheon. What might have been a conventional police procedural becomes instead an exercise in pure cinema, with Lee prioritizing kinetic energy and visual experimentation over narrative clarity. The film’s most celebrated sequence—a rain-soaked fight choreographed to the Bee Gees’ “Holiday”—exemplifies Lee’s commitment to transforming genre material into graphic-novel-style spectacle. Cinematographers Jung Kwang-suk and Song Haeng-ki create compositions that recall both Hong Kong action cinema and European art films, while Park Joong-hoon delivers a performance of theatrical intensity as the loutish yet driven detective.

This film accompanies Seoul After Dark: Personal Memories of Korean Cinema.

Past events

Sun, Feb 22, 1:30 p.m.

MoMA, Floor T2, Theater 2

The Roy and Niuta Titus Theater 2
Sat, Feb 7, 7:00 p.m.

MoMA, Floor T2, Theater 2

The Roy and Niuta Titus Theater 2

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