Officer Black Belt (2024)

"Will it be fun?"

Officer Black Belt takes the viewer into the world of parole officers who deal with ex-offenders who are still being monitored with ankle bracelets. In South Korea they have martial arts officers who are the muscle for the parole officers when things go wrong. Kim Woo Bin packed on 8 kg/17.5 pounds to look more imposing for his role as a directionless man who finds his direction helping to protect the parole officers and citizens of Seoul.

Lee Jung Do spends his life doing what is fun. Fun for him is martial arts training where he holds third dan black belts in Taekwondo, Judo, and Kenpo. When he’s not fighting for fun he plays video games with his best buds. He also delivers fried chicken for his dad’s restaurant. On the way home one night he comes across a martial arts officer wounded in a fight and takes down the criminal. After receiving an award Parole officer Kim Sun Min offers him a temporary job while the officer recovers. Jung Do soon finds he has a natural affinity for being a martial arts officer and helping people.

Officer Black Belt had action and humor in a film dealing with a terrible subject-sexual assault and child exploitation films. Like Jung Do, most of us will want to taser certain parts off of the perpetrators’ bodies. The film went from a case of the week to an overarching villainous gang and uber-villain. Kang Ki Jung had sexually assaulted 15 children and only received 20 years in prison (that’s a little over a year per child-what is the criminal justice system thinking!!!) Jung Do and Sun Min would have to use all of their skills and put their lives on the line to prevent more children from becoming victims after he was released.

This was one of Kim Woo Bin’s stronger roles as he displayed a range of emotions as the friendly fighter who grew to enjoy the responsibilities of his job. Kim Sung Kyun as Kim Sun Min brought the bro in bromance as he guided Jung Do in his new career. Lee Hyun Geol was creepily effective as the enormous Big Bad villain. There were some continuity issues as day turned into night in a matter of seconds in several scenes. I enjoyed the first half of the film more when the officers went more by the book. In the second half they recklessly went into dangerous situations without calling for back-up. Jung Do relied on his Scooby Gang instead of looping the cops into the evidence they found which seemed irresponsible and put their lives in danger. While Taekwondo is a great competition martial art, Jung Do really needed some additional training in how to hit the vulnerable spots-eyes, ears, neck, knees-if he was going to continue fighting gangs of bad guys or with one-on-one fighting with well-trained bad guys.

Overall, Officer Black Belt was entertaining and Kim Woo Bin’s performance was engaging. There was plenty of action and the fights were well choreographed. The film didn’t break any new ground in the action arena but I did like that they attempted to shine a ray of light into the darkness. When strength was called for, they brought it, and when compassion was called for they brought that, too. To answer Lee Jung Do's question "Will it be fun?" at his interview--yes, it will be fun. When it's not terrifying.

13 September 2024

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Fantastic Action, Meh Story

With Officer Black Belt, Jason Kim seeks to further cement his legacy as a master of the action drama, However, unlike previous works such as Midnight Runners, and Bloodhounds, Officer Black Belt is a movie that falls flat in really everything except action.

Let me start by saying that the action in this movie is fantastic. The choreography is really impressive, well executed, and easy to follow. One thing I really loved about the fight scenes is that there is a dedication to truly incorporating the martial arts that Lee Jeong Do knows. I have been practicing Judo for a good portion of my life, and I watched this movie with a friend who does Taekwondo and another friend who does Judo. One thing we could all agree on about the action scenes is that there were a lot of clearly identifiable moves from both Judo and Taekwondo (I won't be able to speak on he Kendo sadly). You don't see that often in dramas, sometimes they'll use maybe a few moves and then it ends up just being a kinda flail of limbs. In this case there were a lot of moments where we could call out the techniques. The action really is impeccable in this movie, and a lot of work and love went into it. It's fun to watch and really exhilarating.

Unfortunately, the action is really the only thing this movie has going for it. The story can't exactly decide what it wants to be, somewhere in between being about following the law, but also about vigilantism. Many characters feel like caricatures of certain archetypes (like gamers, and nerds), and there are a lot of questionable moments logically. Why does no one call the cops early on? Why do people keep turning their backs in fights? Why do people not make sure weapons are out of reach? Why were there no repercussions from authorities? It feels like in an attempt to draw out the action and to have conflict, there are a lot of dumb moves done by characters. There are also a lot of unnecessary triggering scenes, particularly in implied rape and child sexual assault. Which don't really need to be there. We don't need to see a child in distress and about to get assaulted to understand what is happening. At some point it feels like too much, especially for a movie advertising itself as a comedy (the contrast between the trailers I saw and the actual movie tone/scenes really surprised me).

There are odd tone shifts, and the pacing in the movie suffers from a somewhat jilted story-line. The action really is the saving grace of this movie, its fun to watch which is what you want in an action movie. If I were to rewatch this I would probably just skip past all the non-action scenes and just watch the fight scenes. All in all, I think this is a movie you kinda need to turn your brain off for. If you are looking for action, this movie is great, but don't expect anything revolutionary in the way of story line or characters. It's good, not great, and the action really does the heavy lifting in stopping it from being worse.

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