You
know things are bad in the DPRK if the Grand Poobah himself wants to defect. In
this thriller set three or four years in the future, the “Supreme Leader” is
aptly known as “King.” Whether he really wants to defect or not is uncertain,
but “Ahab,” a South Korean mercenary, is determined to bring him back safely
regardless. It will take a bold move to prevent a catastrophic war and Ahab is
just the guy to make it in Kim Byung-woo’s Take
Point (trailer
here),
which opens tomorrow in Los Angeles and next Friday in New York.
Ahab
and his seedy team of mercs are lethally effective, but as foreign nationals,
they can be easily disavowed. That is why Agent Mackenzie frequently subcontracts
their services. However, this gig was always going to messy and it just got a
whole lot more complicated. Ahab’s crew ensconced themselves in the secret
tunnels under the DMZ, waiting to whisk away a high-ranking official who
supposedly wants to defect. The game gets exponentially more serious when King
shows up in his place. Maybe he wants to defect or maybe he doesn’t. Either
way, Ahab and his men can collect the enormous bounty on King’s head if they
bring him in alive.
The
initial snatch and grab proceeds surprisingly smoothly, but everything soon goes
down twisted thereafter. It seems Ahab and King were set up by elements in the North
Korean government loyal to China, who want to take over the DPRK and embarrass the
American government, especially Pres. McGregor, whose re-election numbers have
been in freefall. He might end up hoisted on his own Wag-the-Dog petard, unless
Ahab and his crew can deliver the wounded King to the rendezvous point. Things
look really bad for the colorful mercs, but Ahab finds an unlikely ally in Yoon
Ji-ui, King’s personal physician.
Politically
speaking, Take Point (the title is a command
and also maybe a place) is about as cynical as a film can get. Everyone is
betraying everyone else, so you can’t accuse it of playing favorites, but it is
safe to say there is some serious moral equivalency going on here. At least
there is also some slam bang action as well. Kim really puts poor Ahab through
the wringer and paints him into a corner. His prosthetic leg takes more of a
beating than the one the Rock sports in Skyscraper.
As
Ahab, Ha Jung-woo is a terrific world-weary, beat-to-heck anti-hero. It is also
a good deal of fun watching him play off American thesps Jennifer Ehle and
Malik Yoba, as Mackenzie and Gerald, Ahab’s field lieutenant. Of course, it is
obvious Ahab’s righthand man Markus is questionable, because he is played by
Kevin Durand at his shiftiest.
Scurrying
through all those underground tunnels could potentially get tedious, but Kim keeps
the energy cranked out and the close-quarters combat easy to follow. You have
to give him and the stunt team credit, because they keep raising the stakes and
topping themselves, every step of the way. Recommended for the action spectacle
(rather than as any sort of coherent political statement), Take Point opens tomorrow (1/27) at the CGV Theatres in LA and
Buena Park and next Friday (1/4) in New York, at the AMC Empire.