I love Asian action thrillers, Time to Hunt has all the elements I like in that genre. The director, Yoon Sung-hyun, also wrote the script, placing the story in a future, not so far away, in a South Korea sunk in a financial crisis, where crime reigns in the streets. The creation of that dystopian world, not so far removed from the world's current reality, makes the film more interesting.
A group of three friends, with one of them recently released from prison, plan a robbery at a clandestine gambling house, including a third member they know who currently works as a cleaner inside the place. They buy weapons from a dealer friend of one of them and make a plan. They achieve the goal of robbing the casino, take the money they will use to go live on an island paradise, but also take the hard drive with the recordings of the casino's customers. The mafia that owns the place turns to a ruthless professional killer to find the daring thieves. The game of cat and mouse begins, hunting time begins...
The cast consists of Ahn Jae-hong, Lee Je-hoon, Hae-soo Park, Park Jung-min, Choi Woo-sik, actors from South Korea, who have worked in many films and on television in their country. I'm not an expert on the actors' careers, but you can do a google search if you want to know more about them.
The first part of the film may make us think that it is a typical film about a robbery, but this is not the case. After the mysterious character in charge of finding the thieves appears, everything is transformed into a dizzying race to survive. The killer likes to play with the victims, giving them a chance to try and escape, even giving them an advantage.
The killer enjoys hunting them down one by one...
He has his moments paused, to go deeper into the relationship of friends, the past, the family. Fraternal ties are important to all three offenders. All those moments are interrupted by the action scenes, which have the hallmark of Asian productions. They are raw, violent and wild. The professional killer seems immortal.
The killing machine
The tension is constant, it becomes more present as the film unfolds. So he will always have our attention, he lets us rest in small scenes, but then he offers us an adrenaline rush. The result is a very entertaining film, but, I criticize only one detail, the duration...
There comes a point, before the climax, where the viewer may feel a little exhausted, then comes the sequence that we believe is the end (it had to be the end) but the director decides to offer us a long epilogue , which, in my view, was not necessary.
A good option to see at the weekend. The film is available on Netflix.
My Rankin: 3.9/5
Trailer
