The Spy Gone North review: There are two types of spy movies. In one hand you have your bombastic, action set-piece driven blockbusters with a superspy at its centre. In the other, there is the more pared-down, realistic account of espionage, driven more on implication, intel, and intellect than they are pyrotechnics.
BFI London Film Festival
The Spy Gone North very much fits into this latter category, providing a slow-burn thriller that builds its thrills on topicality and entanglement.
The film is loosely based on the true story of ‘Black Venus’, the code-name given to an operative of the South Korean Intelligence service (played by Hwang Jun-min) who, in the 1990’s, used the cover of a salesman in order to get close to North Korean officials and find out if the North Korean government were developing nuclear weapons. He soon finds himself becoming more embroiled in the machinations of both the North and the South.
It is not hard to see where the topical nature of this film resides. The concern of North Korea’s development of Nuclear Weapons may have dominated the news of late, but it has hardly been a recent concern, as this film demonstrates. The icy relationship between the North and the South is also a point of concern here. As the film progresses, it becomes less concerned with nuclear arms and much more concerned with the state of democracy in the South, and quite how the North is being used to sway the electoral system.
As the film charts through the 90’s and becomes more and more political, it also becomes more emotionally driven, as ‘Black Venus’ begins to question the motivation behind the orders that he is being given. It certainly helps from an audience perspective, as much of the first act is a slow-burn to the point of being quite tedious.
As soon as our spy starts to truly realise what is at stake for both himself and his country, the film kicks up a gear, with scenes of conversation and espionage becoming increasingly more intense as the implications of the words said by these men of power gathered in rooms becomes all the more troubling, harrowing and of greater concern to the general public of both North and South. The couple of scenes in Kim Jong-Il features are exceptionally tense, and laced with foreboding and just a welcome bit of wit.
Jun-min is a fine lead as ‘Black Venus’/Park Seok-young. He does very well to flesh out the performative aspects of his role, from the conflicted spy to the somewhat prattish but audacious businessman that he must portray in order to establish connections in the North. There is somewhat a lack of connection initially to him, as we are often told he wants to do this job to protect his family but his family are nowhere to be seen at any point, with his friendship to Comrade Ri (Lee Sung-min) often coming across as a last minute attempt to provoke more emotion, though the performances are strong enough to make you forgive any sense of contrivance.
The Spy Gone North may prove to be a little too slow for some, but for those willing to stick with it, they will be rewarded with a thriller that draws you in with political intrigue and a dangerous, powder-keg atmosphere.
The Spy Gone North review by Andrew Gaudion, October 2018.
The Spy Gone North review at the 2018 BFI London Film Festival.
