Robert Ito in The New York Times:
Park Chan-wook is one of Asia’s most famous directors, an auteur beloved as much for his complex, often critical visions of his home country of South Korea as for scenes of stomach-churning horror. But when Park started work on “No Other Choice,” he really wanted to direct it as an American film, so much so that he spent 12 frustrating years trying to get financing from Hollywood studios. The source material, Donald E. Westlake’s 1997 horror thriller novel, “The Ax,” was based in the United States, “so it just felt very natural to me,” he said. “I didn’t put too much other thought in it.”
Beyond the novel’s suburban East Coast setting, the plot and lead character also felt particularly American to the Korean director: a manager of a paper company has his life upended by corporate downsizing, and to secure a new job, he sets about murdering his rivals in increasingly gruesome ways. “This is a story about the capitalist system,” Park said. “I thought it would be best told in America, since America is the heart of capitalism.”
More here.
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