AdamantCocoon

23Jul12

Although I wouldn't fault anything in your analysis of its themes (the cyclicality of violence, not merely of retribution, moral culpability), and I gather the film is of some value, Park's execution wasn't exactly unforeseen. Johnnie To's PTU (I had this film in mind, and obviously Tarantino's should have sprung prematurely) abstracts venality to the point of expressionism, and never actively posits inquiry into the violence that unspools onscreen. It's the visual meditation on such violence as an intrinsic "call to order" that proves insightful, eliminating the need to weigh every individual's moral compass. Even so, PTU was only marginally more satisfying than SfMV, and they are, in toto, two different beasts, but even if I hadn't seen thematically reminiscent films, the tendency of Park to add weight to what are blatantly empty acts of infliction and victimization in SfMV is finally underwhelming.