South Korean actor Hwang Jung-min, nicknamed: Elevator God of War.
In the 30 years since his debut, he has won a number of film awards and is also the most box office appeal actor in the Korean film industry.
His starring works such as "International Market", "Veteran", "Prosecutor's Biography", "New World", "Cry", "Secret Agent" and other works have been well received and praised as a 100 billion box office film emperor.
However, the movie emperor, who has national influence in South Korea, is now a hostage in the hands of kidnappers.
The other party extorted 500 million ransom from him, otherwise he would tear up the ticket.
And this is the latest Korean crime movie that Fan Yingjun wants to recommend today-
Hostage
Hostage: Missing Celebrity
This film is played by Hwang Jeong-min and is a popular movie in this year's Korean summer program.
Director Bi Gancheng is a newcomer director, and another actress with a heavy role in the film, Li Yumei, is a child actress who has just starred in Netflix's blockbuster drama "Squid Game".
The film is adapted from the 2015 domestic film "Rescue Mr. Wu", the original version starring Andy Lau and Wang Qianyuan, the story is based on a formal crime, the main plot is adapted from the kidnapping of Wu Ruofu, the actor of "The First Case of Kidnapping of Chinese Stars".
The case occurred one night in 2004, when the popular actor Wu Ruofu and several friends had just finished talking about things and came out of a bar in Chaoyang District, and as a result, they were kidnapped by several strange men, and the suspect demanded a ransom of 2 million yuan.
This case was adapted by director Ding Sheng into "Rescue Mr. Wu", and wu Ruofu, a party in the original case, also participated in the role in the movie. The film was a great success after its release, especially the kidnapper image played by actor Wang Qianyuan was greatly praised, and it is the most impressive villain image in domestic commercial films in recent years.
After the success of "Rescue Mr. Wu", the Korean filmmakers bought the rights to the script, so there was the movie "Hostage".
In the original version, Andy Lau played Mr. Wu, in this film, he was played by Huang Zhengmin, a powerful actor in the Korean film industry.
It is worth mentioning that in the film, Huang Zhengmin starred in his real name.
So much so that the translated title of the film in Taiwan was directly translated as:
"Kidnapping the Shadow Emperor Huang Zhengmin".
Speaking of the story of the movie, the Korean version has made a substantial adaptation of the plot and story, although it is only 93 minutes long, which is much shorter than the original version in China, but the conflict of the plot is more intense, and it tends to be a typical Korean commercial crime film.
At the beginning of the movie, actor Huang Zhengmin just attended a film conference.
After the event ended, the agent invited Huang Zhengmin out to a party. He knew that Huang Zhengmin's wife and daughter had recently been vacationing abroad, so Huang Zhengmin was also alone when he returned home.
Huang Zhengmin drank at the event, felt a little tired, refused the agent's invitation, and found a substitute driver to send him home.
The surrogate driver sent Huang Zhengmin to the vicinity of his house, and Huang Zhengmin, as usual, went to a nearby convenience store to buy a bottle of water and planned to take some decanting pills.
The clerk is a fan of Huang Zhengmin and offered to thank him for signing his signature last time, and during the two greetings, the clerk told Huang Zhengmin about the recent kidnapping of the café owner.
The owner of a local café and the female intern of the café were kidnapped a few days ago, and the kidnappers offered a ransom of 200 million won, but in the end the kidnappers chose to tear up the ticket, kill the café owner, divide the body, and send the body pieces to the family.
Also kidnapped that day was a female intern, Su Suyan, who had been missing for many days. The sister of the family is now posting a message of help online, hoping to find out the whereabouts of her sister.
Huang Zhengmin did not take the news said by the clerk to heart, but when he walked out of the convenience store, two strange men took the initiative to surround him.
One of the men began to directly provoke Huang Zhengmin, asking him how many girl stars he had a relationship with?
Huang Zhengmin thought he had met several drunken hooligans and warned the other party to leave quickly. As a result, one of the men suddenly intervened, coronaing Huang Zhengmin and carrying him into the carriage of a truck.
When Huang Zhengmin opened his eyes again, he was already in an abandoned warehouse, and in front of him were four men and a woman and five kidnappers.
Led by the fierce boss Choi Ki-won, the second boss in charge of the work, Dong Hoon, and Dong Hoon's girlfriend Nova, as well as two thugs Tae Hing and the bald man Yong Lu, who is not very smart.
It was Dong Hoon who took thugs Tae Hing and Yong Lu with them, and the three of them kidnapped Huang Zhengmin here.
In addition to the five kidnappers, there is also a young girl tied up in the warehouse, Huang Zhengmin from the other party's clothes, contacted the missing information seen in the clerk's mobile phone before, guessed that the other party was the female intern Park So-yeon who was kidnapped in the café kidnapping case.
At this time, Huang Zhengmin's hands and feet were tied, and the five kidnappers in front of him were fierce, obviously with bad intentions.
Huang Zhengmin begged the other party to spare him, but Dong xun beat him up because Huang Zhengmin did not use honorifics when he spoke to him.
After realizing that he had been kidnapped, he would definitely panic if he changed into an ordinary person, but Huang Zhengmin secretly calmed down after a short period of panic. The reason why he is secretly calm is because he still pretends to be very flustered on the outside.
Choi Ki-won, the leader of the kidnappers, shows Hwang Jeong-min a video of them killing the owner of the café.
Faced with criminals who could kill themselves at any time, Huang Zhengmin offered to pay the kidnappers a ransom.
The kidnappers asked Huang Zhengmin how much he thought he was worth, and Huang Zhengmin knew that the kidnappers had kidnapped the café owner to ransom 200 million yuan, so they offered to give 500 million yuan, and at the same time let the kidnappers let go of the innocent Su Suyan.
However, the kidnappers were not satisfied, thinking that the price given was too low, and Huang Zhengmin had to tell the other party that the maximum amount of the bank transfer per day was only 500 million, and if he wanted to withdraw more money, he could only withdraw it the next day.
Huang Zhengmin said this, naturally in order to delay time and strive for the opportunity to save himself.
But the problem is that the kidnappers can't go to the bank to withdraw money in person, so it will be filmed by the camera, and if the network transfer is made, the OTP dynamic token (equivalent to the bank's U shield) is required for payment.
So unfortunately, when Huang Zhengmin went to the convenience store to buy water before, he forgot his OTP card in the convenience store.
In order to get the money in Hwang Jung-min's account, choi Ki-won, the leader of the kidnappers, has to take tae-heung with his thug Tae-heung to get back the OTP card, leaving Dong-hoon and his girlfriend and the less intelligent Yong-rok to guard the kidnapped Hwang Jeong-min and So-yeon.
Meanwhile, local police investigated the disappearance of the café and began tracking down the vicious kidnappers.
Through an arrested car thief, the female criminal police officer who handled the case found a clue to the identity of the kidnappers, learned that the identity of one of the kidnappers was Dong Xun, who had been imprisoned, and thus found the identity of the kidnapper boss Choi Ki-won.
But the trouble is that the car thief does not know the den where Choi Ki-won is hiding, and the case is at an impasse.
Back to Huang Zhengmin's side.
His disappearance has not yet been discovered, and the police naturally do not know that a big star has been kidnapped.
The tied up Huang Zhengmin can only carry out self-help, and for a professional actor -
Acting is his only weapon at the moment.
When the kidnapper boss Choi Ki-won left, Huang Zhengmin told Dong Xun and others who guarded him that he had a reporter to interview tomorrow, and that he would definitely alarm others if he did not go, so he needed to make a phone call and inform the other party that the interview was canceled.
Dong Xun and others were afraid that Huang Zhengmin's disappearance would soon be discovered, resulting in him not receiving the ransom, so he had to agree.
So Hwang Jeong-min called his friend, Park Sung-woong, another South Korean film emperor-level actor, and asked the other party to tell his agent that his interview tomorrow would be temporarily cancelled and asked him to apologize to reporters Xu and Choi on his behalf.
The agent was puzzled by the call from Park Sung-woong, who knew that tomorrow's interview would not have these two reporters at all.
The names of these two reporters are actually from the names of the characters in the movie "Illegal Trade" played by Huang Zhengmin, and the identities of the two people in the movie are policemen.
So Huang Zhengmin asked the agent to inform the two reporters, and what he really meant was that-
Hurry up and call the police!
Huang Zhengmin's routine is not over, he secretly sent out the alarm signal at the same time, but also tried to save himself from the predicament.
Huang Zhengmin claimed that he had a heart attack and needed regular medication. Dong Xun and others did not believe it, but they did not expect that the tied Huang Zhengmin was indeed "ill", not only began to convulse all over his body, but also broke into a cold sweat, and even finally appeared incontinence.
The kidnappers knew that Huang Zhengmin was dead, and the money would definitely not be available, so they had to drive away to buy medicine.
However, all this was deliberately pretended by Huang Zhengmin, the purpose of which was to support Dongxun, and then save himself from the predicament and defeat the less intelligent Yonglu.
Huang Zhengmin and Su Suyan try to escape from the hospital, but are blocked at the door by Dong Hoon's girlfriend, who confronts the two with an earthen musket.
Just at this time, Dong Xun actually went and returned, it turned out that he told the boss Cui Jiyuan about going out to buy medicine, and was scolded by the other party to make his dog bloody, so he quickly went back to see the hostages.
Seeing Dong Xun return, Huang Zhengmin could only risk death, rushed up and grabbed the gun in Dong Xun's girlfriend's hand, and the two fought together. In the confusion, Park So-yeon picks up the gun that fell to the ground and seriously injures Dong-hoon's girlfriend.
While Dong Hoon is immersed in grief, Hwang Jung-min flees to the woods on the mountain with Soo Yeon, but Dong Hoon chases after him.
The huge woods made the two lose their way, and in the end the two were caught back.
After this storm, the kidnappers' control over Huang Zhengmin became stricter, and they directly tied him up with chains.
Back to the boss Choi Ki-won, he got Hwang Jung-min's OTP card at the convenience store. But when he left, he was just blocked by the female policeman on the road, and the two sides launched a chase, but he finally escaped.
However, Huang Zhengmin actually did not tell the truth at the beginning, and the payment password did not tell the truth, so that Boss Cui did not get the money.
Because Huang Zhengmin knew that he had seen the kidnapper's face.
If the other party is given money, the kidnappers will certainly not let them go.
At this time, the agent went to the police station to report the case, and the news of Huang Zhengmin's abduction soon made headlines, and such a major star kidnapping case attracted the attention of public opinion from all walks of life, which made the police handling the case feel a lot of pressure.
The kidnappers also began to cause infighting, Boss Cui was chased by the police outside, and Dong Xun's girlfriend Nova was already dying, he asked Boss Cui to share a sum of money for himself first, so as to treat his girlfriend Nova's injuries.
But Boss Cui is a fierce man.
Knowing that the new star was seriously injured, he was unwilling to pay, after all, it was better to have one less person to share the loot.
As everyone knows, Dong Hoon is truly in love with his girlfriend, and his girlfriend Nova eventually died tragically because of excessive blood loss, which directly led to a breakup between Dong Hoon and Boss Cui.
Boss Cui fell into isolation, at this time, he suddenly made an unexpected decision -
Go to the police station and surrender yourself.
Boss Cui voluntarily surrendered himself and offered to make a deal with the police, and he could take the police to the place where the hostages were held, but on the condition that he agreed to reduce the sentence to 20 years and asked for a resettlement payment of 300,000 yuan per month.
In order to solve the case, the chief of the police force had to promise Boss Cui and take the brigade to follow Boss Cui to the place where the hostages were held.
However, just before arriving to leave, the female police officer realized that something was wrong, and through the clues provided by an eyewitness, she found that the place where Huang Zhengmin was held should be a wood processing factory in the mountains.
According to the police handling style in Korean films, the police team leader completely ignored the clues of the female criminal police, and insisted on leading the team to the place identified by Choi Boss, and the result was indeed a trap.
Boss Cui and his accomplices had already planted homemade bombs in advance, causing heavy casualties to the police.
Boss Cui escaped the explosion by snatching a gun from a criminal policeman and planning to kill him and settle accounts with Huang Zhengmin and Dong Xun, while the female criminal police officer also took her colleagues to the place where the hostages were held.
A desperate fight has begun...
Compared with the realistic and cold style of the original "Rescue Mr. Wu", this movie "Hostage" is undoubtedly an authentic Korean crime film routine, the original director Ding Sheng strives to restore the prototype of the case, so the whole film is handled with extreme restraint, but the Korean director obviously feels that the story is not exciting enough, so more dramatic conflicts and story twists have been added.
The biggest change in the whole story is the protagonist played by Huang Zhengmin, who, as a kidnapped hostage, appears to be somewhat "different from ordinary people".
On the one hand, in the face of life and death, he can still maintain rationality and goodwill, and has been trying to save the girl Who is also a hostage, Su Yan (although in the end there is also a scene forced to sacrifice the other party's choice, but this treatment is very understated); on the other hand, Huang Zhengmin can fight with the outlaws in the film, not only can use his acting skills to scare the kidnappers, but also fight at key moments, personally subdue the gangsters, and the protagonist is much more than and more than the original Andy Lau in the original version.
It is not difficult to understand that the Purpose of the Korean screenwriter's adaptation is to make the film more commercial, the story is more reversed, and the action scenes can become more. If Huang Zhengmin's acting skills lead the development of the entire plot, the acting skills of Kim Jae-fan, Liu Qingxiu and others who play the kidnappers are an important driving force to increase the tension.
Their rough demeanor and fiery emotions make the audience tense their nerves all the time when watching the movie. In addition, in addition to the scene where Huang Zhengmin is abused by the kidnappers, Huang Zhengmin escapes with another hostage, and various scenes such as the long end of running in the mountains and forests, the police and bandits flying car chase, etc., are also filmed very imposingly, which really enhances the tense and exciting atmosphere for the film.
In particular, it is worth mentioning that the main actor In the film, Huang Zhengmin starred in his real name, and the film also made a lot of tributes and ridicules around Huang Zhengmin's real-life actor identity. In the film, Taixing, who arranged one of the kidnappers, is a fan of Huang Zhengmin, and there is a scene where Taixing forces Huang Zhengmin to say his classic lines in the movie, which is obviously a very tense and thrilling plot, but it makes the audience who have watched Huang Zhengmin's movie feel a smile.
But overall, Fan Yingjun personally believes that the Korean remake of "Hostage" is not as good as the original "Rescue Mr. Wu", the Korean version of the adaptation attaches too much importance to entertainment elements, the whole story has been changed to a very routine commercial genre film, the police have become an indispensable foil or background, And Huang Zhengmin has single-handedly reversed the situation.
It can be said that the original version of "Rescue Mr. Wu" is a crime film with realistic themes, and the commercial demands of the Korean version are more clear, and the main creator obviously wants to make a popcorn film that makes the audience look good, and finally it is only reduced to an assembly line remake, if there is no Huang Zhengmin's hard performance, this film even seems a little unremarkable.