The director’s latest film is noticeably short of his trademark sex and violence, but he still isn’t scared to confront some difficult truths about our hate-filled age
When his leading man asked Park Chan-wook to describe his role in the director’s latest film, the noir romance Decision to Leave, Park told him the character was the sort of deferential police officer who “doesn’t carry a gun, but he carries wet wipes”.
Park recalls this over Zoom with a sly smile; his interpreter laughs. The director, known for Oldboy and The Handmaiden, is at the Toronto film festival promoting Decision to Leave, which tells the story of a mild-mannered detective (played by Park Hae-il) who grows dangerously close to the lead suspect in a murder case. “It’s really nice to be able to go back to cinemas,” he says of the return of in-person events (he’ll be in attendance for the London film festival this month). “I think I had taken for granted being able to screen my films in front of a wider audience, how valuable that experience was, before the pandemic. But now I know.”
