Relish the chase in dystopian Korea

Amid a state of chaos, a group of men dream of a better life. Living in a country wrecked by an economic crisis in the dystopian future, they hatch a plan to rob a gangster-run gambling house to grab some cold hard cash. Their new life awaits in another land.

Time To Hunt starts like many other heist movies. Leading the team is ex-convict Joon-seok (Lee Je-hoon from Signal) who was jailed for three years for robbery. Fresh out of prison, he meets up with his friend Gi-hoon (Choi Woo-shik from Parasite) and Jang-ho (Ahn Jae-hong from Reply 1988) to hatch a plan for another robbery as they feel they have nothing to lose and they are willing to risk it all to make their dream come true. The men soon get in touch with an arms dealer and Sang-soo (Park Jung-min from Bleak Night), a man working for the casino, to prepare for their big night. Sang-soo also decides to join the plan, making a team of four.

Together, they rob the casino easily and make off with the money despite some minor hiccups. This is when the story -- the hunt -- really begins. Their short-lived euphoria is interrupted by Han (Park Hae-soo from Prison Playbook), a cold and cunning hunter deployed to go after them.

From here on, it's a game of cat and mouse, close calls and near misses. The backdrop of the story is a dystopian Korea plagued by protests and pollution, streets full of graffiti, and a devalued currency which has made people reliant on US dollars as a means of exchange. Such scenes are set quite early on in the film and continue to play out throughout the story as the hunt moves from one desolate place to another showing the extent of how much society is really suffering. Director Yoon Sung-hyun has crafted this world with some thought and made good use of fancy lighting work while cinematography by Lim Won-geun adds a certain flair to the film.

Time To Hunt, now streaming on Netflix. photo:

The action-packed film is full of familiar faces and well-known actors who play rather charming characters. However, as far as their story arc goes, I'm not sure they give us much to root for or any reason to sympathise with them. The characters are bold amateurs and perhaps overly naive, to the point of being foolish, to think they could rob a casino and escape to begin with. Moreover, they are not skilled and it is revealed early on that one of them is not able to handle firearms all too well either. On top of this is the fact that they are being chased by a seasoned hunter who always seems to be one step ahead of them, giving the feeling that the odds are stacked against them from the start.

Han the hunter enters the chase for the desperate cons silently. His character offers a faint reminder of the blind house owner in Don't Breathe -- with fewer thrills -- and perhaps also Terminator, with less muscle. He toys with the robbers' fear by giving them a head start when they're cornered all too easily, making him quite an interesting character. However, not much information is provided about him. Maybe the filmmaker intended to explore more about this mysterious killing machine in a sequel, which is hinted at the end.

Running over two hours, the film could and probably should have made for a long, thrilling ride for audiences so they could stay on the edge of their seats. What better way to escape the mundane days at home than a heist? But perhaps this is also where Time To Hunt stumbles a little. While the story has its tense moments, its pacing can be rather slow-burn. There were many opportunities for this to become a high-octane ride but they were missed.

The ending also dragged on so they could provide a starting point to a future instalment that may come our way. Is it needed? Sure, there are still mysteries to be solved as many questions were left unanswered. Maybe we'll be in for a revenge saga. The hunter becomes the hunted? Who knows? I guess we can always be optimistic and give it another shot.