2029 AD. The dream
of a unified Korea is becoming a reality…or for some a nightmare. A war erupts between an anti-reunification
group called The Sect and an elite unit of the Public Security Force, The
Special Unit. In the middle of it are
two people, Lee Yoon-hee and Lim Joong-kyung,
are drawn together by tragedies that define their
pasts, challenge their presents and threaten their futures. Amidst a bloody city and a secret war within
the Public Security Force, Lim and Lee’s bond will be tested and soon, they’ll
come face to face with a secret group determined to keep the Special Unit alive
at any cost: the unit codenamed Illang: The Wolf Brigade.
Originally, Jin Roh: The Wolf Brigade was to be the
final, live action entry of Mamoru Oshii’s Panzer Kerberos Trilogy (following
The Red Spectacles and Stray Dog). However,
at the time, Oshii was tapped to direct Ghost in the Shell instead and Jin Roh
would eventually find its way to completion as an Anime feature film
instead. So it feels a little poetic
that the final chapter of the Panzer Kerberos Saga would find its way to live
action cinema, albeit made in South Korea instead of Japan and with a few
significant alterations to the original story.
No matter what the case, I was always excited to check this one out when
I had the chance. Jin Roh is one of my
favorite Anime films and the previews looked like they might do a good job of
bringing it back to the sagas live action roots. Was it a success and how does this film rank
up to other live action Anime adaptations of the last couple of years?
It’s interesting that Illang goes for a total change of
scenery while still managing to retain a lot of Jin Roh’s original feel. The setting is now ten years in the future
rather than post WWII and the nation in civil unrest is South Korea rather than
Japan. It feels smart to update it like
this and handle a very prevalent possibility that the real world is focusing on. Meanwhile, most of the original Jin Roh slips
in seamlessly, from the dialogue to scenes adapted straight from the Anime,
particularly in the beginning and the end.
One could do a side by side, frame by frame analysis of several key
scenes just to see how much time has been taken to recreate them almost
precisely. Does it rob Illang of it’s
identity or mask the stench of unoriginality like 2017’s Ghost in the
Shell? No and…yeah not really actually.
The heart of Illang is still the same as Jin Roh, a forbidden
romance blooming amidst the backdrop of society in turmoil and political
intrigue. Gang Dong-won and Han Hyo-joo
give both similar and different takes as Lim and Lee, the characters inspired
by Fuse and Kei from the original Anime.
Dong-won adds an added layer of complexity to Lim. He’s still the silent terminator in the Keberos
armor but also hides a pain deeper than that found in the original Anime
(mostly thanks to a new plot point introduced for the live action version). Meanwhile, Hyo-joo plays Lee with a bit more
emotion than Kei had in the Anime. She doesn’t
feel as creepily morbid as Kei and her emotional breakdowns were well done
also. And yes, the Red Riding Hood motif
from the Anime is ever present but not as shoved in your face this time
(thankfully). Sure, Lim is a beast
(especially in the action scenes when he’s the South Korean John Wick Terminator)
and Lee rocks the red jacket. But we aren’t
getting passages from the book thrown at us every 15 minutes. And actually, the one portion where the story
itself is told is done through a beautifully animated segment…complete with the
original Jin Roh End Theme playing against it (one of at least two tracks I caught
from memory), that made me smile.
While I did mention the political intrigue that made the
Anime so fascinating is still around, Illang does take a more straight up
action film direction during the second half of the feature. New ones are added for this version
(including the ambush Lim and Lee must fight their way through in a skyscraper exhibit
hall and a new fight scene for the finale).
And as cool as many of them are, ill admit, they tended to pad the
running time more than I would have wanted.
At a little over an hour and a half, the Jin Roh anime expertly balanced
emotional storytelling and intense action (of which there was very little but
done just as effectively). Illang goes
loud but just as brutal and a lot longer than any fight scene from the
Anime. As mentioned earlier, some of
these are shot for shot homages to the original. Others, however, feel like they could’ve been
a lot shorter or omitted altogether without much being lost. I know the Anime had a few complaints about
the slow pacing (which makes sense, it was an Oshii scripted story so it’s
bound to be slow with reason). But sometimes
adding in too much can hamper the final product. That being said, watching Lim mow down cannon
fodder in the sewers in his Keberos Armor will never, ever get old.
The new additions to the story deserve some further note
because they are a mixed bag. I did
enjoy the new event that established why the Special Unit wears their signature
red eyed masks and how it shaped the futures of both Lim and Han (this films
version of Henmi from the Anime). It
also gives reason why the Special Unit is in further hot water during their war
with the Sect. It deepens the friendship
and inevitable conflict between Lim and Han nicely. And then there’s the final act. There’s more to the film beyond the climactic
(and excellent) showdown in the sewers that im sure will cause some level of
controversy amongst fans of the Anime. For
sake of not spoiling anything, ill just say the finale drags things out into a
different direction and I wondered if it justified stretching the film to two
hours and fifteen minutes. Still, Illang
does all this and more than this to stand out from its Anime inspiration. Whether it was all worth it will be up to
viewers themselves. Personally, I thought
the finale was a bit unnecessary.
Illang: The Wolf Brigade is an admirable and pretty
entertaining adaptation of Jin Roh. The
change of scenery worked (even if the overall effect of such a game changing event
wasn’t explored as much as it could have been) and the updates to all of the
central players was very welcome. The
action taken from the Anime was excellently transplanted to live action. However, a few extra fight scenes could have
been trimmed or omitted to end things on a much smoother note. Still, Illang isn’t nearly the worst live
action adaptation that ive seen in recent years. It might be one of the better ones but still
nowhere near as good as Jin Roh: The Wolf Brigade. At least it entertained me more than Ghost in
the Shell. Still, I’ll always kind of
wonder what a Mamoru Oshii directed Jin Roh would look like. Would it be similar to this? Who knows.
7/10
