Emergency Declaration (2022) Review

“Emergency Declaration” Theatrical Poster

Director: Han Jae-Rim
Cast: Song Kang-Ho, Lee Byung-Hun, Jeon Do-Yeon, Kim Nam-Gil, Im Si-Wan, Kim So-Jin, Park Hae-Joon, Kim Bo-Min, Hyun Bong-Sik, Seol In-A, Lee Yeol-Eum
Running Time: 141 min.

By Paul Bramhall 

The disaster movie has become something of a regular fixture in Korean cinema over the last 15 years. We’ve had colossal tidal waves in 2009’s Haeundae, towering infernos in 2012’s The Tower, nuclear meltdowns in 2016’s Pandora, and most recently the threat of unthinkable volcanic destruction in 2019’s Ashfall. Understandably, the COVID-19 pandemic that ravaged 2020 and 2021 has seen film goers appetite for the disaster genre on the wane, so 2022’s Emergency Declaration hopes to recapture audiences fondness for big budget chaos by taking it to the skies.

How much sense that makes will likely depend on audiences willingness to separate fiction from reality. With a story that involves a disgruntled lab worker releasing a highly contagious virus on a packed flight to Hawaii, with so much talk of how easy a virus can spread in the confined environment, it may not exactly be what everyone wants to see as the world begins to re-open to travel. Of course everything is relative, so ultimately such concerns will likely only apply to those watching Emergency Declaration at the time of its release. What can’t be argued though is that director Han Jae-rim (The King, The Face Reader) has brought onboard an all-star heavyweight cast, and chances are many will likely check out Emergency Declaration just to see some of the biggest names in Korean cinema onscreen together.

Lee Byung-hun (A Single Rider, Inside Men) and Kim Bo-min (Miss Baek, The Negotiation) play a father and daughter immigrating to the U.S. Kim Nam-gil (The Shameless, Memoir of a Murderer) plays the pilot, and Kim So-jin (The Man Standing Next, The Divine Move) the head of the cabin crew. We get Song Kang-ho (Broker, Parasite) on the ground as the chief of police, Jeon Do-yeon (Beasts Clawing at Straws, Memories of the Sword) as the Minister of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, and Park Hae-joon (The 8^th Night, Bring Me Home) as one of her aides. The cast is so stacked that an actress like Moon Sook (Svaha: The Sixth Finger, Keys to the Heart) plays a passenger who doesn’t get a single line. If one thing Korean cinema has proven through the years though, it’s that even the most talented actors in front of the camera can’t make a movie work if the talent behind it is lacking.

Surprisingly, Emergency Declaration initially subverts expectations of the kind of movie audiences will have in mind. With a tone that more closely resembles a dark thriller than a disaster flick, we first meet Im Si-wan (The Merciless, The Attorney) as the mentally disturbed antagonist pacing the departures hall of Incheon Airport. Smartly dressed and carrying himself with a deceptively calm demeanour, he makes for a compelling presence, and the idea of him actually boarding a plane instils a fitting sense of dread. When the investigation on the ground uncovers a grizzly murder involving a virus that causes “burst veins and internal bleeding”, proceedings dramatically escalate when a passenger’s eyeball graphically bursts in the inflight toilet, followed by him vomiting blood all over the aisle. Combined with the muted soundtrack, the scenes almost create a horror movie atmosphere as panic begins to creep in amongst those onboard.

Director Jae-rim continues to resist the traditional bombastic nature we’ve come to associate with the disaster genre, using the soundtrack to create dread rather than excitement, with a highlight being a sequence when the flight goes into freefall. A technically outstanding sequence that sees the camera remain in the cabin as the plane spins out of control, the chaos of what plays out onscreen is captured against a foreboding bass heavy drone, making the sight of bodies being mercilessly flung around feel legitimately terrifying. To go into any further detail involving Si-wan’s character would be going into spoiler territory, but I can only theorise that after showing the first hour of footage to the studio executives, Jae-rim’s mix of inflight thriller and grounded police procedural wasn’t well received. Where are the histrionics, the tear inducing death scenes, the blatant tugs at the heartstrings!?

So it is, the next 80+ minutes (yes, it’s over 140 minutes long) becomes a completely different movie all together, comprising of some of the most relentlessly contrived melodrama, blatantly obvious attempts at emotional manipulation, and fatigue inducing heroic speeches I’ve ever bore witness to. All of the good will earned from the initial hour becomes a distant memory long before the end credits, as Emergency Declaration turns itself into one of the most unconvincing attempts to appeal to a mass audience you’re likely to see this year. The first sign of trouble comes when we learn Lee Byung-hun’s character was once a “famous pilot”, one who now has a fear of flying after some unknown traumatic incident, an incident that somehow has a connection to Kim Nam-gil’s pilot. What are the chances!? What could it be!? If you’ve ever watched even the laziest Korean daytime TV drama, chances are you’re going to guess correctly.

All of that restrained bombast that initially worked so well is likewise thrown out of the window, and if anything goes to such an opposite extreme that it becomes impossible to take seriously. Things get so absurd that at one point the plane is being shot at by fighter jets from the Japan Defence Force, part of a sequence that in one scene its hilariously implied that those pesky Japs could still be willing to adopt kamikaze tactics. I honestly laughed. Just to make sure real-world relations don’t deteriorate any further, we then have to watch a news broadcast immediately after in which the Japanese government explains their actions and wishes the Koreans well.

The bloated runtime is padded out further by a meaningless political subplot that see protestors not wanting the plane to land (in case the virus gets into the community), and there’s a whole ‘humble public servants just doing their job vs. big pharma’ plot thread that’s handled with all the subtlety of a brick. Quite how the likes of Jeon Do-yeon got roped into this is beyond me, as her character suffers from some of the scripts most unintentionally laughable lines. At one point the evil western foreigner who owns the pharmaceutical company demands to know who she is, to which she answers in English in what’s supposed to be a moment of defiance – “I’m the Minister of Land, Infrastructure, and Transport.” Right, that kind of line may work for Batman, but it doesn’t really have the same impact for overly long government job titles.

Even the always reliable Song Kang-ho isn’t able to escape the silliness, hatching a plan to allow the plane to land that has to be one of the stupidest plot devices to grace any disaster movie. Without going into detail, the only plus side is that it allows a final scene that pays homage to the final scene of Drunken Master 2, only in Emergency Declaration the amusement isn’t intentional. Needless to say, by the end of the punishing runtime I was left equal parts exhausted and exasperated, and even now I feel unsure of just how a movie that started off so promisingly could descend into what I’d have to say is one of the worst Korean movies I’ve seen (and I’ve seen a lot).

If there’s any highlight from the latter part of Emergency Declaration, then it actually comes in the form of a brief car chase that’s shot entirely through the unique perspective of the pursuing vehicles windshield, ending in said vehicle involved in a crash that flips it upside down. Clearly done for real by stuntmen, it’s an all too brief highlight that ironically has nothing to do with character moments or the actual plot. Surrounding it is a mess of a movie that feels like it sabotages itself in the worst possible way. With melodramatic scenes that are so self-serious they border on satire, needlessly protracted speeches that feel like they’ll never end, and even a montage of final video calls to loved ones, Emergency Declaration is an important lesson on just how disastrous commercial filmmaking can be in the wrong hands. Do yourself a favour, and just watch Liam Neeson in Non-Stop instead.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 2.5/10