NR | 2h 6m | Action, Crime, Thriller | 2017
Movies about wrongfully accused people who are on a mission to clear their names aren’t exactly original, yet a few manage to rise above the films of that sort. Helmed by South Korean director Kwang-Hyun Park (“2036 Apocalypse Earth,” “Welcome to Dongmakgol”), the 2017 cyber-crime thriller “Fabricated City” is a highly entertaining film with lots of action and several plot twists thrown in for good measure. The film certainly kicks things off with a bang.
Kwon Yu (Ji Chang-wook), whose gamer name is “Captain Kwon,” commands a small squad called “Resurrection” within a fabricated (virtual) reality, that is, a first-person shooter action game. The movie opens with Captain Kwon and his team in the game riding transport helicopters over water toward an urban setting; all around them, anti-aircraft missiles streak through the air. Kwon barely manages to rappel from one of the choppers before it is struck by a missile. After landing, he and his teammates immediately engage masked goons.
The Resurrection team’s objective is to defuse a bomb within a building surrounded by a veritable army of bad guys. The action on hand is spectacular, and Kwon’s digital avatar is responsible for most of the outstanding feats of combat. As an ex-taekwondo champion in real life, Kwon engages some of the baddies with flying kicks and other acrobatic maneuvers.
Real Life Takes Over
Kwon’s mother (Ho-jung Kim) calls him from her job at a hospital and nags him about playing too many video games instead of looking for work. After talking with her, Kwon goes right back to playing another video game. Then he receives a phone call from a mysterious woman who says she left her cell phone at the café, and that she’ll pay him $300 if he delivers it to her apartment.Hard up for money, Kwon travels to the woman’s dark, foreboding apartment and finds that its front door is ajar. He enters the house and finds that the woman is taking a shower. He leaves the cell phone, collects the money, and departs while warning the woman that it’s dangerous for her to leave her front door open.
The next day, Kwon is snoozing at home when the police suddenly barge in and arrest him, slamming him to the floor in a dramatic scene. The charges leveled against Kwon are for the rape and murder of the woman whose apartment he took the phone to. Not only can they match Kwon’s DNA to the murder scene, but it’s also matched to the murder weapon, a bloody knife, with his fingerprints all over it.
Although the case against Kwon is pretty open and shut, his mother still believes that he has been framed; she tirelessly campaigns for his innocence after he’s found guilty of all charges and carted off to prison. If Kwon’s real life was pretty tame compared to his video game one, his life behind bars is downright horrid. When Kwon falls afoul of a gang leader in prison named Ma Deok-soo (Kim Sang-Ho), Kwon is subjected to frequent beatings. The harshness of his prison treatment brings him to the brink of despair.
Just when things seem as though they can’t get any worse for Kwon, his mother seemingly commits suicide. Kwon manages to break out of prison and goes to the only person he trusts to get him out of his legal quandary and clear his name: Min Cheon-sang (Oh Jung-se), the defense attorney who represented him. Min assures Kwon that he’ll take another look at his case to see if there is any way to prove the latter’s innocence.
Kwon also finally links up with the real-life folks who make up his video game squad. They begin to help him in his efforts to prove his innocence, as well. A few plot twists lay ahead for Kwon, which make his quest to clear his name anything but easy.
The rest of the film plays out like a suspenseful thriller as Kwon tries to elude several dastardly characters who want him either dead or back in prison.
Although this basic plot of a frame job isn’t exactly original, its execution is exceptional. Not only is the script well-written, but the acting performances are solid, particularly Ji Chang-wook as a young man framed for crimes he didn’t commit. I also enjoyed Shim Eun-kyung as Kwon’s hacker teammate Yeo-wool, a girl who is super-shy and also very intelligent. Thankfully, their two characters didn’t have any sort of romantic side-plot, as it would have felt tacked-on and “fabricated,” if you will.
“Fabricated City” is a fantastic thrill ride that gradually ramps up the tension as the film progresses, and I really felt invested in Mr. Chang-wook’s character Kwon in his quest to clear his name and find those who are responsible for framing him.
This is a gripping cyber-crime flick that should keep your attention all the way up to its spectacular finale.
