In Director Park Chan-wook’s New Film, No Other Choice, Work Is Worth Killing For

How far would you go to land a job? That’s the question which underscores Korean director Park Chan-wook’s latest work No Other Choice.

The film follows Man-su, played by Squid Game’s Lee Byung-hun, a husband and father who suddenly loses the job he’s held at a paper mill for 25 years. At first, Man-su thinks he will easily find another job in his field. When that doesn’t happen – unable to imagine a future outside the paper industry – he convinces himself the only way forward is to kill the competition.

The film is based on American author Donald Westlake’s 1997 darkly comedic novel The Ax, which director Park spent around 20 years trying to adapt. (Director Costa-Gavras, who Park dedicate this film to, released a French adaptation in 2005.) Park’s original plan was to release an English-language adaptation of the book, but he struggled to secure funding. So he decided to make the film in his native Korean and reunite with Lee, who played Seargent Lee Soo-hyeok in Park’s breakout film Joint Security Area (2000). Having Lee attached was instrumental in getting the film financed.

Before starting production on his adaptation of The Ax, he made films such as Stoker, The Handmaiden and Decision to Leave. He’s now considered one of Korea’s most celebrated directors.  

Now set in Korea, the black comedy is “fundamentally similar” to the English version Park envisioned, with a few changes. AI, for example, now factors into the story – an inevitable update, given the stories of AI-related job cuts that have surged in the last few years. Park and co-writer Lee Kyoung-mi fleshed out the female characters, and “how Man-su equates himself to the three victims and almost views them as his double, that sentiment has grown stronger in recent revisions as well,” Park told Broadsheet, via a translator.

No Other Choice premiered in competition at the 2025 Venice International Film Festival, where it received a six-minute standing ovation. It’s South Korea’s official submission for Best International Feature at the Oscars and could land Park his first Academy Award nomination. The film was also nominated for best musical or comedy and best foreign language film at the recent Golden Globe awards but lost out to One Battle After Another and The Secret Agent respectively.

It’s somewhat ironic that the film which may turn out to be Park’s greatest success in the Western world is also the movie that has pushed him to think more deeply about his life beyond work. “It’s very difficult to define my identity outside of filmmaking, which is why I greatly empathize with the characters in the film. I’m also aware of the dangers that come with [defining yourself by your work]. I wanted to show that to the audience as well, that it’s very dangerous for your job to be equated to your life.

“I haven’t found a way to deal with this yet, I still live just like the characters in the film. But especially while I was working on this film, I did have the realisation that I have to reduce the portion of filmmaking that’s taking up my life and try to replace that with family. But also – other than my identity as a filmmaker or as a family member, like a son or a father or a husband – I really want to explore who I am beyond that and expand my sense of identity.”

No Other Choice is in cinemas now.