The Old Woman with the Knife review: A dark Korean thriller that lives up to its name
Me to my partner: That’s the Old Woman with the Knife
I first saw decorated film and theatre actress Lee Hye-young in Hong Sang-soo’s melancholy masterpiece In Front of Your Face (free with a library card on Kanopy). In it, she plays a former actress carrying a deep secret who meets with a director about a new project. Like many Hong projects, it’s a deliberate and thoughtful meditation on the human condition and our relationships to art and each other. Lee is phenomenal in the lead role, bringing a deep well of sadness under a sincere desire to enjoy life as much as possible. It’s one of four collaborations between Lee and Hong, but the only one I’ve seen so far. (Hong, while one of my very favorite filmmakers, is famously prolific and often releases three or four movies in a single year. He’s hard to keep up with.)
When I learned Lee was starring in a new action-thriller called The Old Woman with the Knife, now playing in theaters, I was immediately intrigued. A Hong Sang-soo star in an exploitation-adjacent action movie? That’s the perfect nexus of my interests. While it doesn’t rise to the level of the all-time great dark Korean thrillers, The Old Woman with the Knife successfully combines a strong leading performance with well-executed action and some standout moments of visual flair.
Lee plays a legendary assassin nicknamed Hornclaw who has long been a part of an agency that prides itself on only taking contracts that target the worst of the worst. But the people she came up with in the agency are long gone, and her new boss wants to move in a very different direction, prioritizing high-profile clients who will pay top dollar for the murder of anyone who gets in their way. Hornclaw is now stuck working at a place she no longer recognizes, and when your job is to kill people, it’s a lot easier if you trust the people telling you who’s up next.
Hornclaw seems to have a quiet home life – one of the few moments we see her relaxing, she’s watching Charlie Chaplin’s The Kid (I approve). She’s soft-spoken and dresses inconspicuously, but Lee plays her with an outward severity and standoffishness that hides some deeply-buried trauma. There’s a common thread between this movie, the June Squibb action movie Thelma, and the new Kathy Bates-led show, Matlock: People underestimating older women and paying the price.
In addition to her shitty boss, Hornclaw has a persistent hand tremor that threatens her work and her life, a psychotic new recruit vying for her place in the organization, an old colleague that botched a job, and a new friend being threatened. At times The Old Woman with the Knife feels slightly overstuffed with subplots, but they’re spaced out well enough that by the end, each feels vital.
If there’s one major drawback for The Old Woman with the Knife, it’s how bluntly the movie is willing to state its themes. Hornclaw takes in an injured stray dog, and we are told the “old and sick” pup needs love and care, too. That’s not the only seemingly kind, but ultimately insulting comparison the character receives – a vendor gives her a bruised fruit that no one wants because they don’t know it’s “just as sweet” as the pretty ones. It’s so startlingly blunt that it’s surprising Hornclaw doesn’t call it out, especially because she snaps “I’m not your granny” at a character at a different point.
The Old Woman with the Knife is also quite blunt with its depiction of the horrors people inflict on each other. It is, largely, about punishment, and you often see what leads to it. For a brief content warning: There is a sexual assault attempt that does not end well for the perpetrator, but is harrowing to watch, and a likewise difficult brief scene depicting elder abuse.
The movie’s action design leans on a matter-of-fact style of choreo that successfully evokes a group of professionals who have been doing this work for a long time. Hornclaw’s movements, especially with blades, are fast, straight-to-the-point, and precise, but become a little less controlled during moments of desperation. While she’s still very capable physically, Hornclaw leans on sly tactics to get the job done – her preferred weapon is a blade hidden in a hair stick, and at one point she cleverly uses the movement of a train to disguise a kill. Director Min Kyu-dong peppers in satisfying pops of gore to punctuate the proceedings, adding a sense of danger and consequences at all times.
It’s always fun when an accomplished drama actor flexes their chops in a genre project. Lee performs an impressive amount of the action herself, but the team behind the movie uses some clever costuming and camera angles to swap in stunt doubles without breaking the rhythm or immersion of the scenes. Her evocative face and ability to subtly evoke what she’s thinking, along with some key visual design choices, adds extra depth to what is a worthwhile genre exercise.
While Min’s visual approach to the movie is mostly straightforward, there are a few standout moments of flair. My favorite: A father and daughter making eye contact across the gaps in a passing train car, their relationship forever changed by what she saw a moment before. But I also love how flashbacks and memories seem to intrude on the narrative. Sometimes, the older versions of the actors get swapped into memories from their younger years, which is a choice I always like. It’s those little touches, along with focused action design and a terrific lead actor, that makes The Old Woman with the Knife a memorable new addition to the long history of stellar dark Korean action thrillers, warts and all.