The Tunnel

This review may contain spoilers!

This film does an incredible job at presenting one of the best disaster/survival films of the year so far. I would give The Tunnel a 7.5/10.

This film is a unique disaster film to say the least, it depicts the rather horrifying experience of being trapped when a man-made tunnel collapses upon him and his car while he is driving. The resulting film produces a really engaging examination of the experience of having to survive in a scenario like this while also asking some intense moral questions about when a search should be stopped in a situation like this; there's also a great criticism of political inaction and media spectacle during disaster efforts. This is a film that will keep you engaged throughout and knows how to introduce new plot points to keep the tension consistent throughout. The cinematography is incredible, there's a high level of attention to detail; every movement of debris or flicker in the shadows is captured in a stunning way. The special effects in this film were pretty good too even if they weren't used for anything else other than the tunnel collapse, the way the cave-in looked felt extremely realistic. The score for this film was almost consistently pretty good, high emotional moments or more scary scenes were matched with the perfect accompaniment.

Bae Doo-Na, who played Se-Hyun, had a really empathetic role in this film; her very natural reaction and support for her husband made her one of the most compassionate characters of the film. Oh Dal-Su, who played Dae-Kyung, had the very calm reserved edge that was needed for the role of chief of rescue operations; however Dal-Su brings a wide range to his character bringing some strong moments of conflict as well as some incredibly funny scenes. Kim Hae-Sook, who played Minister, presented a rather amusing parody of a high political figure; the fact that her role seemed more concerned with her appearance in front of the media provided some great criticism towards politics within Korea.

However the best performance came from Ha Jung-Woo, who played Lee Jung-Soo. Jung-Woo does an amazing job as the central protagonist within this film; he does a good job of portraying a role who is very charismatic and relatable. It's great to see how selfless he is towards Mi-Na, as well as the fun dialogue he comes up with towards her pet dog. What really sets Jung-Woo's performance apart however is how he wrestles between surviving or giving up and accepting death, it's a heavy topic and one this movie pulls off quite well.

This film does tend towards the stereotypical model of the disaster model, which is a shame because there are far too many moments where the story becomes predictable. Furthermore this is a story about the experience of survival and moral questions about this event, characters certainly aren't fleshed out anywhere near enough as they could be.

Cho Hyun-Chul, who played the Youngest Member of the Rescue Team, was a bit of a comedic gag role; he was inserted into a few scenes to be funny but was shoved into the background after a couple of appearances onscreen. Nam Ji-Hyun, who played Mi-Na, is introduced a bit too late into the story to be of much interest; despite being trapped along with Jung-Woo her character goes through similar motions of survival to what he has already done which felt a bit repetitive to watch. Yoo Seung-Mok, who played Reporter Jo, was an annoying character but had very little impact upon the film itself; his subplot felt a bit unnecessary and he took up more screen time than his role really demanded. Jung Suk-Yong, who played Team Leader Choi, was an interesting moral role but wasn't given the screen time to stand out; his death felt very sudden and ultimately his character served the plot too much for this performer to stand out.