New World is a 2013 South Korean action crime film written and directed by Park Hoon-jung.
Lee Ja-sung is a police officer working undercover in Goldmoon International, South Korea's biggest crime syndicate, being a key factor of "New World Project" devised by the polices to destroy it from inside. Now his 8th year at the job, he's going through an identity crisis. His superior, Chief Kang, keeps delaying his promise to release Ja-sung out of the mission and reassign him to a more safe position in the force, and when Ja-sung confronts him about it and announces his retirement, Kang tells him that, if that ever happens, he'll intentionally blow his cover and get him killed. Not helping the matters, tensions are high in Goldmoon when the chairman dies in a freak accident, igniting disputes about who'll succeed him. The two biggest powers in Goldmoon are Lee Joong-gu, the leader of the Jaebum clan and former chairman's right-hand man, and Jung Chung, a rising star backed by the Northmoon clan and Ja-sung himself. It's clear both have no interest in sharing the syndicate with each other — even if it means war.
Chief Kang and other police force seniors pick up the news and give Ja-sung an order: aid their machination to manipulate Joong-gu and Jung into fighting each other and take both out of picture. Already putting his life at risk and having conflicted feelings toward Goldmoon, Ja-sung wonders if he can walk out of all this unscathed.
New World was planned to be the first movie in a trilogy, but any further installments are yet to be produced.
Due to the twist-heavy nature of the movie, all spoilers are unmarked.
The film provides examples of:
- Becoming the Mask: Even by the start of the movie, Ja-sung is conflicted that he was with Jung's faction for so long, helping him climb up the ladder so hard he's considered Jung's best friend, he doesn't feel like a cop any more. His friction with his superior, Chief Kang, only deepens it. When Kang sabotages Ja-sung's career as a police to keep him under his leash in the final act, while Jung keeps Ja-sung's cover and asks him a favor to take care of his men just before his death, Ja-sung decides to become a full criminal.
- Black-and-Gray Morality: Goldmoon is full of despicable goons, but it's not like polices are much better. Chief Kang, Ja-sung's direct superior, has no qualms about casually giving him a death threat when Ja-sung doesn't follow his order, and other police seniors care more about the plan than Ja-sung's well being.
- Downer Ending: Ja-sung leads Jung's faction after his death to fully take over Goldmoon and even succeeds in keeping his undercover identity secret by murdering everyone at the police force who knows him. But as his bittersweet look implies in the ending, this is something he never wanted. He took the criminal path only because Chief Kang forced him to be entangled with the insighting ensued in Goldmoon, in addition to burning down the bridge by permanently severing Ja-sung's association to the police force. Also, his wife, one thing that kept him sane in all this, suffers a miscarriage when Joong-gu's men broke into Ja-sung's house, and it's likely their marriage won't ever be the same.
- Even Evil Has Standards: In the final act, Jung finds out Ja-sung is a long-time undercover agent sent by police and responsible for escalating Enemy Civil War in Goldmoon, but he doesn't kill him as retribution. Even after mortally wounded and meeting Ja-sung in his dying bed, Jung tells him he rather values the days he shared with Ja-sung when they were the underclass of the syndicate, which gave rise to Jung's promotion to Goldmoon executive in the present. Jung's approval of Ja-sung in his final moments is a final piece of what Ja-sung needs to successfully take over Goldmoon in the climax.
- Everyone Has Standards: Chief Kang is an uptight, manipulative police officer who doesn't mind blackmailing Ja-sung to keep him under his leash, but he's not corrupt. When Jung offers him money to drive the police's attention out of Goldmoon, he simply refuses it.
- Gorn: True to the crime thriller genre, the film is no shy about showing blood enough to fill buckets. It's infrequent in the first act, but once Enemy Civil War breaks out and knifes are drawn, you can expect every fight will end in a bloodbath.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Chief Kang spends the whole film blackmailing Ja-sung to drag him back into the Goldmoon syndicate. When Ja-sung turns from a cop to a criminal, he repays the favor by sending him an assassin. Kang is fatally stabbed and dies alone, and since he kept "New World Project" as a secret to the others in the force, no one will find out what happened to him.
- Sequel Hook: The movie ends with a flashback scene taking 6 years before the movie's events in which Ja-sung and Jung, lowest ranks at the time, raid an enemy hideout. Presumably, this was a teaser of the sequel before it got indefinitely postponed.
- Sole Survivor: Every main character except Ja-sung dies. All major Goldmoon members are killed in Enemy Civil War. Most of the police officers behind New World Project also die because of it, and those still alive by the climax are double-crossed by Ja-sung.
- Wins by Doing Absolutely Nothing: In the final act, the police seniors reveal to Ja-sung that this is what they planned in the first place by electing Su-ki, a mostly powerless Goldmoon executive, to its chairman position if both Jung and Joong-gu are taken care of. Because Su-ki has neither charisma or competence to lead the syndicate, they believe Goldmoon will become a shadow of past self. Subverted when Su-ki does ascend to the power in the climax after both were killed in war, but shows his true colors when he tries to eliminate Ja-sung because he's now useless to him. What he doesn't know is that Ja-sung turned a full criminal at this point and all his men are already on Ja-sung's side, so they kill Su-ki instead.
