A film about the single night of the military mutiny of 12 December 1979. What it changes in dramatising real events and how it builds tension.
12.12: The Day is a 2023 film directed by Kim Sung-su about the military mutiny that took place in Seoul on 12 December 1979. Over the single night of the events, it follows people inside the military who make very different choices. Hwang Jung-min plays Chun Doo-gwang, the man leading the mutiny, and Jung Woo-sung plays Lee Tae-shin, the commander of the capital defence force who stands against him, with Lee Sung-min, Park Hae-joon and Kim Sung-kyun among the cast.
The film is based on real events and real people, but it changes the names of its main characters. The renaming can be read as a device that makes clear the film is a drama built on the events, not a reconstruction of the record. Parts that were never recorded, such as dialogue, the characters' feelings and the links between scenes, are filled in by the film. If you want to know how the actual events unfolded, official records and historical sources, not the film, are the accurate place to look.
The film's timeline is held almost entirely within one night. Because it cuts between events happening at the same time in different places over a short span, the audience wants to know what happens next even if they know the outcome. A single phone call, an order or the movement of one unit changes the situation from scene to scene, and that chain builds the tension. Assuming many viewers already know the historical outcome, the structure focuses less on what happened than on how those moments led into one another. Editing that cuts briefly between indoor meetings and troops moving outdoors makes the pressure of time felt physically. That the audience gets little chance to catch its breath over the running time is another effect of this structure.
The film organises a large event as a conflict between people. It does not rely only on the two leads, though; it also shows the choices of the many figures in between who hesitate or hold their ground.
Kim Sung-su also directed Beat, City of the Rising Sun, Musa, The Flu and Asura: The City of Madness. He has consistently made genre films in which men clash roughly, and he is also known for working with Jung Woo-sung on several films. Hwang Jung-min makes his character's presence loom large through make-up and speech, while Jung Woo-sung offers a restrained contrast. The way the difference in the two actors' styles is designed to read as the difference between the characters is worth watching for. Beyond the main roles there are many characters who appear only briefly, so after a first viewing, sorting out who is who and watching again can reveal scenes you missed.
The film is made so that you can follow it without detailed knowledge of the background. Keeping the following in mind makes the structure clearer.
The phrase Seoul Spring, the film's Korean title, has been used to describe the period from October 1979 to the following spring, when hopes for democratisation ran high. The film deals with one night in the middle of that period. Thinking about the relationship between the title and the events depicted gives a sense of the longer flow of time in which the film tries to place that night. If the historical background is unfamiliar, reading some basic material on the period before or after watching helps.
Since it is based on real events, it is better not to take every scene and line as fact. Names have been changed, and parts were compressed or added for dramatic structure. There are scenes of gunfire and clashes, so check the rating before watching. Remembering that people who lived through those events and their families are still here today is the basic attitude to bring to a film drawn from history. If the film leaves a strong emotional impression, it is better to check the facts calmly through the records than to turn that feeling straight into a firm judgement.
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