Handsomely crafted and executed with skillful action sequences, Operation Chromite tells the parallel stories of General Douglas MacArthur’s titular mission, designed to cut off North Korea’s supply line to the South and the formation of South Korean’s X-Ray intelligence unit. Condensing what could have made for a mini-series into a 110 minutes, the film hints at what could have been: further relationships between the X-Ray unit and their estranged families torn apart by an enemy within. Emotional beats, although present (and occasionally on-the-nose), largely take a backseat to the strategy of winning and some longing for a unified home.
Being a Korean production, director John H. Lee provides homegrown stars more screen time than Liam Neeson’s MacArthur, who gives tactical support, directing UN forces to the high seas to take back Incheon in September 1950. Faced with a choice of doubling down on what he views as a losing strategy of fortifying the South, MacArthur options to place intelligence assets in the North with the objective of staving the North’s supply line to the South.
Enter X-Ray, an elite unit which provides operational intelligence to the UN as it infiltrates and sabotages the North on the ground, leading to several suspenseful moments even if the objectives of which are never quite as clear as they ought to be. However, the truck chases, explosions and hand-to-hand combat mostly deliver the goods. The disguised covert unit poses as a North Korean inspection unit until their cover is blown and the clock starts ticking for MacArthur’s men.
Members of the unit include Lee Jung-Jae as the head of the X-Ray unit, Captain Jang Hak-soo, who joins forces with a Moscow-trained defector Lim Gye-Jin (Lee Bum-soo). His service to the North hasn’t gone unnoticed by Kim Il-sung, providing him privileged access to the Incheon Defense Commander. The film spends far too little time with Han Chae-sun (Jin Se-yeon), a nurse who fights the North propaganda and supports the Incheon campaign in some of the film’s more handsome set pieces.
Thinly sketched at times, character development is forgotten in favor of tactics, despite some assessment of the true cost of war, including those directly affected even as life seemingly continues in the North. A superb film no doubt could be made from the heroes of the day while providing a broader context – this is not quite that film. A patriotic war drama for its domestic audience, Operation Chromite looks and feels like a blockbuster, offering an occasionally compelling look at the tactics employed and their effect. Something though is lost in translation for an American audience and all the explanatory titles in the world can’t adequately ground us.
Operation Chromite is now in limited release.