1970s The Vietnam War is over. A communist spy nicknamed Captain (Hoa Xuande) goes to Los Angeles, where he continues to lead a double life and report back to his homeland on the movements of the enemies of the people. Based on the novel of the same name by Viet Thanh Nguyen (Pulitzer Prize 2016).
Hoa Xuande as the Captain in a still from the series “The Sympathizer”
The Captain has no name, he only has a type of activity: to serve North Vietnam (communists), monitor and destroy South Vietnam (paid for by the States) from within. In the long-awaited adaptation of The Sympathizer, the hero’s written testimony and confessions, his inner voice, are voiced in the Hollywood spy thriller genre, impeccably stylized, authentic and controlled. Park Chan-wook should be thanked not least for this: for the director of “Oldboy” and “Decision to Leave”, this is the second experience of working on television after “The Little Drummer Girl” – thanks to his decisions, the series instantly plunges into the atmosphere of instability, loss of identity and other post-war injuries
The captain is not just a spy. He was born to a Vietnamese mother and French father, received an elite liberal arts education in the States, and then returned to serve for the good of his homeland. Chang-uk recreates the climax of the Vietnam War in cinematic, uncompromising brutality. Viewers learn that a few days before the fall of Saigon (the capital of South Vietnam), the Captain was almost caught red-handed. To ward off any suspicion of communist loyalty, he is ordered to continue keeping an eye on the paranoid General (Toan Ly), who has fled to Los Angeles.
Robert Downey Jr. in a still from the series “The Sympathizer”
“The Sympathizer” balances between psychological horror and black comedy, attracts with the relevance of what is happening, which wins the audience’s favor. An important reference for the show will be “The Americans” (2013-2018), where KGB spies lived and worked undercover in the States. However, “The Sympathizer” develops much more rapidly: there is panic on both sides of the ocean, the Captain himself is afraid of losing his bearings, his comrades urgently demand the passwords and appearance of the officials responsible for the genocide of the Vietnamese. The captain is a “half-breed” not only by origin, but also by moral choice, which anticipates and intensifies the future with its collective responsibility and clear division.
Robert Downey Jr. in a still from the series “The Sympathizer”
The main face of The Sympathizer is a relative newcomer, New Zealander Hoa Xuande. The actor manages to act as both a storyteller and an active force who is constantly torn by emotional dilemmas. Four characters are played by Robert Downey Jr. The Oscar winner was entrusted with portraying several facets of the evil of American capitalism: from a CIA representative to a campy professor of Orientalism and a maniac director reminiscent of Francis Ford Coppola and his Apocalypse Now. This year, Downey will probably add a television Emmy to his Oscar – each of his incarnations turned out to be creepy and quite close to reality.
Thanks to its precise script and delightful editing, The Sympathizer comes across as a spectacular, multi-genre exploration of human nature. The captain is loyal to several regimes at once; his consciousness is mutilated by war and the duplicity of political systems. An agreement with the devil leads to chaos, chaos leads to normality. There seems to be no way out of the looped labyrinth – and the Captain stubbornly continues to “swim”, not fully realizing the whole hell of dehumanization.
Text:
Egor Kozkin
Tags: review episodes series Sympathizer
