Based on the pacing and acting, this should be a top-tier movie, but I found it difficult to watch because of the cruddy subtitles I had.

It seems that this director has lost the skill to make good films. Compared to other Korean thrillers such as New World and Yellow Sea this is a rather poor effort. By trying to charm simultaneously both Chinese Censorship bureau and European festival board members, the director has made a film which is unable to decide which audience group it wants too target and at the end fails to satisfy either.
The presence of Tang Wei was probably a calculated move to guarantee the film will hit the Chinese screens. Most of the time, Decision to Leave plays like a less edgier version of modern Mainland noir such as Wild Goose Lake and Black Coal Thin Ice. Storyline is ludicrous perpetuates lots of old fashioned cliches from Asian love stories. Tang Wei is good, but there is no chemistry between the two leads, and the male protagonist is too bland in terms of appearance.
Flawless production design is nothing new in Korean cinema. As a matter of fact you will spend more time ogling over those speckless interior spaces rather than the personal dramas unfolding before your eyes.
One a positive note, at least there is the presence of former pop idol Lee Jyun Hun. Not that she does anything special in this film, but she is always good to look at.

Decision to leave looks great. The way the camera moves, the layout of the scenes and the staging of it all, great. But, its a bit plodding, and I didn't quite understand the character motivations. I partly wonder if im at a loss of understanding the korean/chinese ethno-nationalist relationship, since it seemed to play into it all, but overall I didn't see what was so overwhelming about the Chinese girl that the Korean detective was obsessing over.

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"Decision to Leave is far from Park Chan-wook's best works, but it's still an intriguing, layered story about obsession and "forbidden love".

It captures the viewer's full attention during the engaging first part, where the central theme and the respective romance appear to be in sync. However, momentum is lost with the repetitive, lengthy second half in which the same narrative points are approached without the same impact.

Surprising humor provides a good balance, but it strangely ceases to be used after a certain point."

Rating: B-

When a man is found at the base of a mountain with his skull crushed, it looks like he slipped, or did he commit suicide, or was he pushed? Well it falls to detectives "Jang Hae-joon" (Park Hae-il) and his young sidekick "Soo-wan" (Go Kyung-Po) to get to the bottom of it. They are suspicious enough, but the only realistic suspect is his younger widow "Song Seo-rae" (Tang Wei) - but she has an alibi. She looks after ageing grannies and they swear that she is the milk of human kindness. Gradually, the older policeman begins to obsess a little about her. He stakes out her apartment at all hours, follows her - and she knows it too. Is she playing with him? Toying with him? Skip forwards a few years and he and his wife are in a market where they encounter "Seo-rae" and her brand new husband - a man on the run from folks he owes a great deal of money to. An embarrassed exchange follows before they leave, only for the officer to discover a few days later that there is a corpse in swimming pool and yep, it is that of her new husband. Is she a serial killer? Is she completely innocent? The inspector is convinced she is behind it, but he cannot prove it and his personal and increasingly destructive fascination with the woman, along with her own considerable skills at deception and manipulation lead us to a denouement that, well, certainly surprises. The acting here is strong, especially the young Tang We; there is some humour and we are also given a few clues, ourselves, as to just what might have happened - and whether or not she might be (or not) the perpetrator - there are red herrings a-plenty here. Jung Young Sook offers quite a charming contribution as the ageing and ostensibly corroborating granny "Hae-dong" too. The plot has loads of twists and turns, and essentially offers us two stories rolled into one. It's quirkily entertaining - and we are never quite sure! I really enjoyed this.