Welcome back to Movie Recaps. Today I will show you an action, comedy film from 2016,
titled Luck-Key. Spoilers ahead! Watch out and take care.
On a rainy night, while a catchy tune plays on the radio, professional hitman Choi Hyung-wook murders
a man and hides him in the trunk of his car. The victim's suitcase is abandoned in the middle
of the street, only to be taken by a mysterious person right after the car drives away. Meanwhile,
in a small apartment in the same neighborhood, poor actor Yoon Jae-sung burns all his photographs
and gets ready to hang himself, feeling like he has nothing left to live for and nobody will
notice he's gone. However, he's interrupted by his landlady, who is furious about him owing her rent
money, the way he lives like a pig, and how much he smells because he hasn't bathed in a while.
After finding a debt notice from his health insurance that he puts away in his pocket,
Jae-sung decides he should at least kill himself in a clean state and goes to a public bathhouse,
where he sees Hyung-wook washing next to him and notices his very expensive watch.
Suddenly, Hyung-wook slips on some soap and falls unconscious when his head hits the floor,
losing his locker key as he falls. Thinking about the very expensive things this rich man may keep
in his locker, Jae-sung takes advantage of the situation and changes his key with Hyung-wook's.
When paramedic Kang Ri-na comes to take Hyung-wook away, they take Jae-sung's things with them,
and as soon as they're gone, Jae-sung gets to open Hyung-wook's locker and be amazed by its contents.
Deciding he deserves at least one last day of luxury before killing himself, Jae-sung puts
on Hyung-wook's suit and finds his car, which he drives around town to visit his landlady and every
shop he owes money to in order to pay his debts with the money he's stolen. He even visits a girl
from the theatre he used to work at, and after he pays back the money she had lent him, she tells
him she's getting married soon, which breaks his heart. Jae-sung realizes using Hyung-wook's things
won't magically fix his life and puts it all back in a bag that he takes to the hospital.
The plan is to exchange his stuff for Hyung-wook's while he's sleeping, but the man wakes up right
before he can do anything. It turns out Hyung-wook is now an amnesiac and is calling himself Jae-sung
because that's the name they found on the health insurance letter, but it doesn't sound right to
him. He asks the real Jae-sung if he knows him, but Jae-sung panics and leaves with the bag.
Now that he's feeling better, Hyung-wook is allowed to leave the hospital, except he only
has two bucks under Jae-sung's name and his health insurance has expired, so he can't pay the bill.
When Ri-na comes to check on him, he asks her if she can lend him the money and he can pay her back
later when he finds his home by following the address on the letter. Ri-na is a bit
hesitant but accepts, paying for everything before driving him back to his apartment.
On the way there, they're surprised to see that the letter says he's thirty-two years old,
because he looks much older than that. When they make it to his place, Ri-na realizes he can't pay
her back, but she takes pity on him when they find the burnt photos and the rope that indicate he
almost killed himself and tells him not to worry about paying before she goes back to her job.
Hyung-wook wants to get his life back together, so he starts by cleaning and organizing the whole
apartment, then he writes down the few things he's learned about himself before going around
the building to talk to the neighbors, but not a single one of them want to talk to him
when they hear he's the guy from the rooftop loft. One of the neighbors is a violent man
that had been mistreating his wife, so when Hyung-wook approaches him with his questions,
he thinks he wants to interrogate him so he tries to punch him, but Hyung-wook's muscle memory
allows him to defend himself and beat up the man without breaking a sweat. Sometime later, when
Ri-na visits him again, she finds him having a coughing fit after he tried to smoke a cigarette.
He thought smoking was his thing because he's found many cigarettes butts around,
but obviously that's not the case. The only things he's learned so far are that he enjoys cleaning
and is very good with a knife, two characteristics that give Ri-na an idea. She drags him to her
mother's small restaurant and convinces her to hire him, since they've been needing help
because her grandmother is not well and her sister should be studying. Hyung-wook accepts the job
and the first thing he's told to do is to smile more not to scare off the customers. Meanwhile,
Jae-sung realizes that with Hyung-wook being an amnesiac, this is his chance to turn his life
around by pretending to be him. He finds his new home's address on the car's GPS and drives there,
surprised to find a luxurious apartment in one of the most expensive towers in the city.
After finding some uniforms in the closet and deciding Hyung-wook must be a cop, he turns on the
tv, only to find there are no channels on, only a security camera stream spying on a beautiful
woman, Song Eun-joo, who is currently doing yoga. Afterward, he spends the day eating, drinking,
and sleeping. When he wakes up, he immediately freaks out when he notices Eun-joo is killing
herself on the screen - or at least, that's what he thinks at first. Actually, she's pretending to
do so in many different ways before going back to her yoga. Then, Jae-sung searches the house for
more food and finds a box full of money, which he uses to order a whole feast for himself. He also
decides to grab a bottle of wine from Hyung-wook's collection, only to find a secret room behind the
wall when he pulls the right bottle. This room is filled with weapons, fake IDs, phones, and more
security cameras that follow Eun-joo, which makes him believe even more that Hyung-wook is a cop,
especially when he finds the notes he has on Eun-joo: she was the one to go to the police
with a pendrive filled with information about the illegal activities of the company she used to work
for, so she's now under witness protection. Since Hyung-wook can't protect her now, Jae-sung decides
he should do it instead, but to do that he needs to know where she is. Watching her on the screen
she notices the same delivery guy that brought his own food and realizes she lives in the same
building as he does, so he starts walking through every floor and ringing every doorbell to find
her, but he fails, not noticing he accidentally missed a door at the end of a hallway. However,
when he returns to his apartment, he notices on the tv that her exercising matches the noises
he's hearing from the ceiling: this means Eun-joo lives exactly above him. He goes to see her and
introduce himself under the excuse neighbors should know each other, but after apologizing
for the noise, she simply closes the door on his face. Back in the restaurant, Hyung-wook is a
success. His skills with the knife allow him to make food with the most beautiful presentation,
and that attracts a whole new wave of clients to their business. One evening, when turning a
new page on the calendar, he discovers there's an appointment made on the twenty-fifth and decides
to go to see if he can learn more about himself. This appointment turns out to be meeting with
some producers that pick up a bunch of actors in their van to act as extras in their shows.
Hyung-wook tries his best at various roles, but he is awful at all of them.
At the end of day, after getting paid, he can't help noticing that his name
on the producer's paperwork has an old address listed, which is Jae-sung's father's barbershop.
He goes to visit the man only to hear him complain about what a loser his son is, although the
calendar on the wall reveals he's been praying for his success. So Hyung-wook leaves without
saying anything to him but also deciding he would become a good actor to make his father proud.
In the meantime, Jae-sung starts following Eun-joo around, trying to make it seem like
they come across each other by accident. One day, when she's visiting her mother at the hospital,
he notices one of the men from her old company is following her, so Jae-sung grabs her and takes her
to his car, where she can hide safely thanks to the tinted windows, but she continues to be wary
of him. When Thursday comes, Jae-sung sees her packing her things and taking the suitcase with
her to the middle of the street, as if she was waiting for someone, but nobody comes. From then
on, both Jae-sung and Hyung-wook start working hard on their new lives. While still working
at the restaurant, Hyung-wook trains to become a better actor using various techniques like
reading about method acting, practicing better pronunciation, and a rigorous exercising regime.
Jae-sung continues to follow Eun-joo around and pretending to bump into her by accident,
slowly gaining her trust and friendship. Eventually they even start hanging out together,
and to help her have fun without leaving the building and putting herself in danger,
he sends her gifts in the form of puzzles and even uses a projector to play movies under the
darkness of the building's staircase. The two of them slowly begin falling in love with each other,
but Jae-sung still doesn't understand why every Thursday she stands in the middle of the street
with her suitcase, waiting for someone that doesn't come. Hyung-wook gets a role
as an extra in a gangster-themed TV show as the bodyguard of a gang leader, played by a very rude,
selfish, and mean famous actor. He takes his role too seriously and shows off his martial art skills
by protecting the leader from all the attackers, which is a big deviation from the script because
obviously the star is the one that should beat up the bad guys. They re-shoot the scene
to follow the script correctly, but this time, the director isn't mad at Hyung-wook: he thinks
his martial art skills are fantastic and gives him the role of the gang leader's right hand.
When the time comes for him to finally say his first line on the screen, he butchers it and
only says a few words, but the director loves it and keeps it, thinking it adds a certain
impact to the character. The director's praise for Hyung-wook makes the main star incredibly jealous.
Hyung-wook's action scenes make him extremely popular among the public, getting him attention
from fans on the streets and the restaurant, which causes Ri-na to decide to become his agent. His
popularity reaches such a stage that the writers decide to make his role bigger and his character
starts having an affair with the leader's girlfriend, making the main actor even more
jealous. When the day for his character to die comes, the gang leader hits him for real instead
of pretending as an actor, but Hyung-wook uses it in his favor to make the scene more realistic.
The character is so incredibly popular however, that the writers bring him back from death and
make him the gang leader n the next episode. One night, Jae-sung hears one of Hyung-wook's
many phones ring and after some hesitation, decides to pick up the call, which surprises
the man on the other end of the line because Hyung-wook's rules say he should leave a message.
The voice is a client of Hyung-wook's that wants to know why Eun-joo's case isn't closed yet,
so when he asks him to discuss this in person, Jae-sung accepts. Covering his face with a face
mask, sunglasses, and a cap, Jae-sung meets with employees of Eun-joo's old company at an abandoned
building. The men want to know why Eun-joo isn't dead yet and even offer more money to get it done,
making Jae-sung finally understand that Hyung-wook isn't a cop, he is a hitman. Taking the bag
with the extra money, Jae-sung tells them he'll contact them later and rushes out of the building,
which looks suspicious to the company's boss and causes him to send his men to follow him
and find out where he's hiding Eun-joo. Jae-sung tries following Hyung-wook to talk to him about
this problem, but when he finally approaches him, he notices he's still an amnesiac and it would be
pointless to try anything, so he simply pretends to be a fan wanting an autograph before leaving.
When going back to work, Hyung-wook discovers he isn't as good at shooting romantic scenes as
he is with action scenes, causing the director to get very frustrated with him. He doesn't remember
experiencing any kind of love in his life, but he's still determined to get rid of his
awkwardness towards the subject, so he asks Ri-na to help him by kissing him. At first, she refuses,
but after he shows gratitude for all the ways she's already helped him and tells her she's
beautiful, she decides to help him with this as well. They end up making out in the street,
and all the emotions he feels while kissing her, Hyung-wook later uses in the scene,
earning the director's approval. When Ri-na sees the kiss on tv, she gets very jealous,
so Hyung-wook tries to distract her by taking her and her family on a picnic. Another Thursday comes
and Eun-joo goes out to the street to wait again, but this time, she's approached by Jae-sung,
who tells her the man she's waiting for won't come and even if he did, he would put her in danger. To
make her believe his words, he tells her he's a cop that has been assigned to protect her,
but he now cares about her and cannot watch from afar any longer. Jae-sung hugs Eun-joo,
causing the spying company men that had hired Hyung-wook to think they're having an affair,
so their boss asks them to hire someone else to take care of both. Since the men can't decide
who the next best hitman is, they decide to call all four of them and hire whoever arrives first.
What they don't know however, is that all those hitmen they've heard about are just Hyung-wook's
other names and they're calling his many different phones that he keeps in the apartment. Hyung-wook,
Ri-na, and her family have a great time together on the picnic, and don't return home until night
falls. It's started to rain and the radio is playing the same catchy tune from the beginning
as Ri-na stops the van in front of a red light at the same spot Hyung-wook had heard that song many
weeks ago. This combination of factors finally trigger his mind into remembering his old life,
so after saying his good-byes to Ri-na, he returns to his old apartment, discovering all the messages
on his phones requesting him to kill Eun-joo and Jae-sung, who Hyung-wook quickly remembers as the
guy from the bathhouse and the hospital. On the security cameras, he sees Jae-sung take Eun-joo
away, so Hyung-wook changes into his old clothes, reclaims his car, and follows them into an
apartment Jae-sung's recently rented to hide away from him and the company men. Jae-sung tries to
keep him out of their place, but Hyung-wook kicks him off and scolds Eun-joo for having left the
apartment, which isn't what they had agreed on. When Eun-joo points out she didn't know what to
do because he never showed up, Hyung-wook explains what happened to him before correcting Jae-sung's
accusations of being a hitman. Hyung-wook isn't an actual assassin, he just pretends to kill his
victims, while in reality, the assassination is all an act made with fake weapons and fake blood,
which explains why Eun-joo had been practicing how to die while doing yoga. What Hyung-wook actually
does is share the money he's been paid for these assassinations and shares it with the victims,
providing them fake documents and a way to escape and get a new life away from the people that wants
them dead. The mysterious person from that rainy night that took the suitcase had been
the victim himself getting ready to leave, and this is why Eun-joo would wait with a suitcase
as well. Hyung-wook thinks they should go ahead with the plan and get Eun-joo out of the country.
When she mentions she wants Jae-sung to come with her, he tells him he shouldn't go because he's
a good-for-nothing that nobody will miss. This angers Hyung-wook, who tells Jae-sung he's been
enjoying having his life because it's been a dream he could've never gotten on his own, and reminds
him his father still believes in him. Thinking of this dream life he's always wanted and now he
can have, Hyung-wook decides to make a plan so all three of them can disappear under new identities.
He calls the company men and asks them to meet them at an abandoned building, where the three
of them will be faking their deaths. Before going there however, Hyung-wook wishes goodbye to Ri-na,
telling her he's quitting and they can't be friends anymore for her own safety.
This hurts her deeply, but it's not enough to stop her from following Hyung-wook when he leaves the
apartment in order to find out why he's suddenly acting like this. At the abandoned building, the
company men watch Jae-sung stab Eun-joo and hide her body behind a piece of wall before he takes a
fake pendrive she had in her pocket and tosses it at them, calling their deal over. At that moment,
Hyung-wook arrives, pretending to be one of the four hired hitmen, and begins fighting
Jae-sung using both martial arts and knives. Their fight is pretty equal, and they even manage to
do some more fake stabbing, but they're suddenly interrupted by Ri-na, who demands an explanation.
Hyung-wook pretends he doesn't know her and insults her to get her to go away, but this
only makes her angrier. As she keeps on scolding him for his words, Hyung-wook tells Jae-sung
to carry on the plan, so Jae-sung goes after him with a knife and Hyung-wook pretends to save Ri-na
by getting between her and the weapon. Now they are together on the right spot, Eun-joo presses
a button on a special remote control and drops a factory container on top of them, making it seem
as if they have been crushed when actually the container is hollow and they're safely standing
inside of it. To make it all more believable, they release a stream of fake blood that comes
out from under the container. This is enough for the company men to believe they're dead,
and they leave with the pendrive, thinking it's the real one. Relieved to see each other alive,
Jae-sung and Eun-joo hug and finally kiss while Hyung-wook follows a very upset Ri-na out of the
building. He apologizes for having shocked her like this and reveals his real age is forty-five,
which makes him quite older than her. Ri-na freaks out when hearing this,
but now understands better why he thought they couldn't be together. That's a talk
for later though, because right now, she needs to take him somewhere important. Ri-na drives
Hyung-wook to an amusement park where his tv show is being recorded. Hyung-wook is supposed
to shoot a scene where his character breaks up with his girlfriend for the sake of her safety,
but he changes the script and tells her he wants to leave his old life behind and be
with her instead, all the while glancing at Ri-na so she can see he means the speech to be for her.
This makes her incredibly happy and as she nods to let him know she accepts his feelings,
the director decides he likes this version of the scene better and decides to keep it. Afterward,
Hyung-wook goes back to working at the restaurant, where he's been accepted as part of the family.
He also continues to work as an actor, and when the time comes for him to fight an enemy
in the story, he's delighted to learn it'll be Jae-sung, so now they can work together as a team.