‘No Other Choice’ – Park Chan-wook’s Adaptation of ‘The Ax’ Wraps Production

Park Chan-wook, the Award-winning Korean filmmaker behind The Vengeance Trilogy, Thirst, and Stoker, has just wrapped principal photography on his latest feature, No Other Choice, Variety reports today.

The film began filming in August 2024 and is slated for release sometime later this year. 

No Other Choice is an adaptation of Donald E. Westlake’s mystery thriller The Ax and follows “a middle-aged man named Man-soo who embarks on a determined job hunt after being unexpectedly terminated from his position at a paper company.”

The novel’s synopsis gives a fuller picture: “Burke Devore is a middle-aged manager at a paper company when the cost-cutting ax falls, and he is laid off. Eighteen months later and still unemployed, he puts a new spin on his job search — with agonizing care, Devore finds the seven men in the surrounding area who could take the job that rightfully should be his, and systematically kills them. Transforming himself from mild-mannered middle manager to ruthless murderer, he discovers skills ne never knew ne had