General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

Limit (리미트) (2022 film)

Limit (리미트; romanized Li-mi-teu) is a 2022 South Korean crime thriller film directed by Lee Seung-jun, starring Lee Jung-hyun, Moon Jung-hee, and Jin Seo-yeon, about a policewoman posing as a kidnapped child's mother who becomes a target herself when the kidnappers seize her own son.¹^•² It was released in South Korea on August 31, 2022, runs 87 minutes, and carries a 15-and-over rating.¹

Key fact	Detail
Director / writers	Lee Seung-jun; screenplay by Shin Jai-ho and Lee Seung-jun²
Source	Novel by the Japanese writer Hisashi Nozawa; AsianWiki identifies it as Kiroi Jou, published June 1, 1998 by Kodansha³
Release	August 31, 2022, South Korea; 87 minutes; rated 15+¹
Principal cast	Lee Jung-hyun (So-eun), Moon Jung-hee (Hye-jin), Jin Seo-yeon (Yeon-joo), Park Myeong-hoon (Jun-yong), Choi Duk-moon (Seong-chan)²
Production	Better Tomorrow, Naro Pictures, JOY N CINEMA; distributed by THE CONTENTS ON and J&C Media Group²
Box office (Korea)	687 screens; 68,097 admissions; $461,182 gross¹
Festival	Hawaii International Film Festival (2022), Spotlight on Korea¹

Spoilers

Plot

So-eun (Lee Jung-hyun) is a police officer in the life safety division who joins a secret investigation squad. When the squad takes charge of the kidnapping of a boy, she is designated to pose as the child's mother and negotiate with the kidnappers on the mother's behalf.² The investigation stalls: plans to track the suspects end in failure, and the kidnapper, who has planned everything meticulously, stays one step ahead.²

The turning point comes by telephone. The kidnappers discover that So-eun is not the child's real mother, and the caller on the other end of the line is a voice So-eun recognizes as her own son's.²^•⁴ The kidnapper demands to negotiate with So-eun herself rather than the stand-in she was playing, and the film's Korean promotional material frames this reversal as a "target switch" in which the officer chasing the case becomes its object.⁵^•⁶ Knowing that the first 48 hours are the most critical in kidnappings, and stricken by guilt at failing to protect her own child, So-eun decides to use methods outside police procedure to get him back.²

A second thread runs through Hye-jin (Moon Jung-hee), a mysterious figure who knows a hidden secret behind the serial child kidnappings.³ Yonhap's review notes that the film gives both the policewoman and the leader of the criminal group a maternal or family justification for their actions, and links the cases through details such as Yeon-joo's daughter having undergone transplant surgery and Yeon-joo's daughter and So-eun's son attending the same elementary school.⁷

Cast and production

The film is built around three lead actresses, Lee Jung-hyun, Moon Jung-hee, and Jin Seo-yeon, with Park Myeong-hoon, Choi Duk-moon, Park Gyeong-hye, and Oh Min-suk in supporting roles.¹ Yonhap described it as a rare Korean thriller that puts three women in the lead of an action thriller, and noted Moon Jeong-hee's turn as a villain whose expression, speech, and voice change between day and night, alongside Park Myeong-hoon and Park Gyeong-hye as distinctive antagonists.⁷ Lee Jung-hyun said she performed most of her own stunts, filming a mountain fight scene over about three days.⁸

The screenplay adapts a novel by Hisashi Nozawa, the Japanese screenwriter and mystery novelist who died before the film was made; AsianWiki dates the source novel, Kiroi Jou, to June 1, 1998 (Kodansha).³^•⁸ Director Lee Seung-jun, previously best known for The Spy: Undercover Operation (2013), said he spent a long time on the adaptation because he judged the story would work well as a Korean film, and described Limit as a character-centered film rather than an action-scale one.⁸^•⁹ Filming ran from July 10 to September 27, 2020.³

Release and reception

The film opened in South Korea on August 31, 2022 on 687 screens and drew 68,097 admissions for a gross of $461,182.¹ It was later invited to the Hawaii International Film Festival's 2022 Spotlight on Korea section.¹

Reception was mixed. On Cine21, two critics averaged 3.50 out of 5 while audiences averaged 4.00; critic Lee Yu-chae's review argued that a villain character existing only in outline held the film back.¹⁰ Yonhap's review found the underlying plot structure relatively tight but the storytelling uneven, with some implausible developments that interfered with immersion despite the actors' performances.⁷ The Korea Times judged the story plausible enough to keep viewers engaged but not a "must-see in theaters" film, while crediting Lee Jung-hyun for carrying her screen time.⁸ On IMDb the film holds a 5.2/10 rating from 251 votes.¹¹

Disputed details

Two record discrepancies appear across databases. IMDb lists the South Korean release date as August 5, 2022, while the Korean Film Council database, Cine21, and Filmmakers all list August 31, 2022.¹¹^•¹^•¹⁰ Running time is recorded as 87 minutes by KOFIC and Filmmakers but 88 minutes by Cine21 and the Japanese database Eiga.com.¹^•¹⁰^•¹² The title of Nozawa's source novel is also given differently: AsianWiki names Kiroi Jou, while the Korean wiki entry and Eiga.com credit the novel simply as Limit (リミット).³^•¹³

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026