Punished

The film opens with Wong Ho-chiu celebrating his wife and daughter on her birthday. Daisy longs to travel overseas, especially to Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia. A heated argument drives her out of the house.

The next day, Wong receives a cellphone video showing Daisy has been abducted and a demand for ten million is issued for her release. He refuses to involve the police, convinced it’s a dangerous stunt. He vows to avenge his daughter at any cost.

Wong enlists his most trusted bodyguard, Chor, to locate Daisy. Chor begins tracing her whereabouts and follows each lead as tension mounts. The hunt tightens around the city.

Chor's investigation culminates in the devastating discovery of Daisy's body. The news shatters Wong, who faces the irreparable loss of his daughter. The path to vengeance begins to take hold.

Wong, crushed by Daisy's death, fabricates a story that she is alive and in Los Angeles. He pushes Chor to the front lines of the hunt and has Chor videotape each ensuing execution, binding him to the cycle of violence.

As new tapes arrive, Wong prays for solace or justification, clinging to the belief that a sense of order emerges from vengeance. The killings escalate as the tapes become a grim ritual that drives him further away from his former restraint. Chor remains at his side yet increasingly burdened by the burden.

The search for the third perpetrator intensifies, and meanwhile Wong's wife discovers the killings. She pleads for him to stop, but his resolve hardens and she makes the decision to leave him.

A medical check-up reveals that Daisy's heart-ailment medicine was picked up by Wong's assistant, prompting confrontation and a realization of how deeply the circle of people is involved in the plot.

The final perpetrator is revealed to be Daisy's female assistant. On a rooftop confrontation, the assailant fights back and falls, revealing that she has a daughter, which humanizes the antagonist moments before the fall.

Witnessing Daisy’s daughter triggers memories of Daisy's childhood in Wong, slowing his hand and giving him pause about killing the assistant. They manage to pull her to safety, ending the immediate pursuit.

Chor offers to take responsibility for everything, but Wong insists the burden isn’t his to bear and declines to drag Chor further into the nightmare. The two men part ways, each carrying the weight of their choices.

With the quest for vengeance behind him, Wong travels to the Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia with Daisy’s ashes, spreads them across the salt flats, and finally breaks down in tears, haunted but moved by her memory.