PLOT: In a small South Korean village near the DMZ, strange cattle mutilations convince the police chief, Bum-seok (Hwang Jung-min), and a hunter, Sung-ki (Zo In-sung), that a wild, dangerous animal might be running loose. The truth is far more outrageous, and potentially apocalyptic, than they can imagine.
REVIEW: Hope was pretty much the last kind of thing I expected to see at Cannes back in May— at least as part of the official selection. Typically rather highbrow, Hope, which comes from Korean auteur Na Hong-jin, the man behind The Chaser and The Wailing, rocked the Croisette. It’s is an outstanding piece of action cinema. A sci-fi/action/horror hybrid that runs 160 minutes, the hyper-kinetic action sequences and grandiose filmmaking left some critics dazed — at least at first. But, by the time Hope roared to an ending that heavily implies a sequel is on its way, the Cannes critics were cheering and applauding, with it delivering a kind of visceral thrill no other movie in the competition has really aimed to pull off in the same kind of way.
So, what is Hope exactly? It’s hard to go too deeply into the plot, as part of the fun is how the various reveals are presented (in my opinion the trailers have already revealed too much), with the scale growing increasingly epic as the film goes on. The whole first hour of the movie is an extended, real-time chase sequence, as Hwang Jung-min’s initially clumsy police chief realizes an unkillable giant monster is rampaging through the village, racking up an ever-increasing body count as it destroys buildings and rips citizens limb from limb. For forty whole minutes, you never actually see the creature, and as some critics are already pointing out, the eventual reveal is a bit of a disappointment, as Hope has one significant flaw — the CGI just isn’t quite up to snuff.
Even if the VFX aren’t perfect, the bravura filmmaking is so dazzling you’ll forgive that shortcoming quickly enough. The opening action sequence is outstanding, with Jung-min a terrific hero, in that he’s believably terrified (I’ve always appreciated how South Korean action heroes never feel the need to be stoic), but also reliably kick-ass when push comes to shove. Initially a blustering cop the hunters make fun of behind his back, despite being so scared that he can barely load his shotgun, when it comes down to it he’s exactly the guy you want in charge as he rises to the occasion, even if he constantly admits he’s having an impossible time wrapping his head around what’s actually happening. One of the funniest recurring gags in the movie is how the mostly elderly citizens of this fishing village all seem to be hiding vast armories of weapons, as whenever Bum-seok asks someone where they got one of the (many) machine guns featured in the film, they always dismiss him by saying, “No time to explain.” The firepower in the movie is extensive, with the amount of rounds and rockets fired in this likely dwarfing any western action film of recent memory.
Where Hope really kicks into high gear is with the arrival of Squid Game’s Jung Ho-yeon as Sung-ae, the local rookie, whose intro, with her in slow motion pulling out a grenade launcher to back up Bum-seok, had the audience cheering. Her and Jung-min turn out to be a potent buddy movie pairing. By the time this sequence played out, I truly had no idea where Hope was going to go, but after about a half hour of downtime that attempts to explain (kind of) what the monsters are, as their bodies are examined, we dive into another massive forty-minute action sequence that manages to outdo the first one.
The whole final third of the movie follows Zo In-sung’s Sung-ki, as he and his fellow hunters find the source of the monsters, leading to a slaughter and an extended chase where he tries to escape, while Bum-seok and Sung-ae, with a couple of locals along for the ride, try to come to the rescue. The final stretch, which involves a high-speed horse-to-speeding-cop-car transfer done practically, is a masterpiece of action stunt work and choreography, with Zo In-sung such a cool action hero as he blasts away at the pursuing monsters with a machine gun that Sung-ae literally tells him he looks like a movie star and that she wants to date him. The comedy mixed with the action strikes the kind of balance a guy like Michael Bay has always aimed for but never quite managed, where instead of diffusing the tension, the comedy adds to it because it’s character-based.
It’s all complemented by an incredible, pounding score by Michael Abels, who also scored Jordan Peele’s Nope, to which this has a few thematic similarities. And, I haven’t even gotten into the fact that Michael Fassbender and Alicia Vikander have prominent roles — but I’m not going to reveal how they figure into the plot here. Many critics are, but to me that spoils too much of the movie.
It’s interesting to see how Hope is already polarizing critics. Some can’t see past the dodgy CGI or the admittedly lengthy running time, but just as many are praising it as one of the most brilliantly executed action films in recent memory, with the Croisette having not seen this much carnage since Fury Road. It’s one of a kind, and a total blast that will no doubt become an instant classic as far as South Korean cult cinema goes. But, in this era where Korean pop culture is gaining a major foothold in North America, it’s nice to see Neon is giving this a wide, blockbuster-style release, as no summer summer action film out of the States this year delivered the same kind of thrills.
Hope opens in theaters this Wednesday.
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