The New Film Isn't Likely to Be Stranger Than the Sci-Fi Psychodrama It's Inspired By
Greek avant-garde filmmaker Yorgos Lanthimos specializes in extremely strange movies. His original stories veer into the bizarre, for instance The Lobster, a film where singletons need to find love or else be being turned into animals. When he adapts another creator's story, he often selects source material that’s pretty odd too — odder, maybe, than the version he creates. That was the case for last year's Poor Things, an adaptation of Alasdair Gray’s delightfully aberrant novel, an empowering, open-minded spin on Frankenstein. Lanthimos’ version stands strong, but partially, his particular flavor of oddity and the novelist's cancel each other out.
His New Adaptation
Lanthimos’ next pick to interpret was likewise drawn from far out in left field. The basis for Bugonia, his recent team-up with star Emma Stone, was 2004’s Save the Green Planet!, a perplexing Korean fusion of sci-fi, dark humor, horror, satire, dark psychodrama, and cop drama. It’s a strange film less because of what it’s about — though that is decidedly unusual — rather because of the chaotic extremity of its tone and narrative approach. It’s a wild, wild ride.
The Burst of Korean Film
It seems there was a certain energy in South Korea at the start of the millennium. Save the Green Planet!, written and directed by Jang Joon-hwan, belonged to an explosion of stylistically bold, innovative movies by emerging talents of filmmakers including Bong Joon Ho and Park Chan-wook. It came out alongside the director's Memories of Murder and the filmmaker's Oldboy. Save the Green Planet! isn't as acclaimed as those celebrated works, but it shares many traits with them: extreme violence, morbid humor, sharp societal critique, and bending rules.
The Story Develops
Save the Green Planet! revolves around a disturbed young man who captures a chemical-company executive, believing he’s an alien originating in another galaxy, intent on world domination. At first, the premise is played as broad comedy, and the young man, Lee Byeong-gu (the performer known for Park’s Joint Security Area and Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance), comes across as a charmingly misguided figure. He and his naive entertainer girlfriend Su-ni (the star) wear black PVC ponchos and absurd helmets fitted with psyche-protection gear, and wield balm for defense. Yet they accomplish in abducting drunken CEO Kang Man-shik (Baek Yun-shik) and bringing him to the protagonist's isolated home, a makeshift laboratory assembled in a former excavation in a rural area, home to his apiary.
Shifting Tones
Hereafter, the narrative turns into increasingly disturbing. The protagonist ties Kang into a makeshift device and physically abuses him while spouting bizarre plots, ultimately forcing the gentle Su-ni away. However, Kang isn't helpless; fueled entirely by the belief of his innate dominance, he is prepared and capable to endure terrifying trials in hopes of breaking free and dominate the mentally unstable kidnapper. Meanwhile, a notably inept police hunt to find the criminal gets underway. The officers' incompetence and clumsiness is reminiscent of Memories of Murder, though it’s not so clearly intentional in a film with plotting that appears haphazard and improvised.
Unrelenting Pace
Save the Green Planet! just keeps barrelling onward, driven by its own crazed energy, breaking rules without pause, well past it seems likely it to find stability or falter. Sometimes it seems to be a drama about mental health and excessive drug use; sometimes it’s a metaphorical narrative regarding the indifference of the economic system; sometimes it’s a grimy basement horror or an incompetent police story. Director Jang maintains a consistent degree of hysterical commitment in all scenes, and the performer delivers a standout performance, although the character of Byeong-gu constantly changes among savant prophet, charming oddball, and terrifying psycho in response to the narrative's fluidity across style, angle, and events. I think it's by design, not a flaw, but it might feel pretty disorienting.
Purposeful Chaos
The director likely meant to confuse viewers, mind. Like so many Korean films of its time, Save the Green Planet! is driven by an exuberant rejection for genre limits partly, and a profound fury about human cruelty additionally. It stands as a loud proclamation of a society gaining worldwide recognition during emerging financial and social changes. One can look forward to witness the director's interpretation of this narrative from a current U.S. standpoint — possibly, the other end of the telescope.
Save the Green Planet! can be viewed online at no cost.