Krishna
This became famous all over the world, even before Pandemic won the Best Movie in Oscar and established South Korea as an entertainer who punches above its economic weight.
After resisting seeing a ‘zombie’ movie for quite a while, I was persuaded to see this and I am glad that I did. The contrast with The Walking Dead is clear. In that famous TV series also the zombie acopalypse is the backdrop but there the story is not about the zombies at all. They are there to provide a sense of menace in the environment in the background but it is all about how people behave when law and order breaks down and there is anarchy everywhere – caused by the zombies.
Here, though, the zombie problem is real and all the energy of the people who are still normal is expended in not falling prey to the increasing hordes of the zombies. And most of the action happens in a train.
The main focus of the story is on a father daughter duo. The stage is set for the spread of the problem in the first scene, where a truck driver finds out that there was a leak in a nuclear power plant but ‘everything is OK and it is being cleaned up’. When he hits a deer and drives away, it just gets up after being dead. The game is on.
The convenient source of a nuclear leak causing this is pure comic book logic but then who is looking for logic and reason in this movie that is there for the pure adrenalin inducing thrill ride?
Meanwhile, back to the father daughter duo. The father is a fund manager called Saek-Woo. Busy making money, he does not have enough time for his family, causing his wife to leave him. He has the daughter Su-An. He agrees to take his daughter to see her mother who lives in Busan.
Despite seeing several odd things – burning buildings, lots of emergency vehicles about in teh city – he goes to the station and boards the train. We get glimpses of what is going on as the train leaves the station and one man is brought down by what looks like a crazed person – a clever sneak peek of what is to come.
The train contains several other characters – a working class man Sang Hwa with his pregnant wife Seong-kyeong (yes, it rhymes, I noticed), a school group going for a baseball tournament (both boys and girls) and a tough CEO Yon-suk with a puffed up sense of self importance and utter lack of empathy, as it turns out.
As the train leaves, a lone woman manages to board it with a gash in her leg, and shortly after it manages to leave the platform, the guard on the station is overcome by a group of rabid humans – zombies. They miss the train just by seconds – or do they really?
The tension starts when the lone lady goes into convulsions – her eye colour changes remarkably – and then starts biting into fellow passengers who all go through the same conversion dance.
The rest of the story is all about the main group trying to stay one step ahead of the rampaging crowd of zombies who not only are trying to take over this train but also have taken over major cities and practically all of the country.
The movie is one nonstop thrill ride and the antics of the people who try to protect themselves is good. The character Sang-Hwa mixes humour with heroics to keep the momentum going.
If I am not to give away the ending, I perhaps should stop here. The movie is definitely worth watching, if you want a totally entertaining experience.
The only pity is that most of us cannot understand the language and so have to follow the story via the subtitles. Even so, it is a fun ride. Don’t look for any deep logic in it and just go for the ride.
Yes, there are mini lessons like how the busy Saek-Woo realizes that family is more important than making money and other small realizations of many of the characters.
A good romp if you are feeling in the mood for some mindless entertainment
6/10
= = Krishna