Buffalo Film: Movie is by turns baffling, cheap and … impressive?

By Matthew Turner
(Image above: (L-R) Hwang Jung-min and Hoyeon in ‘Hope’)

Hope brings viewers one of the most baffling, unfortunately cheap and risky science fiction films in recent memory, while also being one of the best.

Anyone that is tuned into the famous Cannes Film Festival has undoubtedly heard about the messy epic that is Hope. Korea’s largest film production in history, with a budget that would make American blockbusters scoff, the film was primarily ridiculed following its premiere at the prestigious ceremony for its rough CGI (computer generated images) and messy plot.

The film has now hit theaters as an action epic, heavier on comic relief with about 40 minutes excised. Casual moviegoers, as well as us film nerds that hyper analyze these festivals, for better and for worse, will sit in the theater for 140 minutes with pure confusion flooding the brain. In the case of those that care too much about CGI, you can add a splash of pure disgust into that pool of confusion.

Before the CGI becomes the highlight of yet another Hope reaction, this movie deserves its flowers. Director Na Hong-jin, with his first film since 2016’s The Wailing, commands the screen with such limited resources that one can only imagine what he could do with a blank check.

A creature feature with non-stop action, sprawling landscapes and comic relief that makes us feel for the characters instead of cringing at them is worthy of respect at the very least. Akin to 2023’s universally loved monster film Godzilla Minus One, Hope drops us right into the action from the get-go, and presents us with underdog characters with big personalities and real arcs.

Whereas Hope and Godzilla Minus One achieve all these feats with lower budgets, just under $50 million USD for Hope and $10 million USD for Godzilla Minus One, American blockbusters pull off the same old arcs and mega destruction that are meant to make us cheer with budgets that could go toward art that isn’t propagandized.

Take any blockbuster action film or superhero property to come out of America in the past five years. The buildings collapse, flames engulf what is assumed to contain civilians while the camera and effects are focused on slickness and cool factor. How cool was that? King Kong just demolished a city, but at least baby kong is cute and funny! We feel nothing.

We get desensitized to it and celebrate it with lighthearted ease. There is nothing wrong with mindless destruction, but at what point do these films feel inhuman. Especially with these large films’ productions embracing AI (I’m looking at you Marvel), there is no human element attached. There is no pathos to be found.

Hope, in the footsteps of Godzilla Minus One, brings viewers destruction on a large-scale through a shocked lens that is able to be more human. When people shoot first and ask questions later, we are scared for humanity lost. There is no HOO-RAH when these creatures approach human characters and they empty their clips in response. There is a somberness that makes these films feel human, while focusing on creatures with more humanity than can usually be found in the local multiplex.

Hope follows the residents of Hope Harbor going under an investigation as something, or someone, has started to slay the cattle on the outskirts of the village. Before much longer however, the small, suffering police force needs to step up its game as humans have become the feast of choice.

Through the flawed and fascinating audience surrogates: Ko-Bum-seok, the reluctant police chief portrayed by Hwang Jung-min, and the young and excited Im Sung-ae, portrayed by Jung Ho-yeun with a bad-ass mentality that brings Ellen Ripley and Sarah Connor to mind, we feel every injury sustained and beg for resolution with the characters.

The leads carry viewers through the destruction with an empathetic eye that is sorely missed in American cinema. Blood, sweat and tears consume these characters until they do not know who they are anymore. The unspeakable horrors that flood the harbor, leaving rubble and corpses in its wake disorientate these officers as well as the viewers.

It is not picking sides, it is empathizing with each side of the battle, and losing respect or gaining sympathy as each layer is uncovered. It is a film about humanity. How we react, how rash we are and how unlikely that is to change.

It is not a celebratory splatter-fest that makes us cheer for violence. It is a moving epic that seeks to cause celebration for the craft of cinema and the truthful feelings that we are forced to introspectively process. Without ruining more of the plot and character traits, I must implore viewers to know nothing about the fantastically bonkers plot that left my jaw dropped until the credits.

If the major concern holding hesitant readers back is aged CGI, then I can comfortably say that Hope is not for you. I can also comfortably say, maybe movies are not for you.

If one is not willing to overlook one of the most real, human, impressive, big, confident and practical effects production because it does not look as smooth as the polished war commercial, then cinema is truly in a place of dystopia.

For others, Hope is a beacon of, drumroll please … hope. The film has big ideas and requires big thoughts about the world, and that is what large-scale cinema needs right now. It is one of the most impressive and confounding sci-fi feats that I have ever witnessed, and here’s hoping that more gems like Hope can make it to cinemas alive and untampered.