The New Film Isn't Likely to Be More Bizarre Than the Science Fiction Psychological Drama It's Inspired By
Greek surrealist filmmaker Yorgos Lanthimos is known for distinctly odd movies. The narratives he creates veer into the bizarre, like The Lobster, a film where singletons must partner up or risk being turned into animals. In adapting existing material, he tends to draw from original works that’s quite peculiar too — odder, perhaps, than his adaptation of it. That was the case regarding the recent Poor Things, an adaptation of author Alasdair Gray's gloriously perverse novel, an empowering, sex-positive spin on Frankenstein. Lanthimos’ version is good, but in a way, his particular flavor of oddity and the novelist's neutralize one another.
His New Adaptation
His following selection for adaptation was likewise drawn from the fringes. The original work for Bugonia, his recent collaboration with star Emma Stone, was 2004’s Save the Green Planet!, a bewildering Korean fusion of science fiction, black comedy, horror, irony, psychological thriller, and cop drama. It’s a strange film not so much for its subject matter — although that's highly unconventional — but for the chaotic extremity of its atmosphere and storytelling style. It’s a wild, wild ride.
The Burst of Korean Film
It seems there was a certain energy in South Korea in the early 2000s. Save the Green Planet!, helmed by Jang Joon-hwan, was included in a surge of audacious in style, groundbreaking movies by emerging talents of filmmakers such as Bong Joon Ho and Park Chan-wook. It debuted the same year as the director's Memories of Murder and Park’s Oldboy. Save the Green Planet! isn’t on the same level as those iconic films, but there are similarities with them: graphic brutality, dark comedy, bitter social commentary, and bending rules.
The Plot Unfolds
Save the Green Planet! focuses on an unhinged individual who abducts a corporate CEO, convinced he is an alien originating in another galaxy, plotting an attack. Early on, that idea unfolds as farce, and the lead, Lee Byeong-gu (the performer from Park’s Joint Security Area and Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance), comes across as an endearing eccentric. He and his childlike acrobat girlfriend Su-ni (the star) don slick rainwear and bizarre masks encrusted with psyche-protection gear, and wield ointment as a weapon. Yet they accomplish in abducting inebriated businessman Kang Man-shik (Baek Yun-shik) and bringing him to Byeong-gu’s remote property, a dilapidated building he’s built at a mining site in the mountains, home to his apiary.
A Descent into Darkness
Moving forward, the story shifts abruptly into increasingly disturbing. Lee fastens Kang to a budget-Cronenberg torture chair and physically abuses him while declaiming absurd conspiracy theories, eventually driving the innocent partner away. But Kang is no victim; driven solely by the certainty of his innate dominance, he is prepared and capable to endure awful experiences just to try to escape and exert power over the mentally unstable protagonist. Meanwhile, a comically inadequate manhunt for the kidnapper begins. The detectives' foolishness and lack of skill is reminiscent of Memories of Murder, although the similarity might be accidental within a story with a narrative that appears haphazard and improvised.
A Frenetic Journey
Save the Green Planet! just keeps barrelling onward, propelled by its own crazed energy, trampling genre norms along the way, well past it seems likely it to find stability or falter. Occasionally it feels like a serious story regarding psychological issues and pharmaceutical abuse; in parts it transforms into a symbolic tale on the cruelty of corporate culture; sometimes it’s a claustrophobic thriller or a bumbling detective tale. Jang Joon-hwan applies equal measure of intense focus to every bit, and the lead actor shines, although the protagonist continuously shifts from savant prophet, charming oddball, and frightening madman depending on the narrative's fluidity in tone, perspective, and plot. It seems it's by design, not a bug, but it can be rather bewildering.
Designed to Confuse
The director likely meant to confuse viewers, of course. In line with various Korean films during that period, Save the Green Planet! draws energy from a gleeful, maximalist disrespect for genre limits in one aspect, and a quite sincere anger about societal brutality additionally. It’s a roaring expression of a nation establishing its international presence amid new economic and artistic liberties. It promises to be intriguing to observe Lanthimos' perspective on this narrative through a modern Western lens — perhaps, an opposite perspective.
Save the Green Planet! is available to stream at no cost.
