Directed by: Yeon Sang-ho
Official Selection at Cannes Film Festival 2020.
This film is the sequel to Train to Busan (2016). They are zombie films. I loved Train to Busan - for the kind of visual storytelling it had. I remember my grandmother could understand every little nuances, even without following the subtitles. That film was a well made zombie film, mainly for the acting, and the depth in the storytelling - unlike a random zombie movie - which only banks on the action.
With this film, I was disappointed - because the film has very little portions where the film feels like this is not just a zombie film. Apart from the characterization of the kids, the initial prologue, the caged game between the zombies and the people, and the ending 15-20 minutes - the whole film is just people trying to survive the zombies. The VFX was weird at a lot of places, especially the car chase sequences. The action choreography too felt, a little over the board - this wouldn't have been a problem if this was a regular zombie franchise movie - here I was expecting some layers and nuance, considering the earlier film and also because it got an official selection at Cannes.
The way they were leading up to the ending, I thought that they would have the woman survive by her daughter - something that Bong Joon-ho usually does. The sudden flip in the ending, felt convenient. Although, because of the way Yeon extracts performances out of the actors in such scenes - we buy into it. I was also wondering why sequels of films generally have the film set in a darker/ a more gloomy world than the previous ones. It's a decent film, I expected a lot more out of it.
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