Two years before taking Hollywood by storm with Parasite, the first non-English speaking movie to bag an Oscar for Best Film, South Korean director Bong Joon Ho presented in 2017 at Cannes Okja, his second American movie after the promising Snowpiercer in 2013 and a remarkable series of good film made at home.
Originally booed at Cannes because a Netflix production, hence without cinema release, the delicate yet aggressive modern fairytale of Okja was able to make an impact for its good storytelling, something nowadays not always found, and that was able to touch the heart of many viewers.
Mixing elegiac moments, particularly in the first part set in Korea and focused on the delicate relationship between the "beast" Okja, the genetically modified superpig produced by ruthless capitalists, and the "beauty", the young girl with a big lion-heart, with other sof pure action, like the beautifully filmed truck chase through the streets of Seoul, echoing 007 and M:I movies, Okja succeeds in keeping a good narrative balance, solving within the fairytale the problems represented by an excess of leads, interesting but not always properly developed, particularly for some of the Animal Liberation Front characters, and some up and down performance of both Tilda Swinton and, even more so, an usually much more composed Jake Gyllenhaal, that in some scenes look like a Wes Anderson's film waste.
Maybe Okja is not an exceptional movie but it is surely interesting and never banal, even when touching on potentially obvious topics like the juxtaposition between animal rights activists and the foodstuff industry. Indeed, it is a movie worth watching for its crafted narrative, the simple originality of the story and the ability of the director, patently confirmed by Parasite, to master at the same time different tones, like fairytale, comedy, drama, social criticism, making sure that oscillating from one to the other, even when not very linear, never looks forced or imposed. In addition to sprinkle the movie with some hidden quotes for the film buffs, Bong Joon Ho ends the movie with an interesting and open ending, where on purpose there is not a clear winner and the question of who really won the battle, and even more so who will win the war, remains sadly open.
Originally booed at Cannes because a Netflix production, hence without cinema release, the delicate yet aggressive modern fairytale of Okja was able to make an impact for its good storytelling, something nowadays not always found, and that was able to touch the heart of many viewers.
Mixing elegiac moments, particularly in the first part set in Korea and focused on the delicate relationship between the "beast" Okja, the genetically modified superpig produced by ruthless capitalists, and the "beauty", the young girl with a big lion-heart, with other sof pure action, like the beautifully filmed truck chase through the streets of Seoul, echoing 007 and M:I movies, Okja succeeds in keeping a good narrative balance, solving within the fairytale the problems represented by an excess of leads, interesting but not always properly developed, particularly for some of the Animal Liberation Front characters, and some up and down performance of both Tilda Swinton and, even more so, an usually much more composed Jake Gyllenhaal, that in some scenes look like a Wes Anderson's film waste.
Maybe Okja is not an exceptional movie but it is surely interesting and never banal, even when touching on potentially obvious topics like the juxtaposition between animal rights activists and the foodstuff industry. Indeed, it is a movie worth watching for its crafted narrative, the simple originality of the story and the ability of the director, patently confirmed by Parasite, to master at the same time different tones, like fairytale, comedy, drama, social criticism, making sure that oscillating from one to the other, even when not very linear, never looks forced or imposed. In addition to sprinkle the movie with some hidden quotes for the film buffs, Bong Joon Ho ends the movie with an interesting and open ending, where on purpose there is not a clear winner and the question of who really won the battle, and even more so who will win the war, remains sadly open.