“Those on board must survive!”
Don’t you love it when a movie lives up to the hype? I’ve had people recommend Train to Busan to me for years, to the point where I’m now mad at myself for waiting so long to watch it. It’s a modern classic of the zombie genre, easily the best zombie movie of this young century. It’s frenetic, tense, heartbreaking, and – well, there’s a ton of adjectives you could use to describe Train to Busan. They all add up to the same thing: this film is pretty damn near perfect.
The thing that Train to Busan does with excellence is give you a reason to care about everyone on screen. It does so in an unconventional way, though, by first showing us that our protagonist, Seok-woo, is an inattentive father who cares more about money than his relationship with his daughter, Su-an. (For her birthday, he gets her a new Wii, which he had already given her months prior.) Beyond that, he’s a hedge fund manager, which is all part of Train to Busan‘s look at the class warfare between the haves and have-nots (much like Snowpiercer, another film from a Korean director that takes place on a train). It’s no wonder, then, that Su-an wants to visit her mother in Busan for her birthday. Seok-woo reluctantly agrees to escort her.
Director Sang-ho Yeon expertly builds dread as people board the train, amid reports of riots and some sort of biological outbreak. We know something awful is going to happen soon, and we meet the characters it’s going to happen to. The best parts of Train to Busan are silent and fluid – no jump scares here – and this is best illustrated with the shot of an infected woman staggering on board with everyone unaware. Soon the carnage begins, and the film starts to make its true point.
Pretty much any zombie story – The Walking Dead, Dawn of the Dead, Night of the Living Dead, etc – is really about how humans deal with the apocalypse. Train to Busan fits into this mold, but that’s a feature, not a bug. Even our protagonist shuts the door on two people, Sang-hwa and his pregnant wife Seong-kyeong, because he doesn’t think they’ll make it in. It’s not done out of selfishness, but out of plain pragmatism. Sung-hwa is rightfully pissed at Seok-woo, and so are we, but who in that situation would do something different? I can’t honestly say that I would.
The zombie design is incredible. The actors move with jerky, halting movements, and resemble nothing more than a hivemind as they throw themselves (sometimes literally) at the survivors. Unlike zombies that American viewers might be used to seeing – i.e. heavy on the gore – these are a wholly unique design, looking like something out of a Junji Ito manga: all black veins and cloudy blue eyes. In a very cool detail, they can’t see in the dark, and are left to find their way by hearing.
And make no mistake: this movie is smart, and sad, but it also absolutely whips ass. Just completely rips shit and rules so hard. The action is terrifically well-shot and -edited; everything is clear and easy to follow, with a sense of stakes that never feels as though anyone is safe. One bravura sequence, which recalls the hallway scene in Oldboy, sees Seok-woo, Sung-hwa, and a young baseball player named Young-guk fight their way through four train cars of rabid zombies. There’s punching, kicking, stealth, ingenuity – everything you could conceivably want out of an action movie. Train to Busan is able to be an action movie, a horror movie, and an allegory at the same time.
Its ultimate message is one of hope and sacrifice. No one is better than anyone else, no matter what their social class. This is made flesh with the character of Yon-suk, who introduces himself as a COO, believing this gives him dominion over everyone. Even in a movie full of zombies, Yon-suk is the villain. This is a man who literally feeds people to zombies so he can save his own hide, so certain is he that his life has more inherent worth than anyone else’s. That notwithstanding, he also gets a heartbreaking scene of his own, showing he’s just a scared human like everyone else. Train to Busan affords everyone their own interiority, and is far better for it.
It’s so hard to bring anything new to the zombie genre. Shaun of the Dead made it funny, 28 Days Later made them fast. But so much of the genre is forgettable or just plain crappy. Train to Busan brings something else to the genre: excellence. It’s not just a great zombie movie – it might be the best zombie movie ever made.
Thursday, 10/1: Phantasm
Friday, 10/2: Frozen
Saturday, 10/3: Suspiria
Sunday, 10/4: Suspiria (2018)
Monday, 10/5: Emelie
Tuesday, 10/6: Castle Freak
Wednesday, 10/7: Session 9
Thursday, 10/8: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2
Friday, 10/9: We Are Still Here
Saturday, 10/10: The Changeling
Sunday, 10/11: The Bad Seed
Monday, 10/12: Verotika
Tuesday, 10/13: The Legend of Hell House
Wednesday, 10/14: Lake Mungo
Thursday, 10/15: Puppetmaster
Friday, 10/16: Marrowbone
Saturday, 10/17: A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master
Sunday, 10/18: Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers
Monday, 10/19: Sweetheart
Tuesday, 10/20: Girl On the Third Floor
Wednesday, 10/21: Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon
Thursday, 10/22: Triangle
Friday, 10/23: Dog Soldiers
Saturday, 10/24: Noroi: The Curse
Sunday, 10/25: Train to Busan
Monday, 10/26: Tales From the Hood
Tuesday, 10/27: Mandy
Wednesday, 10/28: Sometimes They Come Back
Thursday, 10/29: Veronica
Friday, 10/30: The Wicker Man
Saturday, 10/31: Child’s Play
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