Na Hong-jin’s sci-fi monster pic Hope hits North American theaters on September 9 (two days earlier in select formats), and if you're a curious movie enthusiast looking for something different from Spider-Man: Brand New Day and Odyssey's of the world, this just might be the ticket.
Na Hong-jin is an acclaimed South Korean director known for intense horror thrillers and atmospheric sci-fi spectacles. His credits include The Yellow Sea and The Wailing.
Hope is his latest effort, and critics are praising the film for its ambition but are somewhat critical of an underwhelming second half and shaky VFX.
In their review, THR wrote, "The rare action thriller that takes place almost entirely in broad daylight, Hope pulls you in immediately with its virtuoso camerwork, pulse-pounding score, adrenalized pacing and sharply drawn characters."
RogerEbert.com adds, "This bloody, motoring adventure relishes the unease it places on the audience, lulling one into a classic heroic Western before morphing into a surprising creature feature whose recollections of “Predator” and “Prometheus” further reckon with the morality viewers bring into sci-fi flicks."
Variety was a bit more critical, writing, "Perhaps it was always going to be a disappointment. But the weightless, old-school videogame aesthetic of the alien monster design sticks out even further amid the stylishness of the world captured in-camera. And those problems are magnified in the slack middle section of this 160-minute film, as the hunters make discoveries of their own in the forest, unnecessary subplots and aliens multiply, and there are some halfhearted attempts at giving them a thin backstory. "
IndieWire was even more critical, disparaging Hope as a film that,'“might have remained a worthwhile — and compellingly vertiginous — experience if it managed to keep up its previous level of quality after the big reveal, but Na can only keep the momentum going for a few minutes before the rest of the movie starts to become as unimaginative as its monster. "
Deadline focused on the film's surprising use of its A-list cast, writing, "Making use of a starry cast including Michael Fassbender, Alicia Vikander, Taylor Russell and Cameron Britton as the key aliens featured, the former three from the royal family of Gh’ertu, they all play coolly designed and imposing characters from another world, and they speak the special language. "
Keep in mind that most of these early reviews have come by way of the film's premiere at Cannes, earlier this summer, so it's entirely possible that the monster/aliens' VFX have been improved in the months since.
In the remote South Korea village of Hope Harbor, police chief Bum-seok (Hwang Jung- min) and officer Sung-ae (Hoyeon) are called to find a mysterious creature that has wreaked havoc on the village. In the nearby forest, a coterie of hunters, including Sung- ki (Zo In-Sung) set out to track the beast and find themselves hunted instead. But all is not as it seems, and perceptions can be misleading. What begins as ignorance plants the seed of disaster, escalating through human conflict into a tragedy of cosmic proportions.