마더 (Mother) *

I'm a picky audience when it comes to genre, especially when it comes to mystery stories -- which, at its heart, is what Mother is. Don't get me wrong, I'm tough on mysteries because I love a good mystery. And having seen a lot of them, I'll be honest with you: nothing raises my hackles quite as quickly as the old trope of "I don't remember the pertinent information... oh wait, now I remember it all exactly. Just in time, too!" That's a rough hump to get past.

I like when the movie is driven by its characters, but between this and The Host I wonder about Bong's use of quirkiness. I'm of the school of thought that quirky characterization should be the medium, not the message. But still, you felt right along with the characters in this, and in The Host. I liked the convoluted backstory wherein everybody's current predicament is the fault of the main character's previous actions -- felt very Almodovar. I didn't like the convoluted foreground-story that was one big, labyrinthine red herring. I just couldn't connect the dead-end theory to the real story in a meaningful way.

To put it succinctly (something these posts never quite achieve), if I broke this film into an objective pro/con list, I think the cons would weigh out, but there's something in the tone and style of the film that saves it. It's not great, but it's good. I think I like both Bong's other films more, is all.

Seen at the Broadway Multiplex as part of the Portland International Film Festival.

괴물 (The Host)

What a bizarre combination of tones! Not just scary but brutally dark at times, blackly cynical, broad and maudlin, but also adventurous, tragic, hilarious, awkward, and just plain silly. It's a slapstick with really hefty stakes. The closest western film I can think of off the top of my head to the tone of The Host is maybe The Goonies. A ragtag team with a lot of comic relief get in over their head and the stakes are high and the setpieces are actually kinda scary. This film goes both sillier AND scarier than Goonies, but I don't know what else to compare it to. If I was describing this to someone who'd never heard of it, I guess I might say it's like the Griswolds from Vacation vs. the monster from Cloverfield.

Really surprised with a lot of the twists in this story, the team-protagonist thing, and the tragic elements at the end (which I won't give away). A little confused on the timeline of when the Bronze-medal archer sister and the unemployed grad student brother pass out and wake up, or even how many days or hours are meant to pass throughout this story... on first watching my gut tells me they're playing a little loose with the chronology of events here, but otherwise it's a totally engaging, fun movie. I'm going to have to go back and rewatch Memories of Murder sometime soon. It's been years.