The New Film Couldn't Be Weirder Than the Science Fiction Psychodrama It's Adapted From

Greek surrealist director Yorgos Lanthimos specializes in highly unusual movies. His original stories veer into the bizarre, for instance The Lobster, in which unattached individuals are compelled to form relationships or face transformed into creatures. Whenever he interprets another creator's story, he tends to draw from basis material that’s rather eccentric also — more bizarre, perhaps, than his adaptation of it. This proved true regarding the recent Poor Things, an adaptation of Alasdair Gray’s gloriously perverse novel, a feminist, open-minded take on Frankenstein. The director's adaptation stands strong, but partially, his particular flavor of weirdness and Gray’s balance each other.

Lanthimos’ Next Pick

Lanthimos’ next pick to bring to screen also came from the fringes. The source text for Bugonia, his latest collaboration with acclaimed performer Emma Stone, is 2004’s Save the Green Planet!, a perplexing Korean mix of styles of science fiction, dark humor, terror, satire, psychological thriller, and cop drama. It’s a strange film not primarily due to what it’s about — though that is highly unconventional — rather because of the chaotic extremity of its atmosphere and storytelling style. It’s a wild, wild ride.

A New Wave of Filmmaking

There likely existed a creative spirit within the country during that period. Save the Green Planet!, the work of Jang Joon-hwan, was part of a boom of stylistically bold, boundary-pushing movies from a new generation of filmmakers including Bong Joon Ho and Park Chan-wook. It came out alongside Bong’s Memories of Murder and Park’s Oldboy. Save the Green Planet! isn't as acclaimed as those celebrated works, but there are similarities with them: extreme violence, dark comedy, sharp societal critique, and genre subversion.

The Plot Unfolds

Save the Green Planet! focuses on an unhinged individual who abducts a chemical-company executive, convinced he is an alien from the planet Andromeda, with plans to invade Earth. At first, the premise unfolds as slapstick humor, and the young man, Lee Byeong-gu (Shin Ha-kyun known for Park’s Joint Security Area and Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance), comes across as an endearing eccentric. Alongside his childlike circus-performer girlfriend Su-ni (the star) don slick rainwear and bizarre masks adorned with anti-mind-control devices, and wield menthol rub for defense. However, they manage in seizing drunken CEO Kang Man-shik (the performer) and taking him to a secluded location, a ramshackle house/lab assembled at a mining site in the mountains, home to his apiary.

A Descent into Darkness

Moving forward, the film veers quickly into something more grotesque. Byeong-gu straps Kang to a budget-Cronenberg torture chair and physically abuses him while declaiming outlandish ideas, eventually driving the gentle Su-ni away. However, Kang isn't helpless; driven solely by the conviction of his own superiority, he can and will to endure awful experiences in hopes of breaking free and exert power over the clearly unwell younger man. Simultaneously, a comically inadequate investigation for the abductor commences. The cops’ witlessness and clumsiness echoes Memories of Murder, even if the similarity might be accidental in a film with plotting that seems slapdash and unrehearsed.

A Frenetic Journey

Save the Green Planet! continues racing ahead, fueled by its wild momentum, defying conventions without pause, long after you might expect it to calm down or run out of steam. Sometimes it seems as a character study on instability and pharmaceutical abuse; in parts it transforms into a fantasy allegory regarding the indifference of corporate culture; sometimes it’s a claustrophobic thriller or a sloppy cop movie. Director Jang applies equal measure of hysterical commitment in all scenes, and Shin Ha-kyun is excellent, even though the character of Byeong-gu constantly changes from visionary, charming oddball, and terrifying psycho depending on the film's ever-changing tone across style, angle, and events. It seems that’s a feature, not a flaw, but it can be quite confusing.

Designed to Confuse

The director likely meant to unsettle spectators, indeed. In line with various Korean films during that period, Save the Green Planet! draws energy from a joyful, extreme defiance for stylistic boundaries on one side, and a quite sincere anger about societal brutality in another respect. It stands as a loud proclamation of a culture finding its global voice during emerging financial and cultural freedoms. One can look forward to witness how Lanthimos views this narrative through a modern Western lens — arguably, the other end of the telescope.

Save the Green Planet! is available to stream for free.