Hope

Epic, long, and ultimately pointless.

Na Hong-jin's latest film, Hope, premiered at the Cannes Film Festival and quickly became one of the most divisive titles of the lineup, generating reactions ranging from absolute praise to complete confusion.

The story follows Hope Harbor, a small settlement located near the demilitarized zone. One day, the local sheriff notices something tearing through the village, destroying everything in its path and killing anyone unlucky enough to cross it. A group of hunters heads into the surrounding forests to track the creature down, while Sheriff Bum-seok joins the hunt with the help of several people he encounters along the way. The pursuit eventually leads to a creature, which was initially believed to be a tiger, being hit by a truck and killed. Upon closer inspection, however, it becomes clear that this is something humanity has never encountered before. As the village struggles to recover from the destruction, deaths, and countless injuries left behind, another revelation emerges: there is more than one creature, and they are not from Earth.

Hope begins as a genuinely solid action film with colorful characters, a strong atmosphere, and absolutely incredible production design. It has been described as one of the most expensive films in South Korean history, and judging by the sheer scale of the sets, especially during the first half of the film, it is easy to see where the money went. During the village chase sequences, it genuinely feels as if an entire town was built or rented specifically for the production. It looks expensive, it looks impressive, and it creates a real sense of excitement.

For the first forty minutes, we watch an epic chase sequence. Then it stops, only to return shortly afterward. After that, we get a chase through abandoned buildings, a chase through fields, a chase through forests, another chase through the village, another chase through fields, several more through forests, and eventually a chase on the road.At some point, the chase becomes the entire film.

In the end, Hope spends more than two hours simply chasing things. Here and there we get a few minutes of people trying to understand what happened, what these creatures are, and what can be done about them. But every time the story starts moving forward, it is interrupted by another fifteen-minute chase sequence, then returns for two minutes of plot before launching into another chase. Eventually, the whole thing feels absolutely endless.

The story itself contains enough material for a strong one-hour action movie. It certainly does not justify a 160-minute runtime.

And once the film moves away from its expensive practical sets and enters territory that relies heavily on visual effects, things get even worse. The VFX are an absolute disaster. The creatures themselves look unintentionally funny and often downright bad. The designs leave a lot to be desired, and nearly everything associated with these alien beings ends up looking strange for all the wrong reasons.

Watching the gala screening at Cannes was at least entertaining because the audience reacted very loudly whenever certain characters appeared on screen. The cast is probably the film's strongest asset and one of the few things actually attempting to push the story forward. Hwang Jung-min and Zo In-sung do solid work, while the audience erupted when Hoyeon appeared as the rookie cop.

But the further the film goes, the more obvious it becomes that it is trying to show absolutely nothing for as long as possible. After sitting through two hours of chase scenes and maybe thirty minutes of actual story, you expect some kind of epic conclusion that finally reveals the point of it all. Instead, the film commits its biggest mistake: it does not end. It merely hints that a sequel may be coming.

Unfortunately, the screenplay, visual effects, and overall concept let the project down, as does the apparent desire to turn it into a larger franchise. The only elements truly deserving of praise are the cast and the production designers responsible for creating the film's impressive physical world.

4/10