- Director: Bong Joon Ho
- Screenplay: Bong Joon Ho
- Cast: Robert Pattinson, Naomi Ackie, Steven Yeun, Toni Collette, Mark Ruffalo
- Cinematography: Darius Khondji
- Editing: Yang Jin-mo
- Score: Jung Jae-il
- Genre: Science fiction black comedy
- Runtime: 137 minutes
‘Oh Mickey, you’re so fine.
You’re so fine, you keep on dyin’.
Hey Mickey, hey Mickey.’
Which Mickey though? Mickey Barnes’ luck has run out on Planet Earth and with no options left, gets recruited to work as an ‘expendable’ in a colonising space mission. With all his memories and personality quirks intact (saved in a high-tech brick), Mickey’s body is merely a tool; used until no longer deemed necessary (upon the point of death), incinerated in a furnace, then printed out by a cloning device ad infinitum. He’s stabbed, gassed, poisoned, used as a guinea pig to manufacture an antidote – you name it. ‘What does it feel like to die?’, pretty much everyone asks him.
With moments of black humour, Bong Joon Ho’s epic science fiction fable (his first feature since ‘Parasite‘) muses on mortality – removing the idea of finality of life makes these expendables (or ‘print jobs’) less human, more akin to recyclable cattle. Mickey is told he’s special when he’s freshly printed but his existence is meaningless and he’s consigned to gruelling labour and eating bland food – what’s so special about it?
In fact, he suffers an accident during an assignment on the icy world Nilfheim and scientists have already generated the next iteration before the previous one has been declared dead, leading to a case of ‘multiples’. They’re not twins, they are the same person in two corporeal forms. As if he’s looking in a mirror.
Robert Pattinson is great in the dual role of Mickeys 17 and 18. The entire cast delivers strong performances; Naomi Ackie as a ballsy security officer (and Mickey’s love interest), Mark Ruffalo as the egotistical head of the colony and Toni Collette as his Lady Macbeth-style wife with an obsession with sauce. The second half delves into the political side of the expedition, with Ruffalo’s character taking centre stage, a little too reminiscent of a certain president. Gorgeously shot throughout, there may be multiple Mickeys, but there’s only one Bong Joon Ho.
My rating: 9 / 10
SilverScreen 