A Korean firecracker of zombie brilliance loaded w. palpable social commentary on traditional Asian themes, pathos, family-drama exposition, mythic cinematography staging, & breathtaking performances. One of the best zombie films ever made. 9.1/10.

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Plot Synopsis: A man (Gong Yoo), his estranged daughter and other passengers become trapped on a speeding train during a zombie outbreak in South Korea.

*Possible Spoilers Ahead*

Review

2/9/2020, 11:30PM EST – ‘And the award for Best Picture goes to… PARASITE’. Few more monumental words have ever been spoken in the movie industry; they completed a trifecta of Best Picture/Director/Original Screenplay for a South Korean film at Hollywood’s most sacred night and cemented the start of a new age of cinematic globalism. A magnifying glass to the wonderful films Asia has to offer led many – and me – to see what action movies they have on tap, and I could not be more stunned at what I found. The nation’s first attempt at the sacred pop culture icon creation of America: zombies.. might be the best movie EVER to tackle the undead. A Korean firecracker of zombie brilliance loaded with palpable social commentary on traditional Asian themes of hyper-cleanliness and order twisted into a heavy metal ballad of velocity and carnage, Train To Busan is a high-octane ride of pathos, magnificent characterization, mythic CGI and cinematography impossibly-staging its pulse-rattling action sequences in a finite cabin space, and breathtaking performances.

The main event of any zombie movie, and what makes or breaks the film/franchise: the undead. Evil Dead, The Walking Dead, Dawn Of The Dead, Night Of The Living Dead, 28 Days Later, [REC]/Quarantine.. the landscape is as packed with flesh-eating franchises as a train/airport terminal the week of Christmas. How can a newcomer pave their way into this oversaturated market and differentiate themselves, when everything’s that’s ever been conceived has been done multiple times over the past 40-50 years? The answer is simple: imagination and genre analysis. The idea of an entire undead movie taking place in the finite cabin spaces of a train – with a couple of sequences in terminals outside just for change-of-scenery – navigating up and down its carts as people get picked off and learn things about themselves and society is quite simply one of the boldest and most daring ideas to ever be attempted in the zombie genre. Gone are the cabins in the woods or entire neighborhoods/cities with millions of hiding places.. these creatures are right in front of you and require a 10x higher craftsmanship and storytelling prowess to make such an impossible idea work. The zombies themselves are fantastic – the most blood-curdling undead I’ve seen since Evil Dead & Exorcist brought to life by amazing VFX, physicality, and a surgical knowledge of the genre picking and choosing what worked best about undead appearances over the years from white eyes to black veins to demonic positions to appetite and willingness to RUN after their prey to unholy screeches for an end-product that will keep you up at night. Brilliance.

‘I’ll bet you never got to play with your [own] daughter. When she gets older [though], she’ll understand why you worked so hard; dads get all the sh*t, and no praise.’ Beyond the walkers and blood-curdling carnage though, TTB sets itself above the competition by being.. somehow, incredibly elegant. The characterization and screenwriting prowess here to fit a family drama of parenthood-commentative existentialism and philosophical discourse on work-life balance, masculinity, capitalism, survival vs. benevolence, coming-of-age, and Good Samaritan-ism is ridiculously impressive. What good is money/power/prestige if your own child never sees you and life falls apart because of it? Is it wrong to act in Darwinistic self-interest over acts of benevolence towards your fellow man, even in the apocalypse? Does unbeknownst complicity in a grand scheme of sadistic proportions make you any less guilty for not questioning it? The characters are beautifully-written and realized by phenomenal performances, from Gong Yoo’s cold, masculine businessman learning to become a father Seok-woo to Ma Dong-Seok’s comic-relief Sang Hwa to Choi Woo-shik’s teenage lovestruck Young-Gook to Kim Ui-Seong’s show-stealing evil villain Yon-suk to Kim Soo-ahn’s heartwarming little girl Su-an.

The film reads like an Oscar-pedigree film that has a lot to say about the world and human condition – unsurprisingly getting nominated at the prestigious Festival Du Cannes, yet is just as entertaining as any blockbuster: one of the few modern films I’ve seen balance the two so beautifully. Train To Busan is a canvas of rich cinematography craftsmanship. Lee Hyung-deok has created a portrait of Asian principles he then subversively flips on themselves when the apocalypse comes. From the opening sequence, there is a hyper-focus on cleanliness, peace, and order/geometry – every set piece and even the natural shots are extremely clean (with no trash, pollution, or any type of visual distractions), singularly-populated, and even given a whitish filter to convey an intense purity and zen balance. Even the hazmat suits are white instead of yellow here – that’s the level of detail and aesthetic work done to reflect multiple Buddhist and Asian cultural identity principles and relax you into a massage-like lather.. to be jarred MASSIVELY when the chaos and pandemonium of the zombie apocalypse comes and bludgeons our peace like a heavy-metal ballad.

The rhythm (echoed by the cinematic score going from softer sounds in ominous tones early-on to hard-crunching drums and synths in the action sequences) is one of the most effective sensory package tricks of zombie cinema – making the action hit harder and out-of-nowhere for maximum efficacy also reflected through magicianship in shot-staging. The limitless crowds of zombies that assault our heroes later-on are captured in impossibly-finite cabin spaces navigating a small train and impossibly-large terminal stations.. all with grace and surgical precision in shot construction. Many of the shots are also symbolic and parabolic – like the roadkill deer and how desensitized we are to nature and the dual-door shot wherein one side has zombies banging on the door to get in and kill and the other side normal people banging on the door to get to safety while being refused by other normal people out of fear and selfishness so as to ask us who is the real monster through Hitchcockian juxtaposition. Hyng-deok has truly crafted one of the most – or THE most – cinematographically-stunning zombie movie ever made.. one anyone with an appreciation for camerawork and technical wizardry must give recognition to.

Flaws are paltry in this miraculous reimagination of what the zombie genre can be. Kim Ui-Seong’s brilliant antagonist and selfish coward sacrificing all others so he can live on Yon-suk is one of the film’s most preeminent highlights, making you hate his character so much by-design that you can’t wait for the inevitable brutality of his death as recompense. The problem is.. he’s given far too kind a death for a satisfying payoff for sacrificing tens of others (even children and people trying to save him) for his own self-interest and survival, one that also happens off-screen and left me whelmed for that evil and effective a pseudo-villain performance. Besides that, a little more exposition on the virus – why, where, when and how did YS Biotech create and release this virus? – would’ve been far welcome and provided a bit more backstory/closure.

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Conclusion

Overall, Train To Busan is now in my Top 3 zombie projects of All-Time, 2nd behind only 28 Days Later for impact and the proverbial test of time – which may end up changing in a couple of years as well with the announcement of a sequel and pop virality in South Korea following its release. It is perhaps the most complete horror-thriller in the last 5-10 years: balancing poignance with viscera; loss with self-discovery; humour with pain; love with the afterlife culminating in that heartbreaking, powerful finale that will not leave a dry eye in the house. A Korean firecracker of zombie brilliance loaded with palpable social commentary on traditional Asian themes of hyper-cleanliness and order twisted into a heavy metal ballad of velocity and carnage, Train To Busan is a high-octane ride of pathos, magnificent characterization, mythic CGI and cinematography impossibly-staging its pulse-rattling action sequences in a finite cabin space, and breathtaking performances. They took our most sacred creation of American pop culture: zombies, and outdid us.. on their first try in a space no larger than a few train cabins. Unreal.

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