Will filmgoers rally behind space travelers who “hate dying” but keep courting death?
The director who gave us Parasite, a cool, curmudgeonly social comedy, is challenging filmgoers with a big-budget, genre-bending epic titled Mickey 17 that will likely be a tougher sell.
Fans of Bong Joon Ho’s movies (Bong-heads, they call themselves) will now have to deal with dystopian class warfare spearheaded by a Donald Trump leader (Mark Ruffalo) who disdains “Expendables.” Loud and orange, he has big ambitions for a frozen planet that’s as hospitable as a hockey rink. Jeopardy lurks everywhere: Even sex is death defying.
Mickey 17 is a $120 million satire – “one that may challenge the public mood,” observes one veteran distributor, who readily admits that no one understands the “public mood.” Robert Pattinson adeptly plays Mickey 17 and is resigned to become Mickey 18 too, and beyond, as he’s meticulously “re-printed” after every death.
Warner Bros appreciates the Bong-head enthusiasm for Mickey but worries that the older art film crowd tends to be slow in discovering hot new products — especially satires about capitalistic over-reach.
It was Sydney Pollack who once said that “gurus who claim to know the public mood are full of sh*t.” When Pollack cast Dustin Hoffman in Tootsie, his distributor warned him that ticket buyers weren’t in “the gender-bending mood.” His movie was a hit.
A highlight of Bong’s new movie is a raucous performance by Ruffalo, who is both loud and orange. One problem: protagonists in satires have usually had to survive dim openings before becoming cult movies.
For example: Think Peter Sellers in either Being There or Dr Strangelove. Or Harold in Harold and Maude. Or James Coburn in The President’s Analyst. Or even the marvelously crazed Tim Curry in The Rocky Horror Picture Show, both on stage, on screen or in jail.
Warner Bros, which will likely allocate $80 million to promote Mickey 17, will pray for quicker adulation. They have reason for optimism because Bong is an adept entertainer and Oscar winner.
“Bong has this joyfulness to him,” Pattison testifies. “We were shooting this montage of grotesque deaths and I still appreciated his lightness of touch.”
Also dying in addition to his protagonists are legions of “creepers,” armadillo-like creatures who make shrieking noises and like icy surroundings. The creepers are less than loveable but still clever enough to avoid the skin-burning ovens. They ultimately set Mickey free – apparently all the Mickeys, in fact.
In interviews, the director professes his empathy for Mickey but especially for the studio marketing team for memorializing the movie’s accident-prone cast of characters. “I know they have a very hard job to do,” he says, adding, “I create a movie but don’t think about the risks.”
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