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The Host is a crazy crowd pleaser

TOXIC AVENGER: Kang-Ho Song

by MARK SLUTSKY

The undeniable breakout, crowd-pleasing hit of the 2006 Toronto International Film Festival, South Korean director Joon-Ho Bong’s horror-comedy-melodrama The Host, was also a huge hit in its native country when it was released. (In fact, it’s the most lucrative South Korean film ever made.) It’s not hard to see why, as there’s a little something for everyone in this crazy movie: monsters, hilarious hijinks, U.S.-critical political satire, family drama. And though stuffing all that stuff into a movie-sized package makes the film run a little long, it’s still one of the more entertaining films you’re likely to see in theatres this year.

As unlikely as it might sound, the movie’s actually inspired by a real-life incident in 2000 where a U.S. army employee stationed in Korea dumped a bunch of formaldehyde down the drain, which presumably ended up in Seoul’s Han River. The Host opens similarly, with a slimy American doctor ordering his assistant to dump dozens of bottles of toxic chemicals, which percolate into the river.

A couple years later, we meet the dysfunctional family at the heart of the movie’s story: Park Gang-Du (Kang-Ho Song), a loser in his 30s who lives with his young daughter, Hyun-Seo (Ah-Sung Ko), and his dad, Hie-Bong (Hie-Bong Byeon) where they sell snacks and drinks out of a trailer by the river, and, as the movie opens, watch Gang-Du’s estranged sister and national archery champion Nam-Joo (Du-na Bae) on TV. (She, and her bow and arrow, unsurprisingly play a role later in the film.)

They’re interrupted, though, by the appearance of a mutant fish-monster, whose introduction provides the movie’s most memorable action set piece. Emerging from the river, it wreaks havoc on the waterfront, in a long, chaotic and very funny sequence (which I kind of wish had continued in real time for the rest of the movie). It eventually escapes into the sewers, but not before sweeping up little Hyun-Seo.

The rest of the movie follows the family’s rescue attempts, as they contend with authorities (who claim the beast is The Host—get it—of a deadly plague), the U.S. government and of course the monster itself.

The movie’s tone is amazingly strange, as characters veer from hysterical, mournful crying to totally hilarious physical comedy in the same scene, and sometimes at the same time. This is a movie that definitely takes the kind of risks that an American action film would never dare to, and it’s very funny, explicit criticism of the U.S. is the kind of thing you almost never see in this genre.

The Host definitely runs a little too long; it would have done well to pare down some of the comedy, as funny as it can be, and the narrative definitely takes some unnecessary detours. But for its flaws, it’s still more fun than almost any picture to come out of Hollywood in the last few years.

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