Alien Concept
Choi Dong-hoon’s ambitious, polished, genre-mashing nonsense could have been a bonkers treat had anyone decided to have a laugh.
Alienoid
Director: Choi Dong-hoon • Writer: Choi Dong-hoon
Starring: Ryu Jun-yeol, Kim Woo-bin, Kim Tae-ri, So Ji-sub, Yum Jung-ah, Jo Woo-jin, Kim Eui-sung, Lee Ha-nee, Shin Jung-geun, Lee Si-hoon
South Korea • 2hrs 22mins
Opens Hong Kong August 18 • IIB
Grade: C+
About half way into Choi Dong-hoon’s Alienoid | 외계+인 1부, time-displaced warrior Ean (Kim Tae-ri, Space Sweepers), captive in a Goryeo-era prison, defiantly flips her jailers the bird. You see, Ean actually grew up in 2000s Seoul, so she’s a modern girl. But she was born in Goryeo. Anyway, the two prison guards look at her, then look up towards the sky, trying to figure out what she’s pointing at. It’s a genuinely funny little moment in a silly, martial arts-magic-space aliens-time travel hodgepodge, and it’s about the only funny moment. The rest of Choi’s latest is very serious. Given Alienoid’s inherent goofiness it’s truly baffling there isn’t more humour in it.
Now, it must be said, Alienoid is most definitely not lacking in ambition the way it’s lacking in jokes. Choi, best known for comedy (see?) crime thrillers Tazza: The High Rollers and The Thieves is swinging for the fences here. He whiffs it most of the time, but during this age of the cookie cutter it’s refreshing to see a film so completely off its nut. There are some high points, some strong visuals (a thick red atmosphere killing smoke sweeping through Seoul looks fabulous) and committed performances, but Alienoid gets lost in the mire for too long in Act 2 to make the relative narrative redemption of Act 3 count.
This guy is coming to 2022. For sure
Okay. So hold onto your shorts: In Goryeo-era Korea, a Guard (Kim Woo-bin, Master) and his trusty… floating robot pal Thunder? come busting through a rift in the space-time continuum in an SUV to re-apprehend an escaped prisoner from… their planet? by pulling it from its human host and stuffing it in a portable thermos or something and head back to 21st century Korea. Okay. But the Guard’s robot pal who also morphs into the form of the Guard brought an abandoned infant from the 14th century with him, so now they have what will inevitably be a precocious daughter; she’s the picture of “Stay in the house, Carl.” (Sorry, that will be triggering for The Walking Dead viewers.) The Guard puts the escapee into a holding cell? raising the question of why bother with human hosts. Anyway. In modern Seoul 10 years later, another ship full of cons from Planet X (I don’t know where it’s from) arrives, and a rebel leader? takes over the body of a friendly neighbourhood cop, Moon Du-seok (TV drama staple So Ji-sub). Uh oh.
Back in ancient Goryeo, clumsy, budding Dosa Muruk (Ryu Jun-yeol, A Taxi Driver) and the henchmen he keeps stored in his fan – consciousnesses are stored in all manner of inanimate objects in Alienoid – rival Taoist magicians, Chung-woon (Jo Woo-jin, Seobok) and Heuk-seol (Yum Jung-ah, Steel Rain 2: Summit), and some kind of weird cult leader? who runs around in a mask all the time (Kim Eui-sung, Train to Busan) are all looking for a Divine Blade that… I don’t know. It’s got power. Also on the trail of this blade is Ean (Kim makes the adult version far more engaging), who’s come home in a way. When all is said and done, Muruk has a massive revelation, the Taoist magicians change allegiances and the cult might get a new leader. That’s the end of Part 1. Part 1!
Well that doesn’t look very Goryeo
That’s only partially as nutty – and convoluted – as Alienoid actually is. I’ll say it again: kudos to Choi for trying something new, even as he mines The Avengers, every kung fu film ever made, and Superman II (fingers crossed we eventually get to see the alien lifeforms in a floating space mirror). But that’s not a bad thing. Sadly, this is Choi’s first significant flop, which will probably put any other outside-the-box films in the development pipeline on the chopping block – for the wrong reasons. The trouble with Alienoid is not its strange mix of genres and styles, it’s its unnecessarily complicated story – which has little to do with time jumping. Alienoid is cursed with, as of the end of Part 1, dangling plot threads, suddenly crucial characters and logic gaps that are likely to just leave viewers shaking their heads. Choi’s traditionally nimble storytelling and deft ability to keep multiple balls in the air seem to have failed him this time. Admittedly there’s nothing that says this won’t come together in orgasmic harmony at the end of Part 2, but for now it’s a waiting game to see where Hong Kong’s great genre experiment lands. Stay tuned. — DEK