In these films, creatures and cartoon characters live among us
“Hope”
⭐⭐1/2 Rating: 2.5 out of 4
For those who relish Korean creature-feature flicks laced with social commentary — think “The Host” (2006) or the gonzo zombie blast “Train to Busan” (2016) — “Hope” may scratch your itch. But be advised, you’ll be nearly an hour in before the first beastie rears its ugly head (I’m being colloquial, not judging beauty), and the film runs nearly three hours. Set in a small seaside town where residents work the earth and harvest fruits de mer, the chief of police, Bum-seok (Hwang Jung-min), is called out to investigate a mutilated bull — a scene that feels lifted from the opener of “Busan.” (Incidentally, Director Yeon Sang-ho’s ten-year followup, “Colony,” also opens in theaters this week, but not in Camberville.) Puzzled by the grim disemboweling — a tiger is suspected — Bum-seok makes his way back to his department’s humble headquarters, but the streets of the cloistered village are strangely desolate, several buildings have been laid to waste, and blood is smeared on walls like a bad stab at an alfresco Rothko. The ominous scene is punctuated by the echo of gunfire, coupled with loud sonorous growls — and every now and then, a car sails through the air and crashes through a rooftop. It’s a riveting build-up, orchestrated with adroit skill by director Na Hong-jin and his filmmaking crew: The choreography is critically tight, the set work impeccable, and Bum-seok’s hyperbolic reactions add a splash of comedy to the taut suspense. Then, just as all hell breaks loose, one of Bum-seok’s deputies, Sung-ae (Hoyeon, “Squid Game”), zips in on cue to demonstrate her boss-level grenade-launching and F1 driving skills.
Loath to give away further details, I’ll just say Grendel would be smiling. The second half of the film doesn’t quite marry up to the blistering start; action sequences go on too long, likely an indulgence of cheap CGI. The narrative, too — which, like “The Host,” hinges on human folly — gets weak in the knees late, and the premise, never deepened enough, begins to sag. As “Hope” wraps, it feels like you’ve just seen Part 1 of a two-parter — and clearly something that could have been made tighter and sharper with better editing and narrative restraint. Na hadn’t made a film in a decade since “The Wailing” in 2016, and if that was the full incubation period of “Hope,” perhaps it cooked too long. If you’re curious about the title, Hope Harbor is the fictional inlet where the action takes place. The film also boasts international stars Michael Fassbender and Alicia Vikander as the voices of the shape-shifting humanoids dislocated and in conflict.
“Coyote vs. Acme”
⭐⭐1/2 Rating: 2.5 out of 4
Back in 1949, Wile E. Coyote made his screen debut in the cartoon short “Fast and Furry-ous,” cinematic eons before Vin Diesel, Dwayne Johnson, and John Cena lent their beefy forms to the muscle-car maverick franchise of a similar name. Interestingly enough, in this toon and live-action romp (cartoon characters and humans coexist in the same world, à la “Who Framed Roger Rabbit”), Cena shares the screen with Wile E. (voiced by Eric Bauza) as Buddy Crane, Acme Corporation’s chief corporate counsel. As we know from the Warner Brothers’ canon of Looney Tunes archives, Wile E. has been after the Road Runner for decades but never can quite lay a paw on the desert flash since the products he purchases from Acme — rocket-powered roller skates, a magnetic glove, the classic anvil, and so on — all backfire and leave the coyote mangled or flattened. But toons can pop right back, right? Maybe yes, maybe no — that’s part of a dark twist behind Project Sisyphus, an Acme undertaking that I’ll say no more about.
The plot launches when Wile E., finally fed up with the endless cycle of frustration, hires a two-bit Albuquerque attorney, Kevin Avery (a generic Will Forte), to sue Acme for shilling faulty products. Forte’s firm — Avery, Jones & Maltese — is named in honor of Looney Tunes legends Tex Avery, Chuck Jones and Michael Maltese. The action ultimately moves from the desert to the courtroom, where Acme acts like a corporate big à la Amazon or Walmart — but back when Avery, Jones and Maltese were cooking up Wile E. and Looney Tunes, the concept of a corporate giant was just beginning to loom. The story is based on a 1990 New Yorker satire by Ian Frazier and adapted by Samy Burch — screenwriter of “Late Fame” (which just played at the Brattle) and “May December” (2023) — with creative input from James Gunn (“The Suicide Squad,” “Guardians of the Galaxy”) and directed by David Green. The courtroom drama gets a tad long in the tooth, but there are some surprising reveals — notably from the Road Runner, who communicates only in beep-beeps, and many Looney toon cameos, including Elmer Fudd, Daffy Duck, Tweety Bird, and Foghorn Leghorn. “Coyote vs. Acme” was completed back in 2022-23 but has taken a long road to the screen amid the reorganization and sale of Warner Bros. It’s no “Roger Rabbit,” but it’s a palatable alternate-reality mash-up.
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