‘Hope’ Review: It’s Aliens Vs. South Korean Villagers In Na Hong-Jin’s Wild Non-Stop Action-Driven Genre Movie – Cannes Film Festival

Much has been written about this year’s Cannes Film Festival being ignored by studios and crowd-pleasing blockbuster type movies, in favor of the more familiar auteur driven quieter films. Well, fasten your seat belts. Cannes just unveiled Hope, a sci fi Alien monster mash from South Korean director Na Hong-Jin that never lets up for a minute of its two hour and 40 minute running time and out Hollywood’s anything of its kind made by Hollywood. And guess what? Cannes not only put it in the official selection, they also have it in competition, a rare film of this kind to get that kind of instant cred from the festival .

Director Na is however no stranger to the Croisette as this is the fourth of his films to premiere here in various sections from Midnight to Certain Regard, but it is his first in the main competition, and first since 2016 and The Wailing which dealt with demonic possession and serial murders in a rural South Korean town. Hope now takes it further in dealing with an Alien invasion from the planet Gh’ertu crash landing in a similarly rural South Korean town, Hope Harbor, and all hell being unleashed as the otherworldly visitors represent all kinds of shapes and class divisions from that planet and each gets a spotlight as the locals go loco and set out to destroy them all without asking questions.

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