Director Bong Joon-ho, a master who has garnered attention not only in Korea but around the world, is finally presenting his new film, ‘Mickey 17’, on the global stage.

The film, which will be first released in Korea on February 28 and then in theaters around the world, including North America, on March 7, was produced by Hollywood film company Warner Bros. and is a global project aimed at the world stage from the beginning. As Director Bong Joon-ho‘s previous work, ‘Parasite’, which was made with 100% Korean capital and Korean actors and staff, swept the Cannes International Film Festival and the Academy Award at the same time, movie fans around the world are paying close attention to what kind of global results this film will have.

O“Worker’s SF”

‘Mickey 17’ depicts the unpredictable story that unfolds as Mickey, an expendable human clone (the Expendables) who is deployed for a dangerous job that puts his life on the line, experiences his 17th near-death crisis. It is based on the novel ‘Mickey 7’ by Edward Ashton, but it differs a lot from the original, which was a ‘hard SF’ genre, by focusing on parts related to science and technology. In particular, Director Bong Joon-ho addressed the ‘class issue’, which he had consistently dealt with in his previous works such as ‘Parasite’.

“In the original, Mickey is a history teacher, but in our film, Mickey is a ‘working class’ (laboring class) who is deployed to a dangerous industrial site. He is a pitiful, pitiful, and lonely friend. How inhumane would it be to be deployed to a site where one has to risk their life and then be reprinted? In order to show that the character is more exposed to such inhumane situations, we made the 17th Mickey, not the 7th Mickey, the main character. You could say it‘s a sci-fi film with a human touch.“

”After making a movie about a detective running around on a rice paddy (Memories of Murder)“, he laughed, saying it felt new to be making a sci-fi film with a production cost of a whopping 150 million dollars (218 billion won).

”It was new and fun to film something like a huge spaceship or aliens for the first time. Of course, there was that aspect to it, but in fact, this film is the first time in my 25-year career as a director that I’ve drawn a love story. Mickey‘s love story appears in the film. Of course, it would be shameless of me to call this movie a melodrama, but I also tried to include that kind of perspective of love.”
O“No discord with the film company”

Director Bong Joon-ho said that he chose Robert Pattinson as the lead actor for this film without hesitation, praising Pattinson as “an actor who has shown amazing acting not only in large-scale superhero films like ‘The Batman’, but also in American independent films like ‘Good Time’and‘Lighthouse’.”

“Robert actually had to play two roles in this film. He had to cover everything from the slightly stupid and timid Mickey 17 to the bizarre and crazy charisma of Mickey 18. The actor who could do both roles was none other than Robert.”

Meanwhile, Director Bong explained the rumors of discord with Warner Bros., the film company, that arose due to the repeated changes in the release date. Some foreign media outlets even reported that Director Bong and Warner Bros. had a conflict over the “final editing rights.”

“In fact, it’s not known to the public, but my films have had their release dates changed a lot every time. This is the first time it has been covered in an article and received attention. The changes in the release date were due to the influence of the Hollywood industry, such as the actors’ union strike, and there was no complicated re-editing or re-shooting. It was a project that I started with the final editing rights from the beginning, and we finished filming very smoothly through a process of mutual respect with the film company.”


Reporter Seungmi Lee smlee@donga.com
This article is automatically translated using Google AI. If you notice any inaccuracies, please let us know at allkstar@donga.com.