Review of The Host (2006) by Russell S — 04 Apr 2010

THE HOST (68/100) About 15 minutes into THE HOST, I thought I was in for a real treat. I was laughing out loud, loudly. Having recently watched Bong Joon-Ho's most recent film MOTHER, I was anticipating a lot of sly genre riffing with a sense of situational comedy. THE HOST was shaping itself up to be LITTLE MISS FISHZILLA, right down to a dysfunctional-family van escape. Then, half an hour in, the unthinkable happened. The movie-that-could gave up. The humor stopped, the plot fell apart, and I got a headache watching the pointless, boring remnants.

Contrary to the contentions of many reviews, this movie is not a political satire--it is far too blunt an instrument for that--and there is nothing even vaguely scary about it to someone past puberty. What has been interpreted as satire is actually the rather dull, B-movie manuever of villain-making--here handled especially poorly and with the repellent odor of least-common-denominator nationalism. The portrayal of Americans as having nothing but malice for intentions and manifesting this in physical defect (such as the inexplicably cross-eyed scientist) bore an uncomfortable resemblance to the demonization of the Jew in anti-semitic literature. So much so, I've really been put off watching the rest of Bong's films. I understand that in part the plot was inspired by the acts of the American military in polluting the Han River, but having all American characters speak in simple, slow-motion dialogue like characters from a Korean ESL TV program hardly seems like trenchant criticism. When the film touches on domestic bureaucracy it is no less broad and seems to merely be playing out the genre convention of anti-government/military paranoia. Even when the plot seems concocted purely for the point of satire, e.g., the protests to the release of Agent Yellow, the bite remains inchoate. The best Bong musters is a joke about the protesters making T-shirts for their pet cause. So basically the level of a joke about sorority girls.

I really wanted to like this movie but the twenty good minutes can't carry the rest of the slouching beast.