Science Fiction

• Title: Snowpiercer
• IMDb: link

I had a very mixed reaction to writer/director Joon-ho Bong‘s Snowpiercer. One one-hand I’m increasingly tired dramas using the trappings of sci-fi to offer up dystopian futures and thinly-veiled class struggle that offer no message other than the fact that such inequality is wrong and ultimately disastrous to the human species. My rebelling against the form isn’t really Snowpiercer‘s fault other than the fact it adds to the glut of similarly-themed films in recent years. On the other hand the film certainly embraces the literal interpretation of rising above your class to offer a bizarre struggle of less fortunate train passengers attempting to climb their way upward.

At its worst Snowpiercer feels preachy and overreaching in its visual style presenting each train car as a bizarely impossible worlds for the voyagers to walk through. It’s also not well served by a performance so over-the-top by Tilda Swinton it’s amazing she doesn’t hit her head on the roof in every scene. At its best the film does serve its message and offer Chris Evans a role as a would-be hero forced to face the deficiencies in both himself and the world he hopes to make more equitable through his struggle.

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