FILM-FORWARD.COMReviews of Recent Independent, Foreign, & Documentary Films in Theaters and DVD/Home Video
SAVE THE GREEN PLANET
Blue-collar everyman Lee (Shin Ha-Gyun) is disgruntled, short on luck and
downright angry. But his fury isn't targeted at the world but Andromedan
aliens, who he believes are the source of all his bad breaks. He arms
himself and his plump, unquestioning girlfriend Sooni (Hwang Jung-Min) with
makeshift protective suits (read, garbage bags) and sets out on a mission to
save the earth from the Andromedans' conspiracy to destroy the planet by the
next lunar eclipse. Lee and Sooni's kidnap Kang (Baek Yun-Shik), a CEO of a chemical firm, who Lee
believes is the one alien possessing the Royal Genetic Code needed to stop
the impending destruction. After dragging Kang to his remote mountain
hideout, Lee embarks on a torture session to make his captive confess to his
alien identity.
Save the Green Planet is a panache of campy visuals, patched together with
fast-paced editing. Its genre-bending narrative starts out as a psychotic
thriller reminiscent of Misery, fuses into a cat-and-mouse detective hunt,
and then launches into a sci-fi tour-de-force before it presents its
deliciously original anti-violence message, all the while retaining its
slapstick touch.
Replete with wincingly horrific torture scenes involving a clothes iron,
nails and a steam-emitting dildo, Save is best avoided by the
faint-hearted. But despite its ludicrous atrocities, the film’s also a morality tale, and for those
who
stick around for the entire roller coaster ride, the ending is a pessimistic
but powerful look at a deeply corrupt, corporate-run world. Marie Iida
|