It’s no big secret that Bong Joon-ho’s weakest films have been his English-language ones, especially “Okja.” I adored the first 2/3 of “Snowpiercer,” but found it fell apart in the last 20 minutes.
With that said, and as expected, reviews for Bong’s latest, “Mickey 17,” are not as glowing as early tweet reactions had indicated. The sci-fi film just screened at the Berlin Film Festival, which means the review embargo lifted as well.
Critics who love Bong’s film? The Independent, IndieWire, Telegraph, Slash Film, and Empire, and Time Out. Notice, four of those six publications are UK-based.
Those more on the mixed (or negative) side include Variety, THR, The Film Stage, The Wrap, Looper, Vulture, Screen, Gizmodo, BBC, Nerd Reactor, Dirty Movies, and Inverse.
Many of these write-ups describe Bong’s film as very political, with one particular character, played by Mark Ruffalo, embodying eerie similarities to Donald Trump.
I’m only supposed to catch Bong’s film next week, but judging by these write ups, it sounds like Warner Bros might have made the right decision in scheduling it for March release. One thing’s for sure, Warners will be very happy once they put “Mickey 17” behind them — it’s become a real headache.
The film, shot in 2022, and which cost $150M to produce, had its release delayed multiple times. Warners has all but given up in their hopes to recoup their money on this one.