Directed By Bong Joon Ho

Starring – Robert Pattinson, Steven Yeun, Mark Ruffalo

The Plot – Adapted from the novel Mickey7 by Edward Ashton, this stars Robert Pattinson as an “expendable”, a disposable crew member on a space mission, selected for dangerous tasks because he can be renewed if his body dies, with his memories largely intact. With one regeneration, though, things go very wrong.

Rated R for violent content, adult language throughout, sexual content and drug material.

Mickey 17 | Official Trailer

POSITIVES

It may have taken Bong Joon Ho six long years to follow up the magnum opus that was “Parasite”, but it’s clear that the allowance of time away was spent fleshing out another sociological stinger that not only metaphorically conjures some of the environmental conflicts unfortunately persisting in our own world, but also fleshing them out in a world set forty years in the future, where Earth is dying a devastating death. This affords “Mickey 17” the same kind of adventurous exploration that a director of Ho’s magnitude can vividly capture and entertainingly engross us in, not only with stellar special effects in both the creature designs of the planet’s surrounding Creeper’s and artificial backdrops, but also its thoroughly vast explorative world-building to the movie’s creative conscience, which sits comfortably inside the developmental confines of a 125-minute run time, allowing a majority of its opening act to spend time fleshing out the history of both the new planet’s necessity towards its people, as well as Mickey’s own unfortunate circumstance with accepting such a cruel and unusual fate. As expected, Bong dabbles in the same themes of classification that made “Snowpiercer” such a compelling social experiment among divided systems, as well as the same animal abuse pertaining to “Okja”, but the most driving forces this time around pertained to colonialism and existentialism, which bared so much more than a coincidental reflection to the wars that we’re currently facing in America with such an overzealously political regime. As a masterful writer, Bong masterfully blends fantasy and reality in ways that his audiences can take mutually beneficial experiences, all with an overly comedic tone that not only contextualizes the mental duress of its characters, but also in making the engagement highly accessible for audiences who might not have a lot of experience outside of “Parasite” with Bong’s oft-putting sense of humor. The gags themselves definitely produced no shortage of effective comedic relief, particularly whenever Ruffalo and Toni Collette viciously chewed the scenery as a married duo of political snobs who will step on anyone or anything, in order to supplant their own idea of a perfect society, but what’s really important is that they never takeaway from the glaring dramatic tragedy that is Mickey’s never-ending nightmare of self-sacrificial slavery, appraising an abundance of empathy for the titular protagonist that goes a long way with the audience identifying with him, even throughout strangely simplistic actions for the character that don’t always showcase him in the brightest of intellectual lights. The film’s atmospheric personality is reflected seamlessly by Darius Khondji’s expressive cinematography, particularly in the swift motions of the camera during character interactions that deviates the manic energy and lunacy of this mission that continuously feels over the heads of those involved. This is most felt when secondary characters come to realize that there are two Mickey’s coexisting on-board, with immaculate framing that visually confides in the body language of its characters, long before they have a chance to express their feelings with dialogue. Likewise, Khondji shoots devastation and adversity in some tightly corresponding and shadowy obscuring situations that makes his artistry slip seamlessly into the depths of these bleak situations, without anything of enhanced visual clarity in lighting or evidential color correction taking away from the legitimacy of the established environments that effortlessly breed their essence of urgency and vulnerability on the characters impacted. Because Bong’s films essentially serve as reflective examinations of the unforeseen conflicts that persist in our lives, so too does his film brandish with it elements of unpredictability and originality that continuously kept me guessing with regards to where and how our protagonists would find their way out of overwhelming situations, especially the kind that are as easy as hitting a reprint button to relieve a version of Mickey that could be getting too close to secreted truths. What’s most surprising is that the movie doesn’t utilize the gimmick half as much as I was expecting from some of its trailers, but even in doing such, it never compromises the fragility and rarity value inside of a life full of experiences, and as to where death could easily become redundantly cold and impersonal by its use as a gimmick, Bong instead values it by crafting it as the ultimate taboo to those curious how it feels to die, with Mickey’s own isolation factor on the advantageous knowledge serving as the driving force towards making him such an ideally imperfect protagonist. If that isn’t enough, Pattinson’s showcase of emulating two characters simultaneously proves why he’s one of the single best actors in the game today, with a versatility for personality and approach that made it all the easier to distinguish Mickey 17 from Mickey 18, even with identical appearances. As 17, it would be irresponsibly easy to characterize this version of Mickey as simple-minded, but Pattinson instills such a warming ignorance to the character and his inflective accent that leaves him open to being taken advantage of, and between it and a sternly aggressive side to 18’s fearlessness, we have essentially gotten two Pattinson performances for the cost of one, with Robert’s rhythmic flow and emotional impulses working perfectly for Bong’s established environments. Other noteworthy performances stem from Naomi Ackie, Toni Collette, and especially Mark Ruffalo, with the latter donning pearly white dentures and a narcissistic personality that will inevitably be compared to one or many current world leaders. Ruffalo is obviously having the time of his life degrading everyone and everything he comes into contact with, and while it’s easy immediately to distinguish him as a ruthlessly conniving force of nature, whose importance starts and ends with him, he provided a palpable x-factor to the engagement that I simply couldn’t take my eyes off of, even when his character sat there and sulked in the responsibilities of his selfish objectives.

NEGATIVES

While “Mickey 17” is a more than worthy addition to Bong Joon Ho’s impressive library of films, it falls short of being his best, as a result of a couple of unfortunate instances that served to feel all the more glaring with the level of technique and creativity that Bong was firing on here. The first and definitely most problematic was the muddled opening act, which not only felt a bit sloppy and even contrived in flashing back so frequently to the past, but also became a bit annoying in being told everything from Pattinson’s overhead narration, versus experiencing them in real time. Narration can be utilized meaningfully if it provides something that we don’t already have access to, but the kind here involves Pattinson speaking directly to the audience, in ways that I truly felt added little to no integral value on its intended purpose, making it feel like an introductory welcoming that spanned on for the entire first act. I can wholeheartedly understand that this information in exposition is vital towards understanding the character and his conflict, however it’s framed as a series of summarized scenes that we experience every second of, and with an over two hour runtime that kept me continuously engaged, it was the only moments of the film where I felt my attention start to wander, especially in summarizing so many key moments between characters that I wish I got to experience without the help of an internalized gimmick. In addition to a first act that felt like a recap section on any streaming series, it was inevitable that someone in an ensemble this impressive was going to feel shortchanged, and here it’s unfortunately Steven Yeun, who isn’t given any kind of meaningful merit in material to make his role feel anything other than a bully who only appears to push Mickey towards another conflict. Considering Yeun has carved out quite a reputation for these highly impactful turns that enhance these bold personalities that he takes on, and considering he’s given second-billing here, it’s disappointing that there were moments where I honestly forgot that he was even in the movie, and even in a movie with a lot of characters that it was already keeping tabs on, more material was deserved towards Yeun’s, whose history with Mickey basically begins this whole plot, until the movie disposes of Steven just as easily as it does one of the eighteen Mickey’s.

OVERALL
“Mickey 17” proves six years away was well spent by Bong Joon Ho, who uses political sensitivity as a creative source, in order to craft something engrossingly entertaining and compellingly original. Despite an opening act that nearly takes the wind out of the film before it takes orbit, the film is commanded by attention-stealing performances from Pattinson and Ruffalo, as well as its fluffily frenzied atmosphere, which gives its audience levity for silliness when they’re not constantly chewing on the eye-opening social commentary that we’ve come to expect from one of the game’s best.

My Grade: 8.2 or B+