Critic Reviews

Hope, the all-time great new action film from writer-director Na Hong-jin, is a glorious genre romp that contains more magnificent moments in its opening act than most do in their entire runtime.

It’s a great feeling to know from a movie’s first frames that you’re in the hands of an assured genre auteur. The rare action thriller that takes place almost entirely in broad daylight, Hope pulls you in immediately with its virtuoso camerwork, pulse-pounding score, adrenalized pacing and sharply drawn characters.

It’s a nonstop blast with the kind of low-to-the-ground vehicular and horseback action that’ll have you falling off the front of your seat.

It’s bold, provocative, and assured filmmaking that oscillates between moments of breathtaking cinematic prowess and satirical characterizations, whose coy rendering turns a mirror toward those who unconsciously lap up hollow action heroes when the far more intriguing story exists in plain sight.

A non-stop spectacle unlike any other. I hoped it would be awesome, and somehow, against all odds, I’m ready for more.

The running time might prove challenging – there’s only so many handbrake turns, high-powered automatic weapons and skewered supporting cast members you can take before it starts getting repetitive. But then Na flips the perspective, making us question our allegiances and ask who the real monsters are.

An exhilarating spectacle of epic proportion, Hope is exactly the kind of violently horrific and chaotically humorous film we’ve been waiting a decade for from Na Hong-jin. He manages to continue his great streak as a master of genre mash-ups in ways that blend the best of sci-fi, horror, and action thrillers. It’s ridiculous, it’s bloody, it’s long – and it’s worth every minute of your time.

There is some top-quality entertainment value on offer here from a movie which can only intensify the world’s K-obsession.

Hope is most certainly a film that will divide viewers, and it’s not especially difficult to find faults – including with some of its baffling hints at a deeper mythology. But as a crazy action spectacle – best enjoyed with an engaged audience – the sheer enjoyable thrill of it all is impossible to deny.

Hope could have been a near-perfect film had it abandoned its desire to go even bigger and simply stuck to the creature feature that made its first half so entertaining.