NOTE: This film was recommended to me by Nenko Manolov for "Steve Pulaski Sees It."
Snowpiercer's cinematic beauty stems from two distinct places, the first being Hong Kyung-pyo's crisp, often gritty cinematography and the second being the hierarchical power structure in the film depicted through horizontality rather than conventional verticality. It's a film that's so focused on these two features that it forgets to humanize the middle-man, the men and women inside the long, ostensibly endless locomotive that is trudging along through the brutal cold, housing civilization's last batch of humans that managed to survive a catastrophic ice age produced by climate engineering. The end result is an admirable slice of ambition that unfortunately settles for the strengths of its aesthetics and symbolism to carry what should've been a far more engaging story.
The class structure of the Snowpiercer train has the wealthier, more privileged in the boxcars near the front of the train, while the poorer, more lower-class patrons ride in the caboose cars, where heating and adequate food are both in short supply. As a result, with children being taken from their families and the elderly being abused, an uprising begins to occur on the train, led by the likes of Curtis (Chris Evans), one of the lower-class passengers. Curtis decides the only way that anything will change is if him and numerous others violently charge their way to the front of the train, an idea so crazy that it just might work.
The Snowpiercer is governed by both Minister Wilford, played by Ed Harris, and Deputy-Minister Mason, played by Tilda Swinton, in a lively, Stanley Tucci/Hunger Games-style performance in that it's so bonkers that it can't help but be effective. The two are appalled by Curtis's efforts to disrupt the system that has worked in their favor for so long, which helps make this uprising a full on battle when the revolutionaries begin gaining traction. What unfolds is a bloodbath aboard a neutral vehicle of transportation that chugs along through the miserable conditions, housing ugliness all the way down the track.
Kyung-pyo's cinematography captures the dirty, claustrophobic environment of the train incredibly well. When we are occasionally blessed with glances of the outside world, we see a whole other achievement in cinematographical clarity and focus and that is the limitless whiteness that awaits us outside. Just from the look of the environment, we can almost feel are skin turn raw and red from the brisk conditions, which are evidently so bad, a man's punishment is to expose his full length arm to the outdoors, which results in it freezing and being smashed off with a battle-axe by Wilford. Such gruesome, unconscionable ugliness is beautifully captured by Kyung-pyo.
Then there's the aforementioned, ever-present symbolic presence of horizontality, which houses the structure of the class system just by its nature. This is more unique than most casual moviegoers would assume because we're so used to just accepting visions of power and status being communicated in more dense urban areas and heavily populated communities via the incorporation of skyscrapers and their inherent verticality. The horizontality present symbolizes the never-ending pursuit of a person who starts from the bottom (the caboose) and works his or her way up to the top (the leading car) through persistence and fight, only instead of a metaphorical "rise to the top" there's the grittier, more tiring "walk to the front." Director Bong Joon-ho works to profile this in a way that subverts the usual power convention by turning one of America's oldest means of transportation into a powerful, visual metaphor.
The most unfortunate thing is that both of these strong components are housed in a film that isn't always particularly captivating. Often the film's attitude and tone is just as unequivocally grim and melancholy as the outside of the train, but not in an emotionally powerful way. While Joon-ho (who also serves as the film's screenwriter with Kelly Masterson) and cinematographer Hong Kyung-pyo make Snowpiercer a riveting film visually, it's a film that lacks in illustrating compelling characters. Films about revolutions, revolutionaries, and uprisings are only as interesting as those involved in them, and while scenes of people being beaten, bludgeoned, and brutally killed are hard-hitting, if we don't know the characters behind them, it essentially fuels the facelessness the powerful regime intends to keep in place for its people. Despite Curtis being in nearly every scene in the film, his character is interchangeable because Joon-ho and Masterson don't seem to write one for him, in addition to most of the other characters in the film being very loose, indistinct souls with very little personality whatsoever.
Films like Snowpiercer aggravate me because they have all the components in place, yet skimp on the emotional relevance of the picture and the ultimate reason as to why we should care about these characters and their struggles as people. Even Joon-ho's tonal shakeup at the end, where the film's depiction of the interworkings of the upper class feels like a more adult version of The Hunger Games would've been more forgiving had there not been such a disconnect with the characters in the film. As it stands, Snowpiercer is a strong showcase for aesthetics, but a mediocre to average showcase for human interest.
Starring: Chris Evans, Tilda Swinton, Song Kang-ho, Ed Harris, Octavia Spencer, Jamie Bell, and Ko Ah-sung. Directed by: Bong Joon-ho.
Snowpiercer's cinematic beauty stems from two distinct places, the first being Hong Kyung-pyo's crisp, often gritty cinematography and the second being the hierarchical power structure in the film depicted through horizontality rather than conventional verticality. It's a film that's so focused on these two features that it forgets to humanize the middle-man, the men and women inside the long, ostensibly endless locomotive that is trudging along through the brutal cold, housing civilization's last batch of humans that managed to survive a catastrophic ice age produced by climate engineering. The end result is an admirable slice of ambition that unfortunately settles for the strengths of its aesthetics and symbolism to carry what should've been a far more engaging story.
The class structure of the Snowpiercer train has the wealthier, more privileged in the boxcars near the front of the train, while the poorer, more lower-class patrons ride in the caboose cars, where heating and adequate food are both in short supply. As a result, with children being taken from their families and the elderly being abused, an uprising begins to occur on the train, led by the likes of Curtis (Chris Evans), one of the lower-class passengers. Curtis decides the only way that anything will change is if him and numerous others violently charge their way to the front of the train, an idea so crazy that it just might work.
The Snowpiercer is governed by both Minister Wilford, played by Ed Harris, and Deputy-Minister Mason, played by Tilda Swinton, in a lively, Stanley Tucci/Hunger Games-style performance in that it's so bonkers that it can't help but be effective. The two are appalled by Curtis's efforts to disrupt the system that has worked in their favor for so long, which helps make this uprising a full on battle when the revolutionaries begin gaining traction. What unfolds is a bloodbath aboard a neutral vehicle of transportation that chugs along through the miserable conditions, housing ugliness all the way down the track.
Kyung-pyo's cinematography captures the dirty, claustrophobic environment of the train incredibly well. When we are occasionally blessed with glances of the outside world, we see a whole other achievement in cinematographical clarity and focus and that is the limitless whiteness that awaits us outside. Just from the look of the environment, we can almost feel are skin turn raw and red from the brisk conditions, which are evidently so bad, a man's punishment is to expose his full length arm to the outdoors, which results in it freezing and being smashed off with a battle-axe by Wilford. Such gruesome, unconscionable ugliness is beautifully captured by Kyung-pyo.
Then there's the aforementioned, ever-present symbolic presence of horizontality, which houses the structure of the class system just by its nature. This is more unique than most casual moviegoers would assume because we're so used to just accepting visions of power and status being communicated in more dense urban areas and heavily populated communities via the incorporation of skyscrapers and their inherent verticality. The horizontality present symbolizes the never-ending pursuit of a person who starts from the bottom (the caboose) and works his or her way up to the top (the leading car) through persistence and fight, only instead of a metaphorical "rise to the top" there's the grittier, more tiring "walk to the front." Director Bong Joon-ho works to profile this in a way that subverts the usual power convention by turning one of America's oldest means of transportation into a powerful, visual metaphor.
The most unfortunate thing is that both of these strong components are housed in a film that isn't always particularly captivating. Often the film's attitude and tone is just as unequivocally grim and melancholy as the outside of the train, but not in an emotionally powerful way. While Joon-ho (who also serves as the film's screenwriter with Kelly Masterson) and cinematographer Hong Kyung-pyo make Snowpiercer a riveting film visually, it's a film that lacks in illustrating compelling characters. Films about revolutions, revolutionaries, and uprisings are only as interesting as those involved in them, and while scenes of people being beaten, bludgeoned, and brutally killed are hard-hitting, if we don't know the characters behind them, it essentially fuels the facelessness the powerful regime intends to keep in place for its people. Despite Curtis being in nearly every scene in the film, his character is interchangeable because Joon-ho and Masterson don't seem to write one for him, in addition to most of the other characters in the film being very loose, indistinct souls with very little personality whatsoever.
Films like Snowpiercer aggravate me because they have all the components in place, yet skimp on the emotional relevance of the picture and the ultimate reason as to why we should care about these characters and their struggles as people. Even Joon-ho's tonal shakeup at the end, where the film's depiction of the interworkings of the upper class feels like a more adult version of The Hunger Games would've been more forgiving had there not been such a disconnect with the characters in the film. As it stands, Snowpiercer is a strong showcase for aesthetics, but a mediocre to average showcase for human interest.
Starring: Chris Evans, Tilda Swinton, Song Kang-ho, Ed Harris, Octavia Spencer, Jamie Bell, and Ko Ah-sung. Directed by: Bong Joon-ho.