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| The titular character with wild hair and an enticing tagline in bloody red makes up this poster for Bong Joon Ho's Mother |
When a young school girl gets brutally murdered in a rural corner of South Korea, a local, mentally disabled young man gets blamed for the crime. But his mother refuses to believe that he could be guilty.
Mother is written by Eun-kyo Park (Crush and Blush/Misseu Hongdangmu (2008)) and South-Korean master filmmaker, co-writer/director Bong Joon Ho (Barking Dogs Never Bite/Flandersui gae (2000)).
It is a pitch black murder mystery which gives the impression that the incompetence among provincial police in South Korea is bottomless. It contains many elements which Ho united with a sharper story and direction in masterpiece Parasite (2019). But the story here is far from as good; less thought-provoking, less provocative overall, and less surprising.
Mother is a somewhat depressing mother story with good acting, which works as a gloomy preamble for one of the best films of our time, Parasite.
Related posts:
Bong Joon Ho: The day after ... the 2020 Oscars
Parasite/기생충 (Gisaengchung) (2019) or, The Haves and the Have Nots
The Host/괴물 (Gwoemul) (2006) or, A Monster in Korea
2003 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
Memories of Murder/살인의 추억 (Sarinui chueok) (2003) - Song performance crowns Ho's rich crime drama
Watch 2 minutes of the film's opening sequence here
Cost: 5 mil. $
Box office: 17.2 mil. $
= Box office success (returned 3.44 times its cost)
[Mother premiered 16 May (Cannes Film Festival, Un Certain Regard section) and runs 128 minutes. Shooting took place in South Korea. The film opened #50 to a 35k $ first weekend in North America, where it peaked at #35 and in 38 theaters, grossing 551k $ (3.2 % of the total gross). South Korea was the film's biggest market by far: Selling 3 mil. admissions, it was among the year's 10 biggest film in the country, grossing 16.2 mil. $ (94.2 %). North America was the 2nd biggest market, and France was #3 with 171k $ (1 %). It won 3/6 Asian Film award nominations and was nominated for an Independent Spirit Film award among many other honors. Ho returned with Snowpiercer (2013). Hye-ja Kim (Late Autumn/Man chu (1982)), who plays the mother, returned in How to Steal a Dog/Gae-leul hoom-chi-neun wan-byeok-han bang-beob (2014). Mother is certified fresh at 96 % with a 7.90/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]
What do you think of Mother?
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