MICKEY 17 (2025)

Director/writer Bong Joon Ho – The Host (2006), Snowpiercer (2013), Parasite (2019) – has released his first film post-Oscar Best Picture win; and while class conflict and wealth disparity were front and centre for Parasite, new offering Mickey 17 adds a story of space colonization and printable/disposable humans to his provocative repertoire. First off, it is not nearly as stirring or sleek as Parasite. It is, in fact, a mess. It’s a mess that could, in fact, be worse, thanks in great part to the steadily impressive Robert Pattinson – Good Time (2017), The Lighthouse (2019), The Batman (2022) – who orders this zany film with equally zany, yet somehow staballizing performances. Now I’m a big Mark Ruffalo fan – You can Count on Me (2000), Zodiac (2007), Spotlight (2015) – but here he is distractingly clownish as Kenneth Marshall, a former politician leading the expedition to the snow planet Nifelheim. He’s a strange choice for the role (in my opinion), yet Bong apparently wrote the part with him in mind (perhaps after seeing his boorish turn in Poor Things (2023))? Not all, but a lot of the dark comedy falls flat, save Ruffalo’s submissive dynamic with wife Ylfa, wisely played with slightly less pomposity by the unfailing Toni Collette – Little Miss Sunshine (2006), Hereditary (2018), Juror #2 (2024) – who is unwholesomely obsessed with sauces. “Sauce is the true litmus test of civilization” she merrily tells the ship’s crew as they choke down their unrecognizable, undefined and unappetizing food rations. So there are moments. Which is really what Mickey 17 amounts to. An assembly of some good performances, micro and macro points about class, the expendability of the lower and the desperate, the responsibility of settlers in a new land, death. It’s not a good film. It’s not a boring film. It’s an unpredictable film. It’s a messy film. 

 WATCH OR NOT: WATCH

Additional musings: Though not great, I love that this weird sci-fi story was brought to life; and with a big budget.