HOPE (Korean) (2026) – A Relentless, Genre-Bending Monster Ride Like Nothing We’ve Seen Before
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐ 1/2
South Korean director Na Hong-jin has made a name for himself with films that refuse to fit neatly into conventional genre boxes. With The Chaser, The Yellow Sea and The Wailing, he has established himself as one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary Korean cinema. He belongs to the current generation of South Korean filmmakers — alongside the likes of Bong Joon-ho (Parasite) and Yeon Sang-ho (Train to Busan) — who have not only gained international recognition but have also demonstrated that Korean cinema can deliver ambitious, highly original genre films that can compete with anything Hollywood has to offer.
With HOPE, Hong-jin takes another major leap, venturing into science-fiction and alien horror with a film that is as audacious as it is relentlessly entertaining. The result is a movie that feels unlike anything he has done before — and, for that matter, unlike anything I have seen in the genre.
The premise is deceptively straightforward. A remote harbour town suddenly finds itself under attack from monstrous creatures, and the story follows a number of key characters, including police officers and local villagers, as they fight for survival and attempt to understand what they are up against. From this relatively simple setup, Hong-jin constructs an extraordinarily elaborate action spectacle that barely gives the audience time to catch its breath.
At more than two and a half hours, HOPE is a surprisingly long film, yet much of its running time is occupied by frantic chases, violent confrontations and increasingly chaotic encounters with the creatures. The almost non-stop barrage of action is staged with such ferocity and unpredictability that watching the film can become an exhausting experience — almost as exhausting as it must be for the characters on screen. There is very little opportunity to settle into a comfortable rhythm because Hong-jin constantly changes the pace, direction and scale of the action.
One of the film’s smartest decisions comes in its first half, when Hong-jin deliberately keeps the actual creatures largely hidden from view. We hear them, glimpse fragments of them and witness the aftermath of their attacks without ever getting a proper look at what the characters are facing. This withholding of information builds an enormous sense of anticipation. Rather than immediately throwing the monsters at us, the film allows our imagination to do much of the work.
Once the creatures are finally revealed, however, the film changes gears dramatically. The camera begins to fully embrace the monsters, and the action sequences become faster, bigger and considerably more chaotic. The choreography and cinematography are extraordinary, capturing the speed and sheer physicality of the encounters in a way that makes the viewer feel as though they are right in the middle of the mayhem.
Indeed, the action in HOPE more than matches much of what Hollywood has produced in the monster and science-fiction genres. I would go even further: what Na Hong-jin has achieved here feels like a new landmark in action filmmaking. The scale, imagination and sheer audacity of some of the sequences are genuinely remarkable. There are moments when you simply wonder how a filmmaker could have conceived and executed something this insane. It is truly the kind of cinematic experience that feels as though it has not been seen or experienced before.
The film is not without its shortcomings, however. The relentless action occasionally asks us to suspend disbelief a little too much, particularly when it comes to the fate of certain major characters. Some of them appear capable of surviving punishment that would surely kill an ordinary human being, being thrown around at tremendous speed and force only to get back up and continue the fight. Given the otherwise grounded physicality of the action, these moments can feel slightly excessive.
There is also a vein of dry humour running through the screenplay. Some of it works surprisingly well, providing a welcome release from the almost unbearable tension, but there are moments when the humour feels somewhat out of place in situations that are otherwise impossibly intense. Presumably, this is Hong-jin’s way of allowing the audience to catch its breath and laugh between bouts of horror and mayhem. It does occasionally disrupt the mood, but it also contributes to the film’s unusual personality.
Ultimately, what makes HOPE so memorable is its sheer boldness. This is not a film content to follow the familiar rules of the alien-invasion or monster movie. Na Hong-jin takes the conventions of the genre and pushes them into increasingly strange and spectacular territory, resulting in an experience that is innovative, unpredictable and almost absurdly energetic.
The film’s quirkiness extends to its curious casting decisions. The choice of having real-life husband-and-wife team Michael Fassbender and Alicia Vikander as two of the key alien characters is an especially strange choice given that HOPE is otherwise predominantly a Korean production, featuring a largely Korean cast and setting. Fassbender and Vikander are almost completely transformed through CGI, with only their facial features recognisably retained, making their star identities seem almost incidental to their roles. Why Hong-jin chose two major Hollywood actors for characters who are so heavily digitally manipulated is difficult to say. Perhaps their recognisable faces are intended to give these otherwise completely alien beings a faint sense of humanity, or perhaps their casting is simply another example of the film’s willingness to make unconventional choices. Either way, seeing the familiar faces of Fassbender and Vikander emerge from these bizarre CGI creations is certainly one of the film’s more unexpected — and intriguing — choices.
HOPE is a film unlike anything I have seen before — and, more importantly, it is something I genuinely liked. It is bold, inventive and unapologetically ambitious, taking us on a high-adrenaline adventure that simply refuses to let go until the very end. Whatever its imperfections, there is no denying that Na Hong-jin has created something remarkably original.
HOPE may well stand as one of the year’s most distinctive and audacious films — a monster movie that doesn’t merely try to compete with Hollywood, but attempts to redefine what can be done with the genre.
