Concrete Utopia: Film Threat's Featured Review
There are many story threads in this movie that are interwoven and all very symbolic. But while Tae Hwa and Lee Shin Ji’s script is charming and the acting is excellent, this action-adventure drama is too bogged down by too many ideas to find a satisfying conclusion. The residents of Hwanggung Apartment are a young couple named Min-sung (Park Seo-joon) and Myung-hwa (Park Bo-young). After a freak earthquake strikes the South Korean metropolis of Seoul, the residents of Hoonggun soon find themselves living in the only building left standing. As tensions rise due to overcrowding, the residents of the apartment elect the mysterious but talented Young Tak (Lee Byung Hun) to be their representative and leader. Especially in “Concrete Utopia,” the lead actors give really strong performances. Taehwa uses acting skillfully to move the pace. Park Seo-joon and Park Bo-young are an incredibly conflicted young couple whose coolness is quietly crumbling under the weight of social obligations. As Yeong-tak, Lee Byung-hun portrays a powerful portrait of a man who is both devilish and inevitably calm in the face of chaos.
The film also has some surprisingly eccentric elements. The film permeates many film genres and frequently switches freely between genres. There are moments filled with humor, tension, and sentimentality. The ironic self-satire also works. But miraculously, these aspects seem to work together rather than competing with each other. But Tefa’s most outstanding achievement is the complexity of Concrete Utopia’s narrative and symbolism. The characters find themselves in carefully staged situations that reflect Korean society as a whole and highlight specific human dynamics. The genre hybrid combines multiple thematic storylines into a narrative that unfolds organically and engagingly.
However, the film’s main flaw lies not in the quality of these thematic threads, but in their abundance. Teha and Shinji thoughtfully came up with many ideas, but they never came together to form a unified, substantive conclusion. The screenplay structure seems to be moving towards, even shouting towards, the story’s completion, but it never comes to fruition. All it offers is a strangely common open-ended ending. Furthermore, many storylines are told in context as being very Korean. Some of the themes covered, such as tribalism, poverty, and deprivation, all exist in a strange cultural vacuum. The viewer can understand this, but they don’t really experience it as much as the protagonist. Without a central idea to build upon, Concrete Utopia is more of a cinematic experiment than a movie. The filmmakers certainly weigh many heavy themes with deft directness. Unfortunately, he never passes judgment on these ideas. Without this judgment, this moment of insight, the viewer is left wondering what value such an experiment has. While this is skillfully done in all technical aspects, it is ultimately a missed opportunity for someone of Um Tae-ha’s caliber.