Hope 3.5/5
Hope is an absurd movie.
It’s almost three hours long. At one point, I got up to use the restroom at the beginning of a poop joke. I didn’t dawdle, but I was still shocked to return and discover that the same joke was still going.
Points for my impeccable timing, I suppose, but I also think this perfectly encapsulates just how strange this movie is.
In many ways, Hope is the anti-blockbuster. Its humor is wildly hit-or-miss—the poop joke, meh; the unbelievable plot armor in Act Three, incredible—and its pacing can be genuinely grueling. The movie already feels like half of a larger story, and then it ends and REALLY feels like half of a story, delivering an all-timer of a cliffhanger that reminded me more than anything of Halo 2.
Maybe that comparison is more useful than it initially sounds, because Hope feels like a video game through and through.
The film appears to take place in a border town near North and South Korea, populated initially by what might as well be unnamed NPCs. Eventually, we assemble our party and begin moving through a series of missions: through the streets, into the forest, and eventually through what feel like a handful of cinematic quick-time events.
Much has already been said about the shoddy CGI, though I found that among the least of the film’s problems. The effects are mostly fine, and in a world increasingly filled to the brim with AI slop, it’s frankly refreshing to see flawed visual effects that still feel handmade, loved, and soulful.
The far bigger issue is the pacing. At its best, Hope approaches Mad Max: Fury Road, launching into relentless chase sequences with a sense of chaos and momentum. At its worst, it feels like a video game cutscene you desperately wish you could skip.
And yet, because the movie seems so determined to subvert expectations, I have a hard time holding it entirely accountable for flaws that occasionally seem intentional. Hope refuses to become the conventional crowd-pleaser it repeatedly appears to be setting itself up as. If the premise or trailer intrigues you at all, I think it’s worth seeing. Just don’t expect the movie to give you what you think it’s promising.
Because the world of Hope is fascinating.
There is a strange richness to nearly every interaction, and the film perfectly captures a world that looks and feels almost exactly like ours but is somehow just a little bit off. Everyone seems geared up and ready for war except, hilariously, our incompetent police chief Ko Bum-seok (Hwang Jung-min), who spends much of the first hour trying to figure out whatever the hell is terrorizing his town.
Then the movie kicks into another gear with my favorite character introduction of the year: Jung Ho-yeon’s Im Sung-ae, who is simply a badass compared to Ko’s slapdash luck and perpetual confusion.
Some of these characters you desperately want to spend more time with; others will grate on you almost immediately. More interestingly, the film doesn’t seem especially interested in character growth. These people are game pieces, and they behave according to who they already are.
It’s a strange choice, but one that increasingly feels intentional given the significant shift that occurs in the film’s final few minutes. I won’t spoil it. All I’ll say is that Hope has a lot of big ideas, and it smartly uses humor to encourage the audience to confront its central question: What happens when all you know how to do is shoot first?
The entire film becomes a critique of reaction—of people responding to things they do not understand with the only tools they know how to use—until it attempts a final magic trick that left my jaw on the floor in equal parts wonder and incredulity.
For that, I can forgive the pacing. I can even forgive the moments when the movie seems inclined to subvert expectations simply for the sake of subversion rather than because it serves the larger story.
And if Na Hong-jin actually manages to make another one of these, I have absolutely no doubt that I will be seated.
Is God Is 4.5/5
leshea Harris’s directorial debut is a revelation. Based on her own 2018 play, Is God Is tells the revenge story of twin sisters Racine (Kara Young) and Anaia (Mallory Johnson), scarred by burns inflicted by their estranged father (Sterling K. Brown), who finally hunt him down at the behest of their dying mother (Vivica A. Fox).
Fox’s casting as Mother—referred to as God by Racine and Anaia—inevitably invites comparisons to Quentin Tarantino, and I mean that in the most complimentary way possible. For years and years, we’ve watched filmmakers learn all the wrong lessons from Tarantino, merely mimicking his style without ever understanding what made it so compelling in the first place.
While that inspiration is certainly present in Harris’s filmmaking, it feels informed rather than imitative, resulting in a debut that is both wholly original and supremely confident. That confidence is anchored by a tight script, fortunate enough to have been honed on the stage, and an incredible cast led by Young and Johnson, who will make you believe these sisters can communicate through the subtlest facial expressions alone.
The performances and compelling central story completely engross you in this world, and this is where Harris’s confidence becomes most apparent. There is never any challenge in suspending disbelief because the world feels internally coherent, the characters are endlessly interesting, and, despite the darkness of this revenge tale, the film perfectly balances its violence and tragedy with some of the funniest moments I’ve seen in a movie all year.
Every filmmaking choice feels in service of the story and its central themes, leaving us with an electrifying film that borders on miraculous. Is God Is is wildly entertaining, thrilling, and funny, but it is also deeply emotional and surprisingly complex, with a third act that genuinely took my breath away.
This film deserves an audience, and I’m ashamed I missed it while it was in theaters. You can help rectify that by watching it at home—and, hopefully, ensuring Aleshea Harris has a very bright cinematic future ahead of her.