ALIVE (KOREA, 2020) - SOLITUDE IN A ZOMBIE OUTBREAK
Joon-woo ( Yoo Ah-in ) wakes up at 10 am in his residence which is a large apartment. His apartment can be said to be quite low, especially if you look at the electronic items he has. The sophisticated drones and the array of computers and accessories that seem ridiculously expensive are enough to tell Joon-woo is the son of a rich man who may not live very independently.
When he woke up, his parents and sister were out. His mother left messages for grocery shopping, but he prefers to play "PUBG" on his computer with his friends because he is also a streamer known in cyberspace as "Monk Mori".
While playing, he learned from one of his friends that the news on TV reported that there was an epidemic that had suddenly attacked his citizens. Panicked, he immediately checked out the window and saw in the apartment parking lot a crowd of people who were panicking and running from zombies who had apparently reached Joon-woo's apartment complex. He was too late to escape and is now trapped in an apartment without enough food and survival begins.
Cho Il-hyung, who is both director and scriptwriter with Matt Naylor, quickly got into trouble without further ado. The film has only been running for a few minutes, quickly the zombie outbreak has hit and Joon-woo (his name always reminds me of Hong Kong director John Woo ) immediately plunges into trouble when the film has not reached 10 minutes.
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#Alive is indeedan interesting zombie film because it doesn't focus on fast action like the film Train to Busan , but rather a zombie film that deals directly with the theme of solitude. For days, Joon-woo had to survive alone because the internet network was very weak as time went on.
Yoo Ah-in who plays Joon-woo can indeed catch a young character who can do nothing but is forced to survive alone. His hair is dyed blonde and his lazy nature makes his character even more real, depicting lazy young people who exist in cyberspace in general.
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He also felt regret, especially for not shopping like his mother had told him to. In his apartment, he can only rely on a small amount of the internet signal he receives to upload a video to the internet to say that he needs help. Whether anyone saw it or not, he doesn't know. He only hopes to survive.
When there's only Joon-woo in the film, the film's story does slow down, as if dropping from an explosive opening. Indeed, sometimes the film's tension increases when seeing the scene of zombies attacking, especially when he sees female police being chased by a bunch of zombies in the parking area, but often we only see Joon-woo trying to think what to do.
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For days she could only surrender, one day taking her father's alcohol, apologizing to his father for his photo, and drinking it. On the day that he decided to give up on life, apparently a neighbor in the apartment opposite saw Joon-woo through his binoculars.
Is Yoo-bin ( Park Shin-hye ), a woman who is a neighbor across from Joon-woo's apartment. Joon-woo is certainly happy with the presence of other humans because he hasn't communicated with fellow humans for a long time, and it didn't take him long to make friends between survivors.
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Yoo-bin's character, played by actress Park Shin-hye , who is known through Korean drama series like You're Beautiful , The Doctors and Memories of the Alhambra , is like a savior not only for Joon-woo but also the savior of this film.
Before Yoo-bin appeared, the film's story did feel choked up because he only relied on Joon-woo who didn't do much. Yoo-bin's presence makes the film even more dynamic, especially because of how exciting it is to see the two of them communicate over long distances, trying to feed each other. Yoo-bin gives ramen, and Joon-woo gives Nutella.
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But what's a little odd is the fact that in one scene Joon-woo and Yoo-bin were able to run in a parking lot and dodge a bunch of aggressive zombies with just Yoo-bin's golf club and ax. Both of them are not fighters, but both of them can quickly hit and dodge zombies . If they were two young people who seemed to have never been involved in a fight, it could mean that other people could also include the female police officer.
Even so, #Alive is still a zombie thriller film that is quite exciting and different from films with similar genres and adds to the list of zombie films produced by South Korea. The film's theme of solitude is also relevant to the current world conditions, where people are confined indoors due to the ongoing pandemic.