Is This The Greatest Monster Movie Since “Jaws”?
Media Release | July 11, 2006That's the question on everyone's lips who saw this scorching hot ticket at Cannes. The juries may have been looking the other way, but there were plenty on the Croisette who considered this and Shortbus the real standouts. Evoking echoes of Jaws and the biological horrors of early David Cronenberg with B-movie zest, The Host is the kind of full-bodied horror show, both scary and hilarious, that so many filmmakers strive to generate without ever quite succeeding. And that's the perfect way to cap this year's That's Incredible Cinema programme at the Telecom New Zealand International Film Festivals (which opens in Auckland this Thursday). This has officially become the most anticipated movie event of the year, so grab a ticket and get in line to have your arse kicked six ways to Sunday.
“Directed by Bong Joon-ho, who made the policier Memories of Murder, this terrific hybrid-genre fantasy about a mutant creature with a lotus-like mouth and a steady appetite has been alternately described as a monster movie and a science fiction thriller, but is also a comedy, a family drama, a political critique and, at times, a seriously scary freak-out. Mr Bong can shift moods and tones on a dime, and when the loudly appreciative audience wasn't laughing at the witty dialogue it was shrieking at tensely wound scenes as effective as any in Steven Spielberg's War of the Worlds.” —Manohla Dargis, NY Times
“On almost every level, there's never quite been a monster movie like The Host. Egregiously subverting its own genre while still delivering shocks at a pure genre level, and marbled with straight-faced character humor that constantly throws the viewer off balance, [this] much-hyped big-budgeter about a huge mutant tadpole that emerges from Seoul's Han River is a bold gamble that looks headed to instant cult status.” —Derek Elley, Variety
Check out the trailer [here]
Screening times for The Host:
» Auckland / Sunday 30-Jul-06 / 8:30 PM / SKY CITY
» Wellington / Thursday 03-Aug-06 / 10:45 PM / EMBASSY
» Dunedin Sunday 13-Aug-06 / 8:30 PM / REGENT
» Christchurch / Friday 18-Aug-06 / 3:30 PM / RIALTO
» Christchurch/ Sunday 20-Aug-06 / 8:15 PM / RIALTO
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