Kimber Myers
If you have even a passing familiarity with Bong Joon Ho, you won’t be surprised that his first post-Parasite movie deals with issues of hegemony, hierarchy, and the evils of the rich and powerful. These aren’t new subjects for the Oscar-winning director, who has mined these topics for literal decades across films as diverse as Memories of Murder, The Host, and Snowpiercer. Yet what is surprising is how he does it in Mickey 17, a sharply funny sci-fi satire that brings new shades to his criticism of the class system. Yet in addition to his frequently mined theme of the dangers of social ranking, Mickey 17 also explores the terrors of fascism, particularly the idiotic brand that appears to be clawing for purchase in the United States right now.
Decades in the future — but depressingly, not that many — the Earth has become largely inhospitable, both for its literal climate and its societal one. Desperate to escape a voracious loan shark, Mickey Barnes (Robert Pattison) tries to travel to where he thinks he can’t be found: space. However, our amiably dumb hero doesn’t have money or any skills that might make him a valued member of an interstellar voyage, so he volunteers as an expendable. He’ll die, over and over in various experiments and dangerous missions for the company in charge, then wake up as a reprinted version of himself, body and memories intact.
Mickey’s life is filled with indignities big (like seemingly pointless deaths) and small (reduced rations of awful food), but at least he has his love, Nasha (Naomi Ackie). Sadly, Mickey 17 is presumed dead after one of those dangerous missions on the planet they’re trying to settle, and Mickey 18 is spit out of the printer. Now two copies of the same man exist, a capital crime in this shitty version of the future.
Bong would have plenty to explore if that were the entirety of the plot, but he brings in more elements, most notably the character of Kenneth Marshall (Mark Ruffalo) and his wife, Yifa (Toni Collette). Marshall is a veneered, preening politician who will feel very familiar to anyone who hasn’t been in a coma for the last decade of real human history: a media-savvy, supremely stupid supreme leader. Bong and Ruffalo are taking on Trump, targeting the American president with a portrayal that isn’t an impersonation (and gives plausibility deniability if it comes to it in a court of law). However, anyone with half a brain will see what he’s doing.
Mickey 17 isn’t particularly subtle in its criticism, but that isn’t to say that it isn’t smart — or that it isn’t highly entertaining. This movie is unhinged, deranged, and silly, switching between tones with ease and evincing Ho’s masterful control as a director at almost every moment. By comparison, Parasite is a study in restraint; this is more in line with Okja from a tonal perspective, but it still feels like its own beast (in this case, it’s the giant tardigrade-like creatures that populate the planet these humans are attempting to colonize). I laughed every time Mickey’s new body juddered out of the human-sized printer, echoing the experience of watching its inkjet predecessor labor over a single sheet. Its pitch-black humor is balanced by sweetness; The 17th version of Mickey is all heart and no brains, and he just wants to live and love.
This soft little doofus is played by Pattison at his goofiest, and the actor makes it easy to differentiate between Mickey 17 and his sharper successor. Pattinson continues to prove he’s among the best of his generation, which is why the best directors in the world keep casting him in roles as diverse as a brooding Batman and this doomed dummy. Ackie radiates warmth and loveliness in her supporting role, which also gives her the opportunity to kick ass, which is a rarely seen and welcome combo in a heroine on screen. Ruffalo isn’t as enjoyable as he was playing against type in Poor Things, but that might also be that I try to avoid spending time with his real-life analog.
Wildly imaginative and just fucking wild, Mickey 17 isn’t Bong at his best, but it’s still better — and far more interesting — than many studio movies have been over the last few decades. Not everything works (especially in its second half) and sometimes it’s a bit too much even for Bong. Yet Mickey 17 is weird in a way that makes it worth watching, if not worth dying (repeatedly) for.
B+
“Mickey 17” is in theaters this weekend.
