Before sci-fi was synonymous with dazzling graphics and big budget blockbusters, before it was a way for smart writers to blend their far fetched ideas with technology that wasn’t around, before it was ever merged with the realm of action movies, it served a simple purpose: to ask what if. For ages, science fiction asked questions of its viewers, contrasting hypothetical society’s with our own, holding a mirror to the systems in place.
As does “Snowpiercer” where, thanks to man’s mishandling of the global warming crisis, Earth has frozen over. The only survivors continue to inhabit the Snowpiercer, a train with a perpetually-moving engine, 17 years later. But the eternal locomotive’s remnants of the old world live on in a classist system, where the riders in the front of the car are afforded luxury while those in the tail section live in crowded filth. But not for long. Because tail-enders Curtis (Chris Evans, Captain America, The Avengers) and Gilliam (John Hurt, 1984, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy) are brewing up a revolution to take control of the engine.
“Snowpiercer” is that rare summer sci-fi movie that takes its concept and utilizes it to the fullest. The film explores layer after layer of injustice, all while really exploring what it would be like to wage class warfare on a train going through a frozen tundra. It has the same fiber of a big summer movie, but takes trope after trope of the classic blockbuster fanfare and transforms them into something much more grounded and compelling.
The movie is mesmerizing in its action as well as in its acting. Octavia Spencer (The Help, Fruitvale Station) makes a perfect Tanya, another tail-ender who’s fighting to find her son, never bringing her character to either extreme of ‘mother’ or ‘rebel’ archetype. Instead she blends the two sides into a wholly believable character. She’s the deeply-caring, maverick mother who’s the antithesis of Tilda Swinton’s (Only Lovers Left Alive, Moonrise Kingdom) Mason, who brutally and unambiguously preaches order in the tail section.
But it’s Evans who carries the movie. It’s a sly touch, casting Captain America as a man fighting for justice at the end of the world, and it pays off. He delivers one of the stronger performances of his career, and by the end he’s gone through so much it’s hard to believe he’s still the same man he was before. It may not be perfect, but it’s a great flip side to his normal boy scout routine.
Director Bong Joon-Ho (The Host, Memories of Murder) certainly delivers some cold bite into the summer with his English-language debut. His eccentric style has made the sci-fi genre a safe place to think boldly and cleverly. It may seem like a tall order to invest so much into a new perspective and edge but don’t worry, you’ll warm up to it.