Passengers is trapped inside a train with angry zombies. Will they survive, or will they die and go to hell?
I decided to give Train to Busan a second chance, as I usually do when I don’t understand why a movie like Train to Busan is so beloved by so many. Did I miss something?
So what is so special about this movie? Is it because people think it’s so cool to like an Asian movie? Hey, we can read, so we are cool since we have watched a movie where we have to read the subtitles? What is so special about this generic zombie movie?
The answer is nothing! My impression is that many people like the movie because of the cheesy South Korean melodrama. But my brain has been destroyed by watching so many South Korean movies that have been ruined because of cheesy melodrama, so it’s hard to sell the melodrama in Train to Busan to a viewer like me.
Train to Busan is decent in the first hour when it still has some of the more likable characters. I’m thinking of the hunk, Ma Dong-seok, and his wife. It’s sort of cheesy, but it’s interesting to see how he and the father of the young girl are interacting after the father almost killed him and his wife. We see that the hunk, Ma Dong-seok, is willing to help a jerk who has to protect his daughter.
But after the first hour, Train to Busan is done entertaining, and the movie just gets worse from here. The antagonist in the movie is the old fart and his stupid, brainless group, who shows much of the real side of how selfish humans are. So I hoped that 95% of the passengers would die on the train. We have a few characters who care about others, but the rest of them behave like idiots who deserve to die. So to hell with them and humankind!
And then we have the zombies. No, just no! They are not frightening, and the actors overact so much that I started laughing. Just look at their body movements and facial expressions. They aren’t behaving like zombies. They are demons who are about to shout out hallelujah and praise Satan. They destroy the tension with their overacting, and that they can’t see a thing when it’s dark is so stupid.
After the first hour, you feel there’s not much happening here. The train trip to hell becomes tedious and repetitive, and there are a few stereotypical characters that are laughable bad, and they take you out of the movie with their stupid behavior. There’s not much creativity here, and the plot becomes repetitive.
I gave Train to Busan a 6/10 the first time I watched it, but now I give it a 5/10. It doesn’t stand a chance against movies like 28 Days Later or Dawn of the Dead, which are the perfect movies in this genre. Train to Busan doesn’t deserve all the praise it has gotten over the years. It’s not that good, and I’m never going to watch this mediocrity again.