Over the holiday break, I watched a Korean film called The Host. The typical foreign films that I see tend to be dramatic, so this monster movie -- part comedy, part adventure / mystery, part drama -- surprised me. It was a little odd and a tad long, but I liked it overall.

I'm told that the movie was a response to the way the media and government dealt with the SARS epidemic in Korea. The movie starts with the discovery of a strange, mutant monster in the Han River. It focuses on one family during the emergency, whose daughter was captured by the monster and whose other members have supposedly been infected with the monster's "virus." The portrayal of the medical staff, police, and government of Korea is unfavorable, but the portrayal of U.S. intervention is even more unfavorable. Doctors and officials from the U.S. are always portrayed as ignorant, arrogant, and narrow-minded.

The film showed an interesting view of modern Korea, and it was nice how the movie didn't fit into any typical genre. It was funny, sad, scary, and weird all at once. The monster hunt tends to go on for a long time, and that's my biggest complaint about the film. I wonder if the portrayal of the attitudes toward the U.S. is accurate to the true feeling of Korean citizens.