When I was way too young I read Stephen King's The Stand and I fell in love with the post apocalyptic genre. It's a great space for social commentary and to explore character archetypes. I don't claim to be an expert, but I've seen enough zombie movies to have seen some shit. But I cannot recall ever shedding a tear over one until today.
I stumbled upon Train to Busan on Netflix today and thought, "Zombies on a train. That should be interesting." I had no idea what was about to hit me. It wasn't the gore or the monsters. It wasn't the claustrophobia or the horror of zombies on a train. It was how much of myself and my family I saw in those characters on the screen.
I'm a busy guy who works too many hours and misses things at home like dance recitals and sporting events. Things get busy at work and I just miss things. Seeing the relationship between the father and daughter protagonists, Seok-Woo and Soo-An, really hit me on a personal level. The movie really peeled back the layers of that relationship and laid it bare for us to see.
I started to lose my composure when Seok-Woo was bitten and had to leave Soo-An behind. I thought back to when she told her dad she couldn't finish her song because he wasn't there to see it. He left the cabin and started walking to the back of the engine and it occurred to me that he never got to hear that song before he died. And then there was the flashback to her birth. That's when I thought I really lost it. But then the soldiers about to shoot them in the tunnel heard her song and it saved them. I'm not the type to get broken up about much of anything. But there I was just sobbing at some stupid zombie movie.
It hit me hard. My wife doesn't think too highly of zombie movies so I figured she wasn't going to be watching. So I told her all about it, spoilers and all, when she got home this evening. Even then I started to tear up and had to catch my breath a few times just to tell her what happened in this stupid zombie movie. It may not resonate the same way with everyone. It got to me for a lot of personal reasons. But to me, Train to Busan was a lot more than I expected. I hadn't cried this hard watching a movie since Old Yeller died.
Submitted June 09, 2020 at 05:06AM by squatch42 https://ift.tt/2XOnGwF
