Beast for the eyes
OKJA Director Bong Joon-ho reveals the secrets of his latest creature feature…
People who know my work probably don’t expect a Disney movie,” jokes director Bong Joon-ho, “and this definitely isn’t that. It’s quite a strange story.” The South Korean filmmaker is chatting to Teasers about his new movie, Netflix original Okja, which may feature a Pete’s Dragon- style kinship between a youngster and a benevolent beast, but it won’t necessarily stir Disney-esque fuzzies.
This is the filmmaker who unleashed a slithery monster on Seoul in The Host and stranded Chris Evans on a train in Snowpiercer. And while Okja does feature a carnivorous turn from Tilda Swinton, the titular fantastic beast (pronounced: ‘ock-jah’) is actually an exotic hybrid who befriends a young girl, Mija (Ahn Seo-hyun), in the forests of South Korea. “It’s a love story,” Joon-ho explains. “It’s a family story about this girl and the animal.”
Ah, yes, ‘animal’. The product of Joon-ho’s own imagination, the Okja is a far cry from the squishy monster of The Host (“Can we call it ‘Okja’, and not call it a monster?” interrupts a PR during our chat). “This animal is kind and introverted and very different from
the monster in The Host,” Joon-ho says. “It’s more of a victim; it was born under ill-fated circumstances. It’s a very kind-looking animal.”
It was clearly important to get the design right. Together with concept artist Chin Wei-chen (who also created the creature in The Host), Joon-ho went through 100 different designs over the course of six months, all inspired by his own initial drawing. “It was about creating something that feels like it really exists in the world,” he says of the beast, a mix of a manatee, hippo and a pig. “Not something cartoonish.”
That’s Okja, but what of the humans? The film’s cast includes Paul Dano and Lily Collins, but it’s Tilda Swinton as icy corporate-type Lucy Mirando whose distinctive look in the trailer got eyes saucering. “I don’t like to categorise a character in harsh black and white tones,” Joon-ho says of Mirando. “There are villainous aspects of her, but you also feel sorry for her.”
It’s Mirando who prompts Okja and Mija to go on the lam after her corporation tries to get its claws into the eponymous BFF. Their adventure resulted in a globe-trotting shoot for Joon-ho. “It’s my biggest production,” he says. “It’s very large in scale; filming involved moving from the mountains in South Korea to Seoul, New York City and Vancouver. The whole production felt like a long trip.” We’re sure Disney would approve.