Okja defies categories
Netflix’s new film Okja isn’t easy to categorize — it’s a feel-good flick, a CGI adventure tale and a rumination on the evils of the meat trade all at once. From South Korean writer-director Bong Joonho, it follows a 13-year-old Korean girl, Mija (Ahn Seo-hyun), whose family raises a genetically modified super-pig for a multinational corporation.
Once Okja reaches mammoth size, the company returns for it — with plans to make it into lowcost jerky. Mija fears for her best friend, and so begins a rescue that’s threatened by capitalists, demonstrators and consumers who all have their own ideas for Okja’s fate.
“Films either show animals as soulmates or else we see them in documentaries being butchered. I wanted to merge those worlds. The division makes us comfortable, but the reality is that they are the same animal,” Joon-ho, who also directed Snowpiercer, told The Guardian.
“All our problems arise because of capitalism. It brings pleasure but also so much pain and unhappiness. The questions I ask in my films about why we harm the environment or animals all come down in the end to capitalism.”
Partly filmed in Vancouver, B.C., Okja has been mired in controversy. South Korea’s three largest cinema chains are boycotting the film because Netflix planned to simultaneously stream it online. Plus, when Okja screened at the Cannes film festival, critics balked at the idea of a streaming service’s presence at the event.
Okja is now streaming on Netflix. Tilda Swinton and Jake Gyllenhaal co-star.
Pop goes Killjoys
Sci-fi series Killjoys is back Friday with season 3 — and an out-ofthis-world guest star. Multimedia pop artist Viktoria Modesta will guest-star as Niko, a lethal Hackmod surgeon with a secret crusade. Her hit song, Prototype, will be featured in the episode.
Modesta is an amputee — an accident at birth left her with a defect in her left leg that reconstructive surgeries couldn’t fix. So, at age 20, she was amputated below the knee and now wears an array of different prostheses.
“It was our opportunity to bring to life this very unique, very sexy, very glamorous aspirational character,” creator Michelle Lovretta told the website TV, Eh? Niko will butt heads with Johnny (Aaron Ashmore) in the second episode.
Bocelli in Florence
Andrea Bocelli steps into the spotlight on PBS’s music series Landmarks Live in Concert on Friday. The series, hosted by Chad Smith from The Red Hot Chili Peppers, features an artist or band performing at a destination of personal significance, and specific locations around it. Bocelli touches down in the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence, Italy, and sings songs including O sole mio and Time to Say Goodbye.