Odd Family: Zombie On Sale, The (2019) Review

“The Odd Family: Zombie On Sale” Theatrical Poster

AKA: Zombie for Sale
Director: Lee Min-Jae
Cast: Jung Jae-Young, Kim Nam-Gil, Uhm Ji-Won, Lee Soo-Kyung, Jung Ga-Ram, Park In-Hwan, Shin Jung-Keun, Jeon Bae-Su, Oh Eui-Sik, Kim Ki-Cheon, Jo Eun-A
Running Time: 112 min. 

By Paul Bramhall

Korea’s infatuation with the zombie genre may have come a few decades later than its western counterparts, but despite its relatively late-in-the-day appearance, that hasn’t stopped it from becoming a popular fixture on both the big and small screens. While there have been zombie movies before in Korea, it was arguably Yeong Sang-ho’s 2016 production Train to Busan that kicked off the current wave. A sequel to his animated feature Seoul Station, Sang-ho’s take on zombie lore can be considered patient zero when it comes to discussions on the subject, and the series was continued in 2020 with Peninsula. In between we’ve had ancient Korean zombies with the likes of Rampant and 2 seasons of the Netflix series Kingdom, zombies in isolation with #Alive, and in 2019 we finally got a zombie comedy in the form of The Odd Family: Zombie On Sale.

The directorial debut of Lee Min-jae, who also wrote the script, TOF:ZOS (as I’ll refer to it from here on in) opens much like any other zombie flick in recent times – a collection of voiceovers from various news broadcasts explain that a pharmaceutical company has been conducting illegal experiments on human subjects in an attempt to find a cure for diabetes, but has had an adverse reaction on a number of patients, turning them into flesh hungry zombies. As the narration continues the camera pans closer to a rain-soaked canister under the cover of night, out of which one such zombie emerges, and proceeds to doddle towards the closest rural town.

Far from the beginnings of a horrific ordeal for the townsfolk though, the bemused walking dead soon finds himself belittled by a pair of Korean grandmas for staggering around drunk in broad daylight, and has to endure insults by a group of kids who think he’s a smelly hobo. To top things off, most of his first 24 hours is spent being chased around the village by a wild dog. The zombies aimless wondering eventually leads him to cross paths with the family who run the local gas station, a shabby operation which has seen better days, and gets by from scamming vehicles passing through into paying for repairs they don’t need. When the elderly patriarch of the family ends up being bitten, rather than turning into a fellow member of the undead, he finds himself revitalised and full of youthful energy he hasn’t felt in years. In a village with a mostly aging population, it doesn’t take long for the family to hatch a bizarre money-making scheme.

In a genre that tends to rely on the trope of surviving, it’s always welcome when a zombie movie tries to do something a little different. From Sabu’s Miss Zombie to the Arnold Schwarzenegger starring Maggie, when done right zombies can be applied to many a different genre other than their own. Such is the case here, which uses the dynamic of a dysfunctional family to tell a decidedly comedic tale which, in many ways, feels like a spiritual follow-up to Kim Ji-woon’s The Quiet Family. Despite being 20 years apart, there are some uncanny similarities, such as the patriarch of the family being played by Park In-hwan (Exit, Thirst), which is the exact same role he played in Ji-woon’s debut, and another returning actor comes in the form of Jung Jae-young (Confession of Murder, Moss). While in The Quiet Family Jae-young played one of the guests that ends up dead, here he’s cast as In-hwan’s oldest son and manager of the gas station.

Both are also ensemble efforts, and TOF:ZOS comes with a great cast. Joining In-hwan and Jae-young are Uhm Ji-won (Master, The Phone) as Jae-young’s heavily pregnant wife, Lee Soo-kyung (Heart Blackened, Coin Locker Girl) as the daughter, and Kim Nam-gil (Memoir of a Murderer, The Shameless) as Jae-young’s brother who’s just returned from his city slicker life in Seoul. The zombie himself is played by Jung Ga-ram (Jo Pil-ho: The Dawning Rage, Believer) who does a stellar job in the role considering he has 2 lines (1 of which is a single word) throughout the entire runtime. As a film industry Korea has leaned increasingly on the big name production in recent years, so the ensemble nature of the piece in itself feels like a throwback to an earlier era of Korean cinema, when ensemble productions like To Catch a Virgin Ghost and The Host where far more common.

Director Min-jae derives most of the comedy out of the family’s interactions with the zombie, who Soo-kyung amusingly names Jeom-bi, and the way he ends up extorted as a means for the family to make money. The fact that he appears to be a vegetarian, with an insatiable appetite for cabbages covered in tomato ketchup rather than any desire to eat the living, makes for a running joke throughout, with the wholesome vegetable and its unlikely accompaniment making appearances in even the more dramatic scenes. I mention dramatic scenes, as someone that’s seen their fair share of Korean comedies, they can sometimes be traumatising affairs that don’t hesitate to abruptly switch to melodrama later on. The most recent example that comes to mind is the whiplash inducing I Can Speak, which goes from comedic bickering between a young civil servant and a cranky old lady, to a harrowing comfort women drama in just 2 hours.

My point is, sometimes watching a Korean comedy comes with a gnawing dread in the back of your mind, as you wonder if the director plans to pull the carpet out from under the viewer at some point. Thankfully this isn’t the case with TOF:ZOS, which stays true to its good-natured premise throughout its 110-minute runtime, even so far as pixelating the one decapitation that occurs. Indeed one of its biggest strengths is how it balances the familiar with a sense of originality. The family dynamic feels reminiscent of that found in Bong Joon-ho’s The Host, complete with the prodigal brother who returns to the family after a long absence, and Soo-kyung’s subtly developed romance with Ga-ram as the titular Jeom-bi comes with a tip of the hat to Jonathan Levine’s Warm Bodies. In one meta-moment we even get a scene where Jae-young amusingly plays a clip from Train to Busan, to try and explain what’s going on to his father. 

Somewhat expectedly, Min-jae doesn’t let the fact that he’s setup a rural town where practically all of its aging population have willingly subjected themselves to a zombie bite go to waste, and the initial energy they find bestowed upon them ultimately doesn’t last long, leading the finale into familiar territory. As the family find themselves holed up in the gas station against a town full of zombies that definitely aren’t vegetarian, they each have to deal with the fact that not only is their money making scheme not going to last, but they may have inadvertently started the zombie apocalypse. As the ante is upped and stakes increased, Min-jae and the cast do a solid job of injecting a sincere dose of empathy into the manic final act, while not forgetting that we’re watching a comedy. One scene that involves a zombie getting caught in electrical wiring, and the subsequent neon drenched lightshow it results in from the just re-launched gas station, is particularly hilarious, and earns one of the biggest laughs of the movie.

While there’s little doubt that the zombie genre is one that’s saturated to the point most ideas have already been explored, including the one here (see the previously mentioned Miss Zombie), TOF:ZOS proves that it’s not what you do with the genre, but how you do it. The answer here is a cast that are more than up for making a fool of themselves, and enough originality on display to set it apart from its peers, making for a consistently entertaining ride throughout. Putting a distinctly Korean spin on proceedings, for a debut TOF:ZOS is remarkably assured, and Min-jae has marked himself here as a director to look out for, which is what I’ll certainly be doing. The Odd Family: Zombie On Sale delivers laughs, thrills, and even a couple of flying kicks for good measure. Now, who’s up for trying some raw cabbage covered in tomato ketchup?

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 7.5/10