“New Normal” Theatrical Poster
Director: Jung Bum-Sik
Cast: Choi Ji-Woo, Lee Yu-Mi, Choi Min-Ho, Pyo Ji-Hoon, Jeong Dong-Won, Lee Moon-Sik
Running Time: 112 min.
By Paul Bramhall
Filmmaker Jong Beom-sik is one of those few director screenwriters in Korea whose name is almost exclusively tied to the horror genre. After making his debut alongside his brother Jeong Sik with 2007’s Epitaph, Beom-sik would go on to helm segments in both 2012’s Horror Stories and its 2013 follow-up Horror Stories 2, however is likely best known for the 2018 found footage flick Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum. While he’s dabbled outside of horror before, notably writing the scripts for the likes of 2012’s Miss Conspirator and 2019’s Forbidden Dream, as well as directing and writing 2015’s Casa Amor, Exclusive for Ladies (a remake of Brazil’s Head Over Heels), it’s arguably the horror genre that fans have been awaiting his return to.
In 2022 that wait paid off, with Beom-sik returning with New Normal, the first feature to see him on both directing and writing duties since Gonjiam 4 years prior. The return to filmmaking in a post COVID-19 pandemic world sees a slightly different style from Beom-sik, one that pivots away from the more traditional scares he was associated with in the 2010’s, and sees his focus turn to the day-to-day horrors we face as part of society. It’s an effective transition, and one that’s reflective of the mindset many would have found themselves in after grappling with more than 2 years of lockdowns and self-imposed isolation. The New Normal that Beom-sik portrays takes place over 4 days in Seoul, as an intermingling series of news broadcasts that play over the opening credits reel off a spate of stabbings, suicides, and feline murders that dominate the cities headlines.
The tone of New Normal comes across as one of humorously nihilistic, with Beom-sik’s approach harking back to the same style of Epitaph in the way a number of standalone tales play out, each of which feature characters that overlap to varying degrees (some who play significant parts, others who are merely glimpsed). The approach could almost see the production billed as an omnibus movie and get away with it, as the 6 chapters that make up the 110-minute runtime each constitute their own individual narratives and main characters. While it’s no secret that omnibus horror movies tend to generally be hit and miss affairs, the fact that this one has a single director and scriptwriter at the helm allows for a level of narrative consistency that’s usually missing, with each of the chapters contributing its own take on the overarching theme.
What that theme is could well be summarised by a neon sign hung on the wall of the characters apartment in the final chapter, which simply reads ‘Fuck The World’, with the icon of a raised middle finger underneath. Beom-sik paints the world portrayed onscreen with broad cynical brushstrokes, but he appears to be doing so with his tongue planted firmly in his cheek, aware of the absurdity of the situations that the characters find themselves in. Choi Ji-woo (Nowhere to Hide, Actresses) is a particular highlight, playing a woman who lives alone in the opening chapter, and is confronted by a suspicious fire alarm inspector who asks a few too many personal questions. The single location setting does an effective job of establishing the slightly off-kilter tone of New Normal, as it becomes clear that not everything is as it initially seems.
Despite the nihilistic subject matter it’s clear thar Beom-sik is having fun, with each of the 6 chapters named after other productions the story being told has some kind of narrative or thematic connection to. Fritz Lang’s M, Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing, Brian De Palma’s Dressed to Kill, Michael Powell’s Peeping Tom, and Lasse Hallström’s My Life as a Dog are all present and accounted for, and part of the fun is deciphering what connection the chapter has to the movie it took its name from. Interestingly the only movie from the 21st century that’s referenced as a chapter title is also the only Korean one, with Lee Jang-hoon’s Be With You from 2018 being the inspiration for the name of the 4th chapter.
It’s also a fitting example of the way New Normal looks to entertainingly subvert genre tropes, with Choi Minho (Derailed, Illang: The Wolf Brigade) discovering a letter in the dispensing part of a drinks vending machine, the mystery writer hoping to find her ideal man and offering instructions of how to find her. The segment mostly plays as a classic Korean romance, as each of the directions Minho follows leads him to another letter, with each one ebbing away at his cynical nature and similarly inviting the audience to invest in the idea of a romantic conclusion. Of course, things don’t end up that way, but it’s a credit to Beom-sik’s confident direction that he’s still able to bring the audience along for the ride and deliver an unexpected finish.
Similarly for the Peeping Tom segment, which makes the bold decision to make a stalker its main character, played by rapper Pyo Ji-hoon (here making his big screen debut after featuring in several K-dramas). Told entirely from his point of view, the chapter follows his obsession with his flight attendant next door neighbour, who he’s studied so closely he can even open his front door at the exact same time she opens hers to leave for work each morning, secretly recording her through the narrow opening. Able to hear her singing in the shower through the thin walls every evening, when he convinces himself that she must know he can hear her, naturally things go awry.
Notably Beom-sik uses each chapter to fragment the 4 days which the events play over, which can see the events that play out in one chapter sometimes taking place before the events of the one that just concluded, again a hark back to a similar technique that he utilised in Epitaph. The technique allows for each of the stories to establish a connection to each other while also maintaining a strong narrative thrust, successfully avoiding falling victim to the stop-start nature that the omnibus style structure often results in.
Out of the 3 other chapters, a highlight sees Jeong Dong-won (here also making his big screen debut) play a high school student who, after spending his life turning a blind eye to those who need a helping hand, decides to be a better person and be that guy who takes the time to help the elderly lady across the road. It also contains one of the best uses of the infamous Thus Spoke Zarathustra by Richard Strauss in recent memory, which only serves to further add to the off-kilter tone that runs through New Normal. The other sees Lee Yoo-mi (Hostage: Missing Celebrity, Park Hwa-young) as a single twenty-something who decides to download a dating app, its selling point being that it sends a notification whenever someone who matches is within the immediate vicinity. Of course not everyone who’s using the app is looking for romance, and sometimes being matched can lead to a date that’s deadly rather than dreamy.
The longest of the chapters is saved for last, with newcomer Ha Da-in playing an aspiring musician who finds her life wasting away working the night shift at a convenience store. Pushed to the edge by the various customers she’s forced to deal with on a daily basis, Da-in distracts herself by contributing to a chatroom where one of the users claims to have murdered someone, and needs advice on how to dispose the body. However when the online chat starts to spill into reality, without the anonymity of a phone screen events begin to go down a darker path that could be difficult to return from.
Overall New Normal feels like a return to form for Beom-sik, and it’s a form that feels like a refreshing change of direction to the types of horror movie we’ve seen from him previously. Revelling in the absurdity of the society that we live in, and the desensitised nature social media has had on us when it comes to the horrors of the world, if this is the New Normal, then Beom-sik seems to be taking the same attitude as Oh Dae-su in Oldboy – “Laugh and the world laughs with you, weep and you weep alone.”
Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 7.5/10
