Arriving right around one year after Parasite won big at the Academy Awards, director Jo Sung-hee’s Space Sweepers is a breakthrough of another kind for Korean cinema: Its very first space epic. Hitting Netflix after a series of pandemic-induced delays, (yip, we’re still in one!). Jo’s film is filled with impressive scope and a clear vision of its in-universe dynamics that makes this film stand out ‘heads and shoulders’ above other sci-fi films, also utilizing a concoction of various familiar sci-fi tropes, we are already familiar with.
Set in a 2092 wherein continued pollution has rendered the Earth virtually uninhabitable. Given the planet’s ill-health, wealthy elites have taken to an orbital utopia built by the UTS corporation offering paradise to a select few—an effort spurred on by the obsessive terraforming developer and UTS CEO James Sullivan (Richard Armitage). While the remaining citizens struggle to make do with whatever scraps remain.
The “Space Sweepers” of the title are the crew of the good ship Victory, who make their way by collecting various pieces of flotsam and jetsam floating through the spaceways and selling them to make a living, and a buck in the endless universe, alongside other ‘Spacers.’ The rag-tag group crew: Tae-Ho (Song Joong-Ki), Captain Jang (Kim Tae-Ri), Tiger Park (Jin Sun-kyu) and the reprogrammed military robot Bubs are also in endless debt.
After snatching a crashed space shuttle in the latest debris chase, Spaceship Victory’s crew members find a 7-year-old girl inside., who just happens to be a nanobot-filled android that a group of space terrorists have fitted with a hydrogen bomb. At first the Victory crew plans to sell the “little girl” back to the terrorist group who lost her, before they realize that she’s much more special than she seems.
However, there are cliches, as the crew make a few unpleasant discoveries and are forced to go on the run (some well-choreographed action blocks make their presence felt here) while gun-toting space robots terrify them are aplenty. Of course, there are the inevitable comparisons to Guardians of the Galaxy or Star Wars that come with the film’s genre, and rightly so, because, the film should stand alongside these other great franchises.
Despite the cliches, the film is largely entertaining. The cast greatly helps with this, as Song Joong-Ki is good and Kim Tae-Ri particularly shines in her role as the no-nonsense Captain Jang; it would have been great to see more of her.
FINAL THOUGHTS:
Space Sweepers is low-risk, and worthy entertainment for the family. It’s a breezy bit of escapism with some social commentary baked in. But it is the breathtaking CGI and loveable character’s you fall in love with, wanting nothing more than to be apart of the Victory crew that makes this film special. Director Jo has created a fascinating science fiction that feels both original and inviting.
4/5 STARS