How far are you willing to go to stick by the ones you love? Would you stay when it got really hard? Job insecurity hard? Body dysmorphia hard? What about possession at the hands of a demon? Writer/director Jason Yu’s debut feature, SLEEP, asks and answers such questions to remarkable effect.
SLEEP follows Soo-jin (Jung Yu-mi) and Hyun-su (Lee Sun-kyun), a married and expectant couple who live by the mantra of making it through anything as long as they’re together. Successful in their own respective professions and incredibly supportive of one another, they feel like the epitome of an ideal marriage. Don’t be fooled, however. SLEEP is a horror film just as much as it is romantic, and soon enough the tension starts to ramp up as it becomes clear—to some—that, while he sleeps, Hyun-su is possessed by a demon spirit. Soo-jin, who is adamant that a successful relationship is one in which neither party gives up on the other for any reason for even a moment, embarks on a quest to save her husband and their baby from the rage of the demon who repeatedly claims his mind and body in the night.
SLEEP is a staggeringly good debut feature. The performances of the entire rather minimal cast are fantastic. Kim Tae-soo’s cinematography helps carry tension even in the smallest moments. It’s almost immediately an apparent descent into madness sold stock and barrel through Soo-jin watching the man she loves become a stranger in the night—and still deciding to fight for him.
Perhaps the strongest thing about this film is not the outright literal onscreen demonic possession, nor the steady ratcheting up of anxious tension as the chapters progress, but the couple themselves. It’s one thing to have a couple start out connected with each other, spouting how much they can never be torn apart no matter the circumstances. It’s a whole other playground to keep them that way. The character development of SLEEP is so strong that, even though not much time passes before we are exposed to the horror, even though we are outright told very little about this couple or either of their families, what we see is more than enough to paint a detailed picture. Soo-jin loves Hyun-su, yes. And he her. That is absolutely and repeatedly made clear through all manner of action and words. But she is also clearly dead set against having a relationship like the one her parents had. The reason it is so important to her that they stay together—even when Hyun-su protests on grounds of safety—is because for her, to leave is to admit defeat. And she will not have defeat of a life she clearly works so hard to both maintain and enjoy.
Hyun-su, meanwhile, actively makes the choice over and over again to hear his wife out. When she seems the most nonsensical, the most unstable, the most desperate, he sits. And listens. When she’s angry, he gives her the space to be angry, and still makes an effort to see through her sleepless rage into the truth—the fear of losing her family that is so visibly eating her alive.
That a movie like this could come out at a time when there is such a crisis in Korea regarding the treatment of women and rapidly declining birth rates should perhaps not be as surprising as I feel it to be. We are always, the world over, engaging with the social and political climate of the world around us—especially when it seems the most on a precipice. Just this year in the US, within months of each other, no less than five films have been released tackling the horror and anxieties of pregnancy and bodily autonomy as we witness healthcare access being once again thrown through the ringer. SLEEP tackles similar themes, to be sure, but within the context of Korea’s own equally fraught cultural moment.
It seems almost an act of radical optimism to release a film in which a nuclear family unit—made up of two entirely independent people consistently choosing to be together while valuing their individuality—is tossed into the most horrific circumstances imaginable, wherein one of them borders on family annihilation and must constantly find the strength to be better, conquering demons real and imagined, and come out the other side more strongly united than before. SLEEP tackles the horror head on, in ways that will leave you pondering it far longer after its end. But it is just as much hopeful as horrifying. As full of love as it is of fear. As funny as it is dark. It’s beautiful, and haunting in more ways than it first appears. Jason Yu has more than proven himself an artist to watch, mentored by Bong Joon-Ho and markedly adept at genre mixing.
I can’t wait to see what he does next, but for now, don’t miss out on SLEEP, available on VOD.
Tags: bong joon-ho, foreign horror, Jason Yu, Jung Yu-mi, Kim Tae-soo, Korean Horror, Lee Sun-kyun, Magnet Releasing, Magnolia Pictures, Sleep
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