Fest Track On Sirk TV Film Review: CONCRETE UTOPIA [Fantastic Fest 2023 - Austin, Texas]
The societal implosion of a level spoken of in "Concrete Utopia" where the world is completely closed off in an interesting parable of Mad Max proportions in a very compressed setting. As an audience, we are never given quite a grasp of what calamity befell humanity, simply that it happened. The concept of huge earthquakes and frigid cold overtaking a city in Korea (not necessarily Seoul) where only one apartment building is still left standing plays almost to the Garden mentality. The beginning of the film in its set up talks about the class structure and the lottery that goes in who lives in certain buildings, almost like an older feudal system. When sources become scarce, an almost miltary structure (and a new form of control) comes over this building led by the people who live there. Most of the perspective comes from a man and his wife who are simply trying to live without getting into the ego and agendas of those around him. A really interesting development is the placing of a quiet man as their spokesperson because of his decisive method of working out problems before the disaster but a lack of information truly about what had come with him before (which is revealed as the film goes on).
The film doesn't really take a wider view of the city, only the people in this building and their place in it while trying to keep the others out. Their savior in many ways is their own downfall because he begins to believe his own hype (which is always the crux of insecure leaders). His actions are consequential overall since they place progressions in motion that he can't undo. This man does some heroic actions but in retrospect, these acts were probably done for the wrong reasons. The aspect of "only residents" become a rallying cry but also a noose for people around the building begins to show fissures. These "residents" go out to requisition supplies and chock it up that they were the ones chosen to survive and that everyone beyond their periphery is wrong. As things slowly unfurl and stands are made, the comeuppance, though expected and severe, is warranted, even as the once great leader simply becomes another link in the chain that is broken. This is what makes the resolution however bleak, earned and yet metaphorical at the same time. Stories that are passed on in the progression of the narrative become a reflection of legends and motivations that are both true but cautionary in nature in that they reflect a different reality than what was lived. B
By Tim Wassberg
