‘Singular and Clever’: Parasite director recommends seeing this new film at the cinema

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A young couple’s life is turned upside down when the husband blacks out in his sleep and transforms into a different person after the blackout. His new born wife can’t sleep because of fear…

3 good reasons to watch “Sleep”.

The fact that Sleep is a Korean horror thriller can add to the good reasons to go to the theaters. And maybe that’s enough for a large part of his audience. For others, here are additional arguments.

1 – Bong Joon-ho acts, so does Gerard

“The most unique and clever first film I’ve seen in ten years” : These words of praise are not from us, but from Bong Joon-ho. Yes, the director of Parasite, the Palme d’Or in 2019 and the Oscar for Best Picture the following year.

But the latter is probably not entirely objective, as Jason Yu, the writer and director of Sleep, was his assistant on Okja. Nevertheless, such voicing arouses curiosity, and the various festivals in which he appeared were not mistaken.

Starting with Cannes Critics’ Week, where he was one of the representatives of genre cinema. Then the Gérardmer Festival, where sleep was a party with a trip to the Grand Prix. A sign that Jason Yoo wasn’t just helping Bong Joon-ho: He was also going to a good school next to him.

2 – one film, several questions

A story of a couple and their parents in the background of sleepwalking, so sleep is the first film. Which was fun to discover at the festival, and especially in Cannes, where the nights are short. But Apriori is less rich in tension and other jump scares that Jason Yu offers, with a bit of humor in the first part, where the film seems to be looking for itself.

The tone and intentions are clearer in the second, with particularly successful shots and a surprise scene that makes us think we should be prepared for anything. In a scenario that can be interpreted differently depending on the sensibilities of each, the supernatural events may reflect the couple and social pressures related to marriage or children.

It is enough that you do not fall asleep in the evening after the session.

3 – after death

Sun-kyun Lee was not the most famous Korean actor in the rest of the world. But a real idol in his native country, until he ended his life on December 27, 2023, at the age of 48.

The suicide was linked to police pressure and online harassment he had been a victim of on social media since his alleged involvement in a drug case last October, when he in turn filed a complaint for blackmail.

Despite his public apology, his public image has been tarnished in Korea, which has been plagued by drug-dealing stories. to this tragic outcome. Sleep is therefore coming to our cinemas posthumously, and Sun-Kyun Lee will be in Killing Romance and Project Silence (also presented at Cannes in 2023), which do not yet have a release date in France.