Professor Se Jeong attends a biotech conference, only to witness it spiral into catastrophe when a rapidly mutating virus is unleashed. As the outbreak spreads and the infected begin to transform, authorities seal off the entire facility.
Writer-director Yeon Sang-ho has carved out a name for himself as a filmmaker who knows how to make a damn good zombie film. He came to prominence in the U.S. after the success of his 2016 zombie horror, “Train to Busan,” and its stellar sequel, “Peninsula.” With “Colony,” he has taken clichéd zombie tropes and turned them on their heads, delivering a film that takes a new approach to the undead.
The story takes place at the Dongwoo-ri Building, an ultra-modern skyscraper located in the center of Seoul, South Korea. Chains Bio is holding a presentation inside the building, where its CEO, Kang Woo-chul (Kim Jong-tae), demonstrates the cell regeneration capabilities of slime mold. After the presentation, disgruntled biotechnologist Seo Young-chul (Koo Kyo-hwan) confronts Kang and accuses him of stealing his research and then firing him from the company. Before entering the building, Seo injected himself with the vaccine, then attacks Kang, injecting him with the slime mold. Kang quickly mutates and infects nearby employees, resulting in an outbreak.
The building is thrust into lockdown, and a small band of survivors, including scientist Kwon Se-jeong (Jun Ji-hyun), manage to hide out in a sports shop. When the hordes of zombies see the group hiding behind the shop glass, they attack, but Kwon’s quick thinking—turning off the lights—confuses the zombies and forces them to retreat. As the group tries to formulate a plan for escape, they see the zombies attack another small group of people, and Kwon observes that the infected possess a high degree of swarm intelligence, akin to an ant hive, allowing them to share sensory data with each other, continuously evolving and learning upon every failed attack.
A police officer in Kwon’s group tells everyone that their only chance of escape lies in finding Seo, who alone carries the antidote within his body. When Kwon tells the cop it is only infectious after being bitten, the authorities remain unmoved, prioritizing Seo above all else. Now the group must devise a plan, using the building’s CCTV to track down Seo and bring him to the roof. Little do they know that Seo can see through the infected’s perspectives and is guiding them into a deadly trap.
Zombie movies are a dime a dozen, and most of them are unoriginal and pale imitations of better-produced films. Here, though, Sang-ho has created a narrative unlike any other zombie film that has come before. Seo can communicate with the zombies, like the queen in an ant hive, which injects the story with unique, unsettling tension and adds a whole new layer of suspense and horror on top of the already scary zombie component. Sang-ho also takes the time to introduce us to some of the characters we will be following, giving each enough character development so that when tragedy strikes, the survivors are more than faceless victims—they are individuals we come to care about.
There are some spectacular set-pieces, especially watching the infected respond as a single, unified organism rather than acting on isolated instinct, and this creates nail-biting suspense throughout. I love that Yeon Sang-ho and co-writer Choi Kyu-seok have accomplished something brand new within the confines of horror, utilizing established tropes in fresh and imaginative ways. It’s unlikely that any other filmmaker will put a fresh spin on a genre we all know so well for a while, so go out and watch “Colony”; it will not disappoint.
Exclusively in Theaters Friday, August 28th
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