Nerds That Geek Movie Review: ‘Train to Busan’

Written by John Edward Betancourt

​It wasn't that long ago, that the zombie genre was more or less a niche market, one that only a handful of fans knew about and celebrated. Most of these features were only available on VHS or DVD and if anyone who loved these stories even muttered the name, George Romero, they were met with a raised eyebrow and a frustrating ‘who?’ But we all know how this story ends. Somewhere along the way the living dead became the hottest thing on the planet and now they're everywhere when it comes to pop culture as a whole.

However, there is a price to pay for having these walking corpses reach the peak of their popularity, eventually, they will reach their saturation point and the ideas will dry up and they will be forced to return to their proverbial graves and already we're seeing some of that now. There's a film featuring romance for the undead out there, and a sitcom featuring them as well. So, in order to stay fresh and vibrant, what's a rotting corpse to do? Simple, let the idea float about the globe and let another mind in another land give the genre a fresh take, as is the case with the thrilling South Korean zombie film, Train to Busan. 

Now the plot for this particular film is simple enough. A father, Seok-woo and his daughter, Soo-an; board a train to the city of Busan so that Soo-an can see her estranged mother. But this routine trip will turn out to be anything but. Something is happening behind the scenes, the dead are returning to life and attacking the living by way of a strange infection, and unfortunately for Seok-woo and every other passenger riding this train on this fateful day, one of the infected has boarded and everyone will be forced to figure out how to survive the onslaught of the living dead as they hope and pray that their train will make it safely to their destination.

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This is a film that quite frankly, I have been scrambling to see for some time, something about it seemed unique when I saw the trailer and thanks to Shudder, I finally had the chance to settle in... and completely and utterly enjoy the hell out of this motion picture. For starters, it does a phenomenal job of setting up the apocalypse by giving us quality time with our lead characters before plunging us into mystery and chaos, and by giving us that face time with the characters, unlike many modern zombie flicks, we actually care about Seok-woo and his daughter and a good majority of the people on this train because they are truly trapped in an out of the blue disaster and considering how fast the dead, spread, terrify and dominate in this film, you're hoping for these people to find a break from what seems to be impending doom.

But the wonder of this motion picture doesn't end with rich characters and quality scares, it's the sheer fact that this movie manages to twist the genre on its heels and inject new ideas into old and tired tropes. It seems as though every single zombie movie out there as of late features ‘The Jerk’, the guy or gal who causes more harm than good but eventually gets their just desserts, and while this film appears to feature it at first... how that storyline plays out will surprise and stun you and well... that seems to happen at every single turn in this film. Just when you think it's going to go a certain way, the story snaps back and utterly surprises you in the process. 

Which means that hands down, Train to Busan is a must-see zombie movie. Not only does it give you everything we love about the genre, it reinvents it as best it can to make this a unique experience and I appreciate the fact that someone decided to try something new with the genre because the end result of the hard work of Writer/Director Sang-ho Yeon is a story that had me glued to the screen and anxious to know what was surprises were just around the corner and that's no easy task to do when your story is basically zombies on a train. So, if you have a little free time, love zombie flicks and have a Shudder account, hop online and check this one out. It's truly a refreshing entry in the genre and one that certainly entertains.

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