‘Mickey 17’ Review: Two Robert Pattinson's Find Their Individuality in Bong Joon-Ho’s Silly Absurdist Satire
Perhaps the movie we need in these Trump 2.0 times.
‘Mickey 17’ Review: Two Robert Pattinson's Find Their Individuality in Bong Joon-Ho’s Silly Absurdist Satire
It was only appropriate to give Bong Joon-Ho that blank check after Parasite. I can't believe Warner Bros., the king of all shelves, was the place to let Bong cash that blank check with another — say it with me now — movie that's a critique of capitalism! Mickey 17, based on the novel Mickey7 by Edward Ashton, which stars Robert Pattinson as a working-class man who dies and is cloned on the daily in a conservative space colony, is Bong’s silliest movie to date, even as he combines themes from Snowpiercer and Okja. It's perhaps the movie we need in these Trump 2.0 times, messy structure aside.
Image Copyright: © 2024 Warner Bros.
MPA Rating: R (violent content, language throughout, sexual content and drug material.)
Runtime: 2 Hours and 17 Minutes
Production Companies: Warner Bros. Pictures, Plan B Entertainment, Offscreen, Kate Street Picture Company, Domain Entertainment
Distributor: Warner Bros. Pictures
Director: Bong Joon Ho
Writer: Bong Joon Ho
Cast: Robert Pattinson, Naomi Ackie, Steven Yeun, Toni Collette, Mark Ruffalo
Release Date: March 7, 2025
On Earth, 30 years in the future, sweet-natured yet simple-minded Mickey Barnes (Robert Pattinson) gets caught up in his manipulative con-artist best friend Timo's (Steven Yuen) schemes. When one of Timo's business ventures lands them into trouble with loan sharks, they decide to cut their losses and join a space expedition headed by a veneer-wearing, faith-driven conservative politician Kenneth Marshal (Mark Ruffalo) and his wife Ylfa (Toni Colette). Without reading the fine print, Mickey signs up for the role of "expendable", a human crash test dummy who does the life-threatening tasks nobody else wants to do. Every time he's killed, a copy of him is printed out on a machine the next day, with his memory intact. Though the job is cruel and soul-crushing, he finds solace in his confident security agent girlfriend Nasha (Naomi Ackie).
On an ice planet called Nilfheim, inhabited by native fuzzy slimy creatures Marshal dubs "creepers," Mickey, on his 17th copy, is left stranded during a routine mission and somehow survives. He returns, only to meet his 18th copy, an aggressive, rebellious iteration of himself.
Bong Rips Our Bleak Reality a New One
As numb as I’ve become to movies serving as metaphors for America's frankly fascist current state, Bong is always refreshingly direct in his approach, putting satire at the forefront and deconstructing the facets of right-wing conservatism. He represents all of us. It’s crazy that Mickey 17 was completed, I can only imagine, long before our last election cycle. With Warner Bros. tax-write-off CEO David Zaslav started riding Trump's dick, rolling back diverse content on MAX to make space for the Paul brothers, it's so validating how unapologetically critical, if not cathartically vitriolic, Mickey 17 is towards the current fascist powers that exist across the world.
The film juggles a lot of current social political themes, from thinly-veiled faux use of religion to carry out evil operations to the cultish influence of a fascist and the low IQ and hostility of his followers. The man is saying the quiet part out loud.
Bong's comedic satirical sense is amusing and often downright funny but sometimes plays rather uneven for my taste. It's like if Mike Judge's Idiocracy were good and not up its own ass. The many vignettes of Ruffalo as an increasingly irritable Marshal channelling Trump and Elon (given the colonist and exploitative boss aspects) and Collette as his smarter right-hand sauce-obsessed wifey Ylfa are amusing until they wears out their welcome. When the joke wears thin, Bong's sharp reflection of our bleak reality is just a harsh reminder that we're living in the worst timeline. Yet when that rage erupts, it feels so cathartic.
Bong aims to radicalize through the harrowing arc of Mickey's 17th iteration. At the heart of the picture is the soul-crushing discussion of the loss of individuality as a working-class employee in a classist system. Though the idea of dying and living again is usually comedic, for 17, it's tragic. Throughout, 17 is constantly disregarded by everyone he interacts with, excluding his girlfriend, and is only seen as his occupation. When people ask Mickey, 'What's it feel like to die?' he shuts down, with Pattinson making the saddest puppy dog face. It spoke to me because it articulated why I shut down when acquaintances ask me about movies at parties or non-movie-centric environments.
Mickey 17’s Ensemble Is Anything But Expendable
Robert Pattinson has become one of the most versatile performers of the past decade post-Twilight, best known for portraying kooky charismatic characters while donning a silly voice. Good Time, The Lighthouse, hell, even his strange, raspy voice as the titular Heron in The Boy and the Heron. In Mickey 17, his voice resembles that of Steve-O of Jackass fame. Pattinson has said it was an inspiration, and while Bong told him not to do the voice, it's just Steve-O, but a few octaves higher. Even though it teeters on grating at times, Pattinson pours so much warmth, charm, and heartfeltness into his vocal delivery. There are two Mickeys: 17, the dumbass, and 18, the jackass, make two halves of a full idiot. Watching Pattinson play with himself with these separate personas is nonetheless delightful, making for great comedy. Given how genre-bending the film is, he is up to task, embodying the sheer range from hilarious slapstick as 17 to menacing action anti-hero as 18.
Naomi Ackie, who is having a great moment right now with her strong performance in last year's Blink Twice and Eva Victor's remarkable upcoming Sorry Baby, particularly stands out. She's a total badass as Nasha, 17’s complete polar opposite andmore level-headed than 18. The romantic relationship she and Pattinson's Mickey share is emotionally investing, sexy, and romantic. She has a cathartic show-stopping moment that spoke heavily to my Black soul in ways that I wasn't aware I needed.
Bong Joon-ho Heightens His Scale
Mickey 17 is so rich and inventive in its futuristic world-building as Bong meticulously pursues a larger scale and scope to this story. His writing and direction make every aspect of this satirical romp feel as big as any blockbuster, while straying from any trope-like sensibilities in its storytelling. There's a ton of imagination regarding the space and clone elements, but at a certain point, the story turns into Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind. The Creepers’ design is similar to the beetle bugs but instead of a message on environmentalism, it's spun to dissect colonialism and indigenous land ownership. It's overwhelming given the multitude of social themes he's commenting on, but given that this is a holistic reflection on the alarming direction of American society the past few years, it's still very fitting. I don't think everything lands in his execution. But damn, it's bolder than most movies, which shy away from speaking truth to power even when touching on post-modern capitalistic themes.
