Global No. 1 Amidst a Tsunami of Harsh Criticism: How to Interpret this Irony? Netflix Korea's ambitious new film, The Great Flood, has emerged as a hot potato immediately after its release. As soon as the movie dropped, domestic communities and rating sites were flooded with disappointed and harsh reviews. Scathing criticisms lined up, ranging from sarcasms that it once again proved the saying "skip Netflix original movies" to pointing out the lack of probability and forced melodrama. However, surprisingly, the report card tells the exact opposite story. It is enjoying explosive popularity abroad, holding the number one spot in the Netflix Global Movie category for a week since its release. Is the standard of domestic audiences too high, or are overseas audiences particularly lenient towards Korean-style melodrama and genre films? This extreme difference in temperature—cold reception at home vs. heat abroad—rather makes The Great Flood a controversial work that must be checked out.
The Shadow of the Previous Work Weighing on Director Kim Byung-woo, and a Reversed Fate One of the reasons why the public's view of this movie was particularly harsh might be due to the disappointment regarding director Kim Byung-woo. The director left great regret to both webtoon fans and movie fans with his previous work, Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint. In the process of moving the original webtoon, which boasted a vast and solid worldview, to the screen, he suffered a box office failure while hearing bitter criticisms about destroying the original work and a lack of directing skills. In fact, The Great Flood was produced first, but as the release was delayed, it unintentionally started with the tag of "the failed director's next work." However, if viewed without prejudice, one can see that the director's unique skill of orchestrating suspense in a confined space worked quite effectively in this piece.
Disaster Striking Ordinary Life, The Beginning of Maternal Love Portrayed by Kim Da-mi The movie begins by showing a peaceful, or perhaps tedious, daily life, as many disaster movies do. 'Gu Anna', played by Kim Da-mi, wakes up beside her sleeping son. Her son 'Shin Ja-in', played by Kwon Eun-sung, is an innocent child who pesters his mother about wanting to play in the water. Anna shows the appearance of an ordinary mother soothing her son and preparing a meal. This introduction acts like a quiet prelude to maximize the horror of the disaster that will follow. The unique mask possessed by actor Kim Da-mi adds mystery to the character of Anna, who looks ordinary but seems to hide a secret somewhere, playing an excellent guide role that makes the audience follow her emotional lines.
Water Rising to the 4th Floor, Immersion Provided by Visual Horror The tranquility is shattered in an instant. Anna discovers water pooling on the floor and is appalled when she looks out the window. It wasn't just heavy rain; the water was rising as if the entire apartment complex was submerged in a giant tank. The first floor and lower levels were already completely underwater. The water continued to surge upwards without stopping. In the early part of the movie, the process of the familiar residential space of an apartment being submerged and transforming into a closed space of horror provides quite an overwhelming immersion. Anna instinctively attempts to escape with her son Ja-in, and the water rising to her chin and the chaotic sight of neighbors create a suffocating tension.
A Single Phone Call, Genre Variation from Disaster to Sci-Fi A single phone call Anna receives amidst the struggle for survival completely changes the flow of the movie. 'Son Hee-jo', played by Park Hae-soo, tells Anna a story that is hard to believe. The great flood happening now is not a simple weather anomaly but a sea-level rise caused by an asteroid impact, and a terminal prophecy that humanity will be annihilated when the remaining asteroid hits Earth soon. And he tells Anna, "The 'Emotion Engine' you developed is the only hope to save humanity," and says he will rescue her. From this point, the movie corrects its genre orbit from a simple survival disaster film to a sci-fi mystery with a grand mission of saving humanity.
Constant Crisis and Escape, Regrettable Sacrifices Until the middle, the movie crosses between Son Hee-jo's desperate efforts to rescue Anna and Ja-in, and Anna's struggle to escape the vertical space of the apartment. The water swells more and more, threatening the high floors, and to make matters worse, a huge tsunami hits the apartment, putting the building itself in danger of collapse. In the process, Anna suffers deep trauma and guilt, having to turn away neighbors asking for help or witnessing people being swept away right before her eyes. These disaster sequences serve as a process of building up the extreme stress and tenacity to protect her son possessed by the character Anna, while providing visual spectacles. Up to this point, it seems to faithfully follow the grammar of disaster movies we know well.
The Reason the Helicopter Didn't Come, A Twist that Hits the Back of the Head Just when the audience expects, "Now the rescue team will come and a hero narrative saving humanity will unfold," the movie pulls out an unexpected card. The helicopter promised for rescue does not appear, or the situation gives a strangely repetitive feeling of déjà vu. And the truth is revealed. All the disaster situations Anna has experienced so far were not real. All of this was a process of trapping Anna's consciousness in virtual reality and simulating extreme situations repeatedly to complete the AI 'Emotion Engine' that will save humanity. This twist instantly collapses the reality of the disaster that dominated the first half of the movie, giving the audience both confusion and shock simultaneously.
Repeating Simulation, The Polarization of the 'Time Loop' Setting The core of the movie lies in this 'repetition'. Every time Anna fails to save her son and meets death, she opens her eyes in her bed again. Like 'respawning after death' in a game, she dies countless times and wakes up again, learning ways to save Ja-in. This borrows the setting of time loop movies like Groundhog Day or Edge of Tomorrow, and at this point, the audience's likes and dislikes were sharply divided. The disappointment that "I thought it was a disaster movie, but it suddenly became a game" collided with the reaction that "the setting of AI learning for human salvation is fresh." Through this repetition, the director intended to show how the emotion of maternal love is datafied and eventually creates a miracle.
Why Domestic Audiences Turned Their Backs, The Loose Development of the Second Half The main reason for the outpouring of bad reviews in Korea is likely due to the way the second half unfolds. For audiences who expected a massive-scale great flood, the setting that it was actually a simulation inside a narrow laboratory can be a letdown. Also, criticism cannot be avoided that the process of solving problems by repeating simulations was portrayed somewhat artificially or simply like clearing game stages. If a sci-fi setting was introduced, it should have been supported by suitable elaborate scientific and logical probability, but the point is that the movie tried to cover up all logical loopholes with the emotional keyword of 'maternal love'. This is the point where criticism arises that the so-called 'K-Sinpa' (Korean melodrama) held back the sci-fi genre.
Yet It's Still Fun? Grammar That Works for the Game Generation However, there are clearly audiences like me who enjoyed this movie. And that power likely appealed to the generation familiar with 'game grammar'. The process of learning through failure, making better choices in the next round, and finally seeing the ending gives gamers a very familiar pleasure. The scene where Anna finds the optimal path after countless failures and finally saves her son (even if virtual) provides sufficient catharsis. Even if the setting of the second half is somewhat loose, the suspense provided by the process and Kim Da-mi's desperate acting have the power to make you watch the movie to the end. The verdict is that although it might not have been the expected genre, it certainly possesses the fun of 'killing time' content.
Déjà Vu of 'Squid Game'? The Paradox of Netflix Korean Movies An interesting fact is that Netflix hits like Squid Game or All of Us Are Dead also received mixed reviews or harsh criticism in Korea in the early stages of their release. While Korean audiences apply very strict standards to the probability and completeness of content, overseas audiences tend to give more points to the fun of the genre and the fresh material itself. For The Great Flood as well, the material of combining a Korean-style disaster with a time loop sci-fi approached overseas audiences freshly, and the development like an intuitive survival game rather than a complex narrative likely worked. The Great Flood, which wrote a myth of reverse export by recording the biggest box office hit in the history of Netflix movies, even though it was called a 'flop' domestically. Although it may not be a perfect masterpiece, it seems clear that it is a work with distinct charms that captivated people around the world, making it flawless as a Netflix popcorn movie.
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