"Mindless Melodramatic Marxism, but Sometimes Entertaining"

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What You Need To Know:
MICKEY 17 tells a story that’s often exciting, comical and weird (in a fun way). However, Mark Ruffalo’s performance as the evil Christian politician is so over-the-top that it helps turn MICKEY 17 into a ham-fisted, hateful piece of Marxist propaganda. As such, the movie not only attacks capitalism, it also viciously attacks Christians. MICKEY 17 also has abundant foul language, many “f” words, intense violence, and some lewd scenes. Discerning moviegoers will reject it.
Content:
More Detail:
In the English language movie MICKEY 17, Oscar winning South Korean filmmaker Boon Jong Ho adds Christianity to his usual Marxist attack on capitalist society. MICKEY 17 tells a science fiction story about a young man who unwittingly agrees to be killed and cloned repeatedly as part of a system to detect deadly diseases and other fatal dangers on a new planet that’s being colonized by a company led by a religious fanatic and controversial politician from Earth who bears a striking disposition similar to Donald Trump’s. MICKEY 17 tells a story that’s often exciting, comical and weird (in a fun way), but Mark Ruffalo’s performance as the evil Christian politician is so over-the-top that it turns MICKEY 17 into a ham-fisted, hateful piece of Marxist propaganda attacking Christians. Sadly, Ho’s communist movies often win awards at film festivals and awards shows. For example, his 2019 anti-capitalist diatribe, PARASITE, won an Oscar for Best Picture.
MICKEY 17 begins with Mickey Barnes deciding life isn’t working out for him on Earth. After getting in trouble with a loan shark, he and a friend go to apply for a colonizing expedition to an ice planet. Disgraced Christian politician Kenneth Marshall, who speaks in bombastic tones and sounds like Donald Trump, is leading the expedition with his wife, Yifa.
At the space port, many people are applying to leave Earth. People are desperately trying to qualify. There seems to be good reason for their desperation. Outside the spaceport, it looks like some kind of cloudy pollution dust is raining down noisily on the facility.
Mickey’s friend, Timo, is lucky. He gets assigned to work in security. Mickey, however, finds out he’s signed a document where he will be an “expendable.” A woman asks if he read his contract. He lies to her and says yes. As an expendable, Mickey will be assigned deadly tasks, such as doing space walks to fix the spaceship or exposing himself to the deadly atmosphere of a planet’s surface. Each time Mickey dies, his mind, memories and personality are downloaded and “reprinted” into a new cloned body.
Meanwhile, Mickey right away hooks up with a beautiful woman, Nasha, who becomes his soulmate and sticks by him through thick and thin.
Trouble arises, however, when Mickey No. 17 crash lands on the planet, and into a cave. His “friend,” Timo, leaves him down there, but Mickey is saved from death by the large, benevolent bug creature and its little progeny that live on the planet.
Mickey makes it back to the human colony on the surface but finds out they’ve already reprinted Mickey 18. It’s absolutely forbidden to have more than one clone running around at the same time. An evil man once did that and used his clones to commit murder and other nefarious crimes. So, if Mickey 17 and Mickey 18 get caught, both will be put to death.
The two clones go into survival mode, although Mickey 17 is immediately jealous of Mickey 18, who’s now sleeping with his beloved Nasha. Meanwhile, their Christian leader, Marshall puts the whole colony in danger when he decides to wipe out all the intelligent bug creatures on the planet.
Part of MICKEY 17 has a theme of death, sacrifice and resurrection. However, the sacrificial martyrdom in the movie comes with a villain being deliberately killed at the same time. This resembles Islamic martyrdom, not the kind of Christian sacrifice and martyrdom the Bible extols. Also, the head villain is the Christian politician, who’s depicted in a hateful, despicable manner. As the main villain, Mark Ruffalo gives an over-the-top performance that mimics Donald Trump. At least twice in the movie, his character is depicted singing some kind of crazy pseudo-Christian hymn with other people. Also, his top Christian aide is very obsequious, and his wife is outrageously obnoxious. The melodramatic, clownish nature of all this not only makes the movie’s anti-Christian attacks more annoying. It also mars MICKEY 17’s artistic and entertainment quality. The main villain in a movie that aims to entertain people shouldn’t be too clownish. Otherwise, you undercut the story’s credibility.
MICKEY 17 also has lots of strong foul language, a scene of depicted fornication, some other lewd content, and references to drug abuse. The movie’s many “f” words are a sign that the director, writer, producers, and actors should have spent more time perfecting their script, especially its storytelling and character development.