Yeon Sang-ho’s “Colony” premiered in the Midnight Screenings section at the Cannes Film Festival on Friday, marking the “Train to Busan” director’s return to the zombie genre. This time, he infuses it a distinctly contemporary twist that reflects anxieties about artificial intelligence, collective behavior and the erosion of human individuality.
“All along my works, I always tried to express the fear or the horror of today’s society,” Yeon tells Variety. “For me, the greatest fear is the high-speed communication exchange. It’s like a living organism and, in a way, it reduces our individualism, our individuality.”
That thematic concern drives “Colony,” which follows biotechnology professor Se-jeong, played by Gianna Jun, as she attends a conference that spirals into catastrophe when a rapidly mutating virus is unleashed. With authorities sealing off the entire facility, survivors find themselves trapped with an ever-growing threat that behaves less like traditional zombies and more like a networked intelligence.
For Yeon, the decision to revisit zombies wasn’t about retreading familiar ground but finding the right vessel for exploring modern anxieties. He points to George A. Romero’s enduring influence, noting that “Night of the Living Dead” and subsequent zombie films remain beloved because Romero was able to express the potential fear of his time through the undead.
