Kingdom (킹덤 Korean, 2013)
Netflix
Netflix
It seems Man has the penchant for screwing things up most of the time. Look at the story of insecticides. He thought he was smart when he created highly toxic chemicals to kill insects to get a better yield on his produce. He deduced that he would get more returns on his plantation if there were fewer pests to suck on the fruits. Little did he realise that insects were needed to complete pollination. Not only that. He soon realised the following summer had no birds. They were either dying ingesting poisonous insects or had no insects to eat!
Then there was a certain Level 4 Biosafety Laboratory in Wuhan, which claims to delve into combating unknown possible virus epidemics in the future. What it managed to do is just to let out one of its experimental bats infected with lethal and possibly genetically modified viruses to somehow make its way to the Wuhan wet market. And the rest is, as they say, is history for generations after us to tell their kids, "... and children, this is how your ancestors screwed up this world!"
This zombie film is set in medieval Korea during the Joseon period. Legend has it a certain Governor named Ahn Hyeon led an army of 500 soldiers to defeat an invading 30,000 strong Japanese army. Unbeknownst to most Koreans, this victory is attributed to a rare herb known as 'resurrection plant', which resurrected diseased villagers into ferocious zombies. After the battle, they were executed and buried in secret. This miniseries is based on this folklore.
There is much secrecy about the King's health since he was diagnosed with smallpox. The Crown Prince wants to know, but the Queen Consort puts the King under quarantine. The Prince smells a rat. The King has been sick too long. And the absence of any news may indicate that he may be too grimly ill or even dead. In such a situation, he has to take over. No, says the gravidly pregnant Queen, who may soon deliver a legitimate heir to take over the throne. The current Crown Prince is born to the King's concubine.
After being prevented from visiting his father, the Crown Prince heads South in disguise to contact the physician who last treated the King to get a clearer picture of his father. To his utter dismay, he discovers that the physician's hospital had been ravaged by zombies. The gist of the story is how the Prince and his followers defeat the zombies and find out the happenings at the royal courts.
The Queen had instructed the physician to use the 'resurrection plant' to keep the King alive whilst awaiting her child to be born. Fate had it that the plant harboured a particular worm that attacked the brain to turn the patients into zombies.
An exciting show with a picturesque view of the Korean outdoors shows the Korean movie industry's best. It may be a tad bit too graphic for the faint-hearted as the main characters go on a decapitating spree to keep the undead dead. Unlike other zombie shows, here, they seem to be able to run quite rapidly but cannot manoeuvre over obstacles encountered along their paths. Kudos to the make-up artists and the stunt coordinators.
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