User:MichelleCHsfsu/Seoul Station (film)

Seoul Station (서울역) is a South Korean animated zombie film written and directed by Yeon Sang-ho. Released on August 18, 2016, the film stars Ryu Seung-ryong, Shim Eun-kyung and, Lee Joon in the lead roles. The film was first shown at the 2016 Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival.

The film serves as an animated prequel to the live-action film Train to Busan, showing how the zombie epidemic began in South Korea before the latter's events.

In and around Seoul station, a young runaway woman must try to survive in a world that sees her as disposable. The story revolves around three main characters: Suk-gyu, a father who searches for his runaway daughter (Hye-sun), who he finds is alive and currently a prostitute. He finds her through her boyfriend, Ki-woong, who tried to pimped her to him. Just as he is about to reunite with her, a zombie epidemic breaks out in Seoul.

Plot
A homeless man walks around the Seoul Station area with his hand covering a bloody wound on his neck. A college student wants to help him, but the man's stench causes him to back out. The man continues to wander until he reaches Seoul Station and lays down. A fellow squatter sits next to him chanting about his anger when he notices the blood. The friend goes to a local shelter and the station guards for help, but was turned away. He then goes to a pharmacy to buy some painkillers and an energy drink, but the man is no longer alive when he returns to the station. The friend goes to the police station to inform them about his friend's death and release his anger. The officers follow him to his friend, but the man is gone. All that's left is a small pool of blood. The friend goes to search for the man and finds him in an alley eating a body.

Hye-sun ran away from her former life in a brothel. She now lives with her boyfriend, Ki-woong, who intends to pimp Hye-sun out again due to money problems. Ki-woong yells at her for not agreeing to prostitute and that he is the one who saved her after she fled from the brothel. He threatens her not to return home if she disagrees with this arrangement. After a fight about this, the two separate and are caught in the chaos bursting out of Seoul Station. Hye-sun escapes with a few survivors into a police station and becomes trapped by a group of zombies within a jail cell to realize a a zombie bit a surviving policeman in the cell with them. Meanwhile, Hye-sun's father, Suk-gyu, approaches Ki-woong before interrogating him for his daughter's location. The two go to Hye-sun's home, only to find that the landlady had become a zombie. The zombie landlady charges and attacks Ki-woong, but is stopped by Suk-gyu. They both hide in the bathroom after seeing more zombies heading their way.

At the police station, the bitten officer calls for backup before succumbing to his infection. One of the survivors beats the officer unconscious, but the officer reanimates and bites another survivor in the cell. Back at the apartment, Sun-gyu and Ki-woong escapes through the bathroom window and climbs the pipe up to the roof. Sun-gyu devises a plan with Ki-woong to get the zombies' attention and run down the alley while he goes down to get the car and drives out to the main road to meet up with Ki-woong. They drive away in shock, but focuses on finding to Hye-sun.

Reinforcements arrives and draws the infected away, allowing Hye-sun and an old man to escape the cell and get into an ambulance. The ambulance crew seems oblivious to what is happening to the infected. Hye-sun calls Ki-woong that she is heading to the hospital and to meet her there. The old man panics when he realizes they are en route to the hospital, where many reports of bite wounds appear to be coming in. He attempts to take the wheel from the driver and causes the vehicle to crash. Hye-sun and the old man flee into the station and through the subway tunnels. Meanwhile, Suk-gyu and Ki-woong make their way to the hospital, but did not realize that the zombies had already taken over the place. They barely escaped the place before continuing their search.

Outside Hoehyeon Station, Ki-woong calls Hye-sun, but their conversation alerts the zombies. Hye-sun and the older man run as fast as they can to get away from the infected. A group of people waves to them, and they run up the makeshift barricade while the other survivors fight off the infected. The two are saved, only to realize they are placed in quarantine by riot police. They learn from the authorities that they consider the crisis to be an insurrection. Suk-gyu and Ki-woong tries to persuade the police to let them through, but they refused. The military arrived to the scene and learns from the officer that the military has full command of the situation.

A survivor fighting on the makeshift barricade gets bitten as he is fighting the infected. He begs the other survivors to not throw him over the wall and they agreed to it. The survivors can no longer hold down the barricade as hundreds of zombies runs towards their direction. Survivors fighting in the quarantine slowly succumb to growing numbers of infected people. After a speech on his poor position in society, the old man tries to lead a revolt. He is quickly killed by gunfire, throwing the crowd into a panic as the infected consume them. Hye-sun escapes, but is scratched on her foot by a zombie.

Hye-sun makes her way into an empty showroom. She notifies Ki-woong of her location before falling asleep. When Ki-woong and Hye-sun are reunited, she reveals that Suk-gyu is not her father but her previous pimp. Suk-gyu has been searching for her because she has yet to pay him back the money she borrowed. As an argument erupts, Ki-woong tries to attack Suk-gyu with a knife but gets killed instead. Hye-sun tries to flee, but Suk-gyu subdues her on a bed. As he prepares to rape her, she loses consciousness. As Suk-gyu frantically applies CPR, he spots the scratch on Hye-sun's foot and realizes that she is infected. As Hye-sun reanimates and kills Suk-gyu, the camera zooms past a dead Ki-woong and the infected overrunning the quarantine.

Cast

 * Ryu Seung-ryong as Suk-gyu
 * Shim Eun-kyung as Hye-Sun
 * Lee Joon as Ki-woong

Reception
Clarence Tsui of The Hollywood Reporter called the film "a simple, thrilling ride through a fiend-infested world." The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported that 100% of critics have given the film a positive review based on 15 reviews, with an average rating of 7.12/10. James Marsh of South China Morning Post gave a rating of 3/5. He commented that the film addresses South Korea's societal issues including prostitution and homelessness. Gwilym Mumford of The Guardian also gave the film a 3/5 rating. He stated that this film is different from its sequel, Train to Busan because it focuses on the "desperate souls trapped in life's margins." According to IMDb, the film has a cumulative gross of $2,021,735 worldwide.

Release
The film first debuted on April 5, 2016 at the Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival. Created by Yeon San-ho, this animated film is considered as the prequel to his critically acclaimed movie, Train to Busan. American distributor FilmRise released the DVD and Blu-ray versions of Seoul Station on July 25, 2017. The animated film is also available to stream on Amazon Prime Video, Tubi, Apple TV and, Shudder.