Psychokinesis: Small Scale Superhero Story

We’re very accustomed to the superhero. It is a sub-genre of action that needs no introduction or explanation. From every medium, from animation, to live action film, to serialized television and everything in-between it was (and in many ways still is) a dominating force of art and pop-culture. The journey of an individual or group of individuals, often gifted with superhuman abilities, overcoming large scale, and in some cases, global and apocalyptic threats. Multifaceted conflicts spanning the world over featuring people going through personal journeys we could collectively look towards for guidance in the most desperate of times to lift our spirits. It’s a tried and tested formula. But doesn’t have to be an inherently derivative one.

Psychokinesis, as you can imagine, is not of the same creative muse as the enduring titans of superhero fiction. Director Yeon Sang-ho, whose works I’ve covered quite a bit since I started writing, had something a little different in mind. An artist who enjoys putting his own personal spices into the oversaturated genres of a given era. And in Psychokinesis he is able to allow his deftness and intelligence in letting a narrative speak for itself, giving an intentionally framed shot its space to express, and creating art in his idiosyncratic voice.

Shin Roo-mi is the owner of a successful fried chicken restaurant in Seoul. However the placement of her restaurant is precarious as she is being pushed out by a mob-run construction company. Roo-mi is evicted with force by hired muscle and her mother is killed in the skirmish. Seok-heon is a security guard, who is not exactly the most morally upstanding of people, drinks water from a mountain spring, and subsequently gains telekinetic powers after doing so. Roo-mi contacts Seok-heon, her estranged father, to inform him of his ex-wife’s death. Wanting to regain his place in his daughter’s life Seok-heon is compelled to use his newfound powers to the aid of her situation.

Picking and choosing when to imbue moments with action and visual noise keeps us from becoming desensitized to the action and becoming overwhelmed while also allowing space for the moments where it does raise its volume to matter to both the characters reacting to it in the story and our own viewing tempo. Its pacing does itself a remarkable service to keep our feet on the ground without overstaying its welcome, moving quick enough to stay engaged but not too slowly as to become weighed down by its own ambitions.

Everything about the film is small scale, or at least in a much smaller scale compared to that of it’s contemporaries. Things still explode, large scale conflicts occur A small territorial land dispute taking place almost exclusively on a few blocks of a street in Seoul, a morally flawed unrighteous individual with self-interested motivations, and a hero eschewing flashy and flamboyant super suits for modern middle-aged Korean male fashion. Very few things about it feel “super”. Its premise looks comparatively tiny put up against its Marvel Cinematic Universe older brothers. But it is certainly more than just that. It’s self-awareness in reminding the viewers that this is not the Captain America or Thor that you’re used to does it many favors as opposed to taking itself overly-seriously, incorporating elements of black-comedy to keep itself light against a heavier more grounded background. 

Understanding putting someone such as Seok-heon in this position in a decidedly real-world setting requires him to express his character relative to our world, not one that is heavily stylized and/or exaggerated. Allowing him to be a piece of a much larger puzzle as opposed being to the entire puzzle by himself. It adds an anchor to the story and texture to the drama without suspending our disbelief. You want to see each respective character succeed not because they are perfect idealizations of the best human qualities, but because you can see how they struggle, through their own fault or situations out of their control, and how that challenges them to be the kind of people they want to be while overwhelmed by things that are so much larger than them.

In comparison to one woefully underdeveloped character who isn’t given enough screen time to embed herself in your mind as the sole “villain,” Psychokinesis’ antagonists feel a bit too nebulous. Being more of a collective corporate juggernaut, it’s possible it was a sacrifice that needed to be made in order to achieve its greater vision of grounding but it’s undeniable that it hurts the film. The motivations, while real, aren’t particularly compelling either as “MORE MONEY” doesn’t exactly resonate effectively to any normal well-adjusted person. The most evil humans to have ever existed still held space for their own humanity. No matter how far gone they may otherwise be, there is something unknowable, even as microscopically quantifiable and barely registering as it is, it is still a beating heart. A vapid soul is still a soul, but one without dimension to compel me to think more deeply about them, their motivations, and how, from an alternate perspective, they could be the hero of their own story.

In experiencing Yeon Sang-ho's works from both animation and live-action I've noticed the distinct thematic and emotional contrast between them. If his animation films are meant to explore the more darker and harrowing aspects of the human experience, often being used to express frustration and dismay with the current direction of our collective existence, then his live-action filmography has a gentler, softer, and more hopeful lens through which he views our experiences. Balancing out and measuring from multiple sides of our seemingly infinite-sided gray matter grime.

Examining my own interpretations of the messages this work is trying to convey is somewhat of a deconstruction of the concept of what makes a superhero as such and how we perceive them. The sense of responsibility that comes with the expectation that we must serve that which is far beyond what we have been is enticing, but a false idol. The larger than life powers inherited, how we can change the world with them, those are superficial, self-aggrandizing, and mere lusts for power and influence previously not had. But maybe being a loving father, redeeming yourself not just to your child but to yourself, that takes heroism. Parenting being the only tangibly real superpower that exists in our believable world, one in which ordinary people do extraordinary things, isn’t so unbelievable after all.