Colossal
directed by Nacho Vigalondo
written by Nacho Vigalondo
2016
In some of the best literary scifi, the thing (whatever it is) is obviously a metaphor, but also treated as a real thing in its own right. The thing doesn't need to make sense, it doesn't have to be scientifically plausible. What it needs is to resonate emotionally. One of the best examples I can think of is Kevin Brockmeier's short story "The Ceiling", where a literal ceiling appears in the sky and begins lowering to Earth, slowly crushing all of human society beneath it, just at the same time the protagonist finds out his wife is leaving him.
Colossal is like that, and it's so much better than you can possibly expect it to be, in part because it spends its first act convincing you it will be dumb, before revealing in the second act that it's so, so smart.
Anne Hathaway is unemployed, spends every night going out drinking, and lives in the city with her boyfriend, Dan Stevens. He gets tired of her and throws her out, so she moves back to her parents' old house in a small town, where she reconnects with her childhood friend, Jason Sudeikis. He owns a bar, gives her a job as a waitress, and she hangs out every night getting drunk with him and two buddies. It's obvious he likes her, that he likes her likes her, and maybe she's starting to like him too? This part of the film is pitch perfect romcom, and you think you know where it's going, but you don't.
Also, just when Hathaway moves back home, a giant kaiju monster starts appearing in Seoul, Korea, and kind of wrecking up the place. Andy is astonished, then horrified as she slowly realizes that the monster mirrors her movements at a particular time, when she's at a particular place in town. She shares this information with the others, who first don't believe her, then are amazed, but also kind of treat it like a joke, especially when they're drunk, which they always are. Amazingly, Sudeikis can also manifest a giant robot when he's in the same spot.
At first, this all seems too silly. It's an absurd premise, and none of the characters take it too seriously. It initially seems like the film won't take it seriously either, and all the fear and destruction is South Korea will just be a joke, a prop, something that happens too far away, to people who are too foreign and too Asian to be treated as though they're as important as whether or not a couple of White people fall in love.
Then, two things happen that change everything. First, Hathaway falls, destroying buildings, killing hundreds, and feels devastated by guilt. Second, she sleeps with someone. Not Jason Sudeikis, but his handsome friend she's had her eye on since the first night.
And this is when the movie gets smart. After Hathaway bangs his friend, Sudeikis's character shows us what kind of man he really is. His nice guy persona, the one the actor is famous for, makes us think the character is nice too, before revealing just how angry and controlling he is, before revealing that he'll blackmail Hathaway by threatening to destroy Seoul unless she submits to him. To prove his point, he wreaks some havoc, in a poignant scene where we see him stomping in the dirt, but hear monster movie sound effects of giant footfalls and crowds screaming.
Initially, it seemed the monsters were just a metaphor for the destruction drunk people can cause without intending to. The trip-and-fall and the deaths it caused perhaps analogous to a drunk driving car crash. And maybe it is, but flashbacks reveal that it's also a specific moment from the two lead characters' shared childhood. A moment when he was bad and hurt her, still replaying after all those years, now grown to colossal proportions as they're adults.
Dan Stevens shows up again, briefly, to try to win her back, but Hathaway isn't a prize. They're both bad boyfriends (although Sudeikis is worse!) and picking one of them isn't what she needs to do.
Hathaway tries to stop Sudeikis on his terms, and she is a fierce fighter, but he's bigger and stronger than her. And even if she wins, can she really leave town and trust that he'll stay away from the spot that lets him terrorize her by terrorizing Korea? Again, the movie is smart. It takes the rules its taught us about how all this works, and shows us how Hathaway can use those rules to get the upper hand over Sudeikis, and make amends to the people of Seoul.
There's no reason why a dumb little movie, a romcom about a drunk girl who accidentally controls Godzilla, and moves back to her small town to learn a lesson about life and love, has any business being as good as this, but Colossal is very, very good.
Originally watched March 2023.
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