This Geek in Netflix: Chawz
Sometimes, I worry about the state of America. We disrespect the trees, the animals, and our neighbors—okay, so I’m not so concerned about that last one, I’ll admit. But the animals!! They’re so goddamned cute and fuzzy and I want to cuddle them until their little cute and fuzzy heads pop off.
This view was clearly shared by Korean director Shin Jung-won when he decided to make the environmentally-focused Chawz (AKA: Chaw or Chawu). Get this: there’s a plague of chipmunks in a small forest in Korea. These chipmunks are so goddamned adorable that humans cannot help but pick them up for some mad cuddle action.
Unfortunately for the human populace (and practitioners of bestiality), these chipmunks have bred with some genetically-modified porcupines from a corrupt laboratory in Seoul and, whenever squeezed, they shoot deadly spikes that were previously buried under their sleek chipmunk pelts.
This wouldn’t be so bad save that, due to massive deforestation by a logging company, the chipmunks are fleeing into nearby towns, hypnotizing residents with their big brown eyes and stripy little behinds into fiercely cuddling them. With the plague of chipmunks spreading quickly, Officer Kim and environmentalist Soo-ryuun have to work together to stop the impending devastation.
…I may have just made that all up.
Okay, I did. I couldn’t help it—the idea of somehow rigging one of these chipmunks with a delayed squeezing device and tossing it into a crowd of hipsters was too appealing. I was weak. I’m sorry.
In reality, Chawz is a combination of many (too many) moving parts centering around a giant hybrid boar living in the woods outside of Sam-mae-ri, “the crimeless village”.
Moving Part #1: The Village Chief and the President (president of what exactly, we never learn) are encouraging deforestation and land development to take their tiny crimeless village and revitalize its economy by labeling everything as “organic”.
Moving Part #2: Grandpa Chun’s only granddaughter gets eaten by a mutant boar while he’s passed out from too much booze and not taking her calls, rekindling his hunter’s spirit.
Moving Part #3: Officer Kim is suddenly moved to the crimeless village with his crazy mother and angry pregnant wife. He daydreams of leaving his mother at a truck stop. I’m pretty sure his mother daydreams about being invited to the Royal Twinkie Ball and being seduced by Prince Sno-Ball.
Moving Part #4: Graduate student Soo-ryuun and her oddly Shaggy-esque partner find parts of Grandpa Chun’s granddaughter while camping out like a pair of dirty hippies in a field while looking for evidence of the giant boar.
Moving Part #5: Totally unneeded character of crazy, gothy village woman and her “adopted” son Duk-goo(!!) who does absolutely nothing but instill sudden distrust of infantilism.
Moving Part #6: Famous hunter Man-rae Baek (who winds up in Pampers at the end of the film, by the way) and his team of “Finnish” (AKA American) bear hunters descend upon the village to wipe out the boar menace.
Moving Part #7: Boars. Offspring of cast-off government hybrids who have learned to love human flesh due to their forests being demolished and the only food available being freshly-ish buried human bodies.
It’s a mess. It’s a two hour, two minute long mess. Half of the moving parts listed above could have been rendered completely unnecessary to the film with slight adjustments instead of causing this unfocused hairball.
However, this movie provide things I’ve never seen before, like a boar in hot pursuit of an old handcar or a boar that squeals so loud it shatters glass or even a boar with a hide so tough that bullets bounce off of it. And, on top of those highlights, the CGI and animatronics team did amazing things—so much higher quality than I expected from this film. I was thinking it was going to be another Pig Hunt which, while fascinatingly amusing, lacked on the boar-puppetry.
Do I recommend it? Not really. It’s so disorganized that it’s almost boaring… see what I did there? “Boaring”! HA! What, not funny? Crap.
If they decide to make a squeal, er, sequel and it’s only an hour and a half long or less, maybe we can renegotiate my terms of mental engagement. However, if you don’t want to wait for an unannounced sequel and you’d rather brave this film’s boorish waters it is –as always– available on Netflix Instant.
