For several horror and zombie film fans, the name of director Yeon Sang-Ho will always be held with special reverence. He is behind 2016’s "Train to Busan"; and if you ask those in the know to rank the best zombie genre films of the last twenty years, "Train to Busan" would easily be in the Top 10. "World War Z" (2013), "28 Weeks Later" (2007), "Zombieland" (2009), and "One Cut of the Dead" (2019) would join "Train to Busan" to make for my personal Top 5 list - take note, zombie films of the last 20 years.

So it’s with a heightened sense of anticipation that I went to watch "Colony," the latest from Sang-Ho, that he’s directed and co-wrote. It inhabits the same universe of "Train to Busan," but is a standalone story, and really dwells on the how of the infection that’s depicted happening, and the why. It’s canny in injecting a lot of human interest, smartly takes pain to set up the characters, and follows through on the expected zombie choreography, and action sequences.

It had its world premiere just last week, as a Cannes Midnight Screening, the same route that "Train to Busan" took a decade ago. This early, I’ll say that it’s far better than "Peninsula", which was the official sequel to "Train to Busan". It smartly updates the zombie infection to talk about collective consciousness, and compare this strand resulting in an infected who moves and acts in a manner parallel to what we see with ants when they work in an ant colony.

The film stars Jun Ji-Hyun as the biotech professor Kwon Se-jeong, and she’s the primary heroine of the film. Koo Kyo-Hwan, is Seo Young-Cheol, the biologist responsible for the outbreak, and the one with the vaccine. Ji Chang-Wook is Choi Hyun Seok, a security expert at the Doongwori Building, where all the action takes place. He’s accompanied by his sister, who’s wheelchair bound, and it’s Kim Shin-Rok who plays this role of Hyun-hee.

And there’s Go Soo as Han Gyu-Seong, ex-husband of Se-jeong. Shin Hyun-Been as Gong Seoul-hee is the one outside the building who helps investigate the case, and is the current wife of Gyu-Seong.

The scenario involves the infection happening within a single building, so we have the infected evolving in a manner that’s unpredictable, we have isolated survivors who have to band together in order to get through this ordeal, and we have a shade over two hours to get through the story. Personally, while I thought the plot had its weak points, I found the pacing to be quite good, and I did not feel the two hours.

The film doesnt have as memorable a lead as Sang-Hwa (portrayed by Ma Dong-Seok) of "Train to Busan"; but the female lead Jun Ji-Hyun acquits herself rather well. And the new zombies, the action choreography, and the scenes of poetic justice are genuinely entertaining. I know the audience I watched the film with were hooked!