Steven Yeun is excited to be a part of Bong Joon-ho’s upcoming science fiction film Mickey 17. Little is known about the upcoming film, though it is set to explore the life of a worker who is regenerated into a new body after dying on a treacherous job. Mickey 17 stars Yeun, Robert Pattinson, Mark Ruffalo, Toni Collette, and more, and is set to be released in theaters on March 29th, 2024.
While at the Sundance Film Festival promoting his new film Love Me, Steven Yeun spoke with Screen Rant about his experience working on Bong Joon-ho’s exciting Mickey 17. While Yeun didn’t give any concrete information about the film, he was quick to praise Bong Joon-ho, both in terms of his ability as a director and his warmth as a person. See what Yeun had to say below:
Screen Rant: And then finally, you are an award winner working with award winners. What was it like working with Bong Joon-ho on Mickey 17?
Steven Yeun: The greatest. Joon-ho Bong continues to reveal to me his artistry and his humanity. You think he can’t surprise you, but he’s a really fantastic person.
Why Expectations Are So High For Mickey 17 After Parasite
Expectations for Bong Joon-ho’s Mickey 17 are sky-high in large part because it’s the director’s first film since 2019’s critical and commercial hit film Parasite. Parasite is generally placed at the top of any Bong Joon-ho movie ranking, which makes sense given its sweep of the 92nd Academy Awards. The movie won Best International Feature Film, Best Original Screenplay, Best Director, and Best Picture, even becoming the first non-English-language film to win in the Best Picture category, giving Mickey 17 big metaphorical shoes to fill.
In addition to being an award-season darling, Parasite was an undeniable commercial success, ultimately making $53.4 million in the United States alone. That puts it in a rare category of non-English language United States box office hits that also includes films like the 2000 hit Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, and 2002’s Hero. Parasite also became Bong Joon-ho’s first movie to gross over $100 worldwide and, even more impressively, became the highest-grossing South Korean film of all time. Given the record-breaking success of Parasite, many eyes will likely be trained on Mickey 17’s box office numbers as well.
Academy Awards winners are chosen by voters in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, all of whom are industry professionals. It’s notable too, then, that Parasite is one of the highest-rated Academy Award Best Picture winners of all time among critics. It currently has a whopping 99% on Rotten Tomatoes in the critic category and sits at 90% among audiences. As even those outside the industry had favorable things to say about the film, meaning that Mickey 17 will be expected to please critics, Academy members, and film producers and studio heads alike.
Mickey 17
- Director
- Bong Joon-ho
- Cast
- Robert Pattinson , Naomi Ackie , Steven Yeun , Toni Collette , Mark Ruffalo , Holliday Grainger
- Main Genre
- Sci-Fi
- Writers
- Bong Joon-ho
- Story By
- Edward Ashton
- Characters By
- Edward Ashton
- Cinematographer
- Darius Khondji
- Producer
- Bong Joon-ho, Dede Gardner, Jeremy Kleiner, Dooho Choi
- Production Company
- Offscreen, Plan B Entertainment, Kate Street Picture Company
