Train to Busan review
By Joel Humphries · Watched 08.14.26
★★★★½ 4.5 / 5
Spoiler-free review
Ten years later, Train to Busan remains the day-zero zombie movie done about as well as it can be done. A father and daughter board a train as an outbreak begins, and from there the film delivers fast, terrifying—but mercifully stupid—zombies, clean action, characters worth cheering for and at least one passenger you desperately want to see get what he deserves. Ma Dong-seok’s Sang-hwa is still the man everyone should want on a zombie team. The movie never mistakes complication for intelligence; it simply understands its people, its monsters and the momentum of the ride. No notes.
Full review — contains spoilers
I saw the 10th-anniversary rerelease of this last week, and this is still phenomenal.
A father gets on a train with his young daughter to take her to Busan to see her mother. Somewhere around the time they're boarding, an outbreak begins. One infected woman makes it onto the train, and then you're off. Zombies on the train, zombies outside the train, zombies following them through the train, zombies everywhere.
This is the day-zero zombie movie done about as well as I think it can be done. Honestly, I think it's the best version.
Everything works. It's well shot. It's well cast. You have protagonists worth cheering for. You have antagonists on the train who you absolutely want to see get what is coming to them. You've got Ma Dong-seok as Sang-hwa, who remains one of the great "I want that guy on my zombie team" characters ever put on screen.
And you've got fast zombies. Fast zombies are the best zombies.
But importantly, they're dumb fast zombies. That's the only way fast zombies make logical sense. If the zombies are faster than you, stronger than you, tireless and intelligent, everybody is dead in 12 minutes. Movie over. These zombies are terrifying because they move like hell, but they're still stupid enough for human beings to have a fighting chance. Perfect.
There aren't a bunch of clever twists just for the sake of having twists. You know who the good people are. You know who the asshole is. You know what everybody wants. Then you sit back and enjoy the ride.
South Korean cinema obviously did not begin with Train to Busan, and it's hardly some rarity for them to get movies exactly right. Parasite is the obvious more recent example of the rest of the world noticing just how good that industry is, but Korean movies and television have been putting out incredible work for a long time.
Train to Busan is one of the best examples. Ten years later, no notes.