Bong Joon Ho on First Animated Movie Ally, Reuniting With Neon

Seven years after he won the Palme d’Or with “Parasite,” Bong Joon Ho is back in Cannes, this time with his first animated feature.

“Ally,” in the works since 2019 and due for completion later this year, is set in the uncharted depths of the South Pacific Ocean, where a curious piglet squid dreams of becoming the star of a wildlife documentary. The impressive voice cast includes Ayo Edebiri, Bradley Cooper, Dave Bautista and Finn Wolfhard, with Alex Jayne Go as the lead. The film reunites the director with “Parasite” distributors Neon, which has already acquired North American rights. Meanwhile, Pathé is representing international sales excluding Japan and China, which are being overseen by CJ and Penture.

Speaking exclusively to Variety from the Gray D’Albion in Cannes, Bong discusses whether his fans might be surprised by his first animated feature and hoping to make an action sequence bigger than George Miller.

What was behind your decision to make an animated movie?

My first ever short was actually an animation film — stop motion animation. Making that was so difficult that I was like, ‘Okay, I’m just gonna work with actors, because they just move on their own and I don’t have to do anything.’ It was so taxing mentally. So that’s why I’ve been doing live-action for the past 20-30 years. But I’ve always had that dream to return to animation.

Where did the story of “Ally” come from?

I was inspired by the book “The Deep: The Extraordinary Creatures of the Abyss” by photographer Clarie Nouvian. Through these photographs, I noticed so many cool creatures. They’re mysterious, but at the same time already looks like they’re animation. So just looking through this book, I noticed one particular fish that looked like it was quite conscious and aware of the camera, so I started creating a story about that character and the other creatures. They’re in the deep sea, it’s pitch black and nothing ever happens there, but once a year the Nat Geo submersible goes down and it’s the biggest event of the year — everyone really wants to be filmed. But then a disaster unfolds. There’s a bomb in the ocean, and it becomes an action movie where the creatures have to protect their world and their homeland.

Is there something new and exciting for you as a storyteller that animation gives you that you didn’t have before?

Just personally as a director, I’ve always wanted to create an awesome action sequence, to create a sequence that can surpass the great ones created by George Miller or Miyazaki Hayao, and I felt like this film was my chance to practice that ambition. With live-action, to do an action sequence you have to block all the roads, you only have three prop cars that you can explode and there’s a deadline. But with animation, there’s no limit — the control freak in me can be fully unleashed.

Is this your first children’s film?

There was “Okja,” but it was with Netflix and their rating system was different and because of one particular sequence it got a mature rating. Aside from that, I feel like the rest of the film is quite family friendly. But with “Ally,” even elementary school kids can watch the film, and that didn’t feel so new because of my experience with “Okja.”

Do you think fans of your other films are going to be surprised by Ally?

I think at first they might be surprised that it’s an animation and they might find it quite refreshing. But once they actually see the film, they’ll be like, ‘Ok, Bong didn’t go anywhere.’ It’ll be quite familiar to them and they might be happy to see my signatures.

Your last film was Mickey 17. I’m curious to know how your experience was working in the Hollywood studio system for the first time.

So technically, Mickey 17 is my third English language film, but Okja was with Netflix, and Snowpiercer was with a Korean studio. So this, that really was my first time working with a classic old Hollywood studio. In terms of the actual filmmaking and the mechanism of creating the film, I thought there weren’t really any differences in the process. But because it had quite a big budget — it was my first film that had a budget above $100 million — I felt a lot of psychological, mental pressure. So I think naturally I’m going to work on smaller films from now on.

Sometimes when filmmakers got to studios and work on films with that budget, they talk about losing elements of creative control. Is the “Mickey 17” that you wanted to make the “Mickey 17” that we saw at the end?

Director’s final cut was part of my contract and everyone at the studio and at my agency tried their best to protect me. Of course, during post production, there was lots of discussions and a lot of opinions going back and forth, but it wasn’t ever like someone was forcing something on me or giving me pressure. And so luckily, all my films have been released as my director’s final cut, even a movie as big as “Mickey 17,” and all the good parts of that film and all the bad parts of that film came from me. I take full responsibility. So shit on me if you didn’t like it!

Does it feel good to be back with Neon, with whom you obviously had such great success with “Parasite”?

This year is mine and Tom Quinn’s 20th anniversary. I met him when he was at Magnolia, a small but great distribution company. They distributed “The Host.” And then with “Snowpiercer,” Tom was part of Radius TWC, the arthouse indie label of the Weinstein Company. At the time, I was rejecting some of the changes they wanted to make and as punishment they sent it to Radius to give it a limited release. It was punishment, but to me it was a triumph, because Tom was there. And then with Parasite, he acquired the film very early on, just on reading the script. So I’m very happy to reunite with Tom again.