STELLAR: A MAGICAL RIDE

Official Selection, 2022 Fantasia International Film Festival

What do you do when you learn that your best friend stole a Lamborghini you just repossessed on the same day you learn that your dad has passed away?! Take your dead dad’s Hyundai Stellar to find the Lamborghini before your boss and his thugs kill you… obviously.

Park Young-bae, an ace in the car repossessing business, must find his best friend, Dong-sik, who stole the $300,000 sports car to pay off debts, before the boss (Heo Sung-tae of Squid Game) and his gang decides Young-bae is better off dead. Driving his father’s taxicab, Young-bae avoids GPS-ing off a cliff, accelerates past a gangster fight with martial artists, and brakes for quirky characters in need of help. Twinkling magically with his father’s spirit, this old jalopy helps him understand the sacrifices a cabdriver father made to protect his family.

With its comedic timing and car chases, STELLAR: A MAGICAL RIDE may look like fast and furious frivolity, but the frivolity is intercepted by a father-son tale enlivened by heart-warming flashbacks and the blinking hazard lights of a car that is part shaman and part Herbie. Director Kwon Soo-kyung and writer Bae Se-Young (Extreme Job) dramatize financial distress through fantastic melodrama. In turn, the audience buckles in for a magical road-trip that moves from grief to acceptance, as Young-bae navigates retrospection while avoiding gangsters in a superstar Hyundai Stellar.

—Alissa Tu