한국국제교류재단

Downsizing
Director: Alexander Payne
Stars: Matt Damon, Christoph Waltz, Hong Chau

“Happiness is everywhere and nowhere.”

Downsizing tells the story of people who choose to be “downsized,” or shrunk to a height of five inches (12.7 cm), for environmental reasons or personal benefit. Even though most downsized people enjoy a huge increase in the value of their money (in the protagonist’s example, USD 152,000 has the potential to be worth USD 12.5 million), there are still impoverished people, migrant workers, people living with disabilities, and those left destitute by their family in their new world.

Leisureland is an affluent living community for people who downsize in order to enjoy more luxury in life. Paul, the movie’s protagonist, decides with his wife to downsize for better opportunities, but his wife betrays him and opts out at the last minute. He downsizes alone and, in the absence of his wife, can no longer move into the mansion that awaited him. One year later, Paul lives in a small apartment in Leisureland and works just as he used to. His life before and after Downsizing is not much different, except for the fact that he no longer worries about money. Then he meets Ngoc Lan, a Vietnamese political activist who was downsized against her will. Watching Ngoc Lan, who has almost nothing to lose, help others, Paul is surprised to see that poverty does, in fact, exist in Leisureland.

Downsizing shows that people struggle even when they appear happy. I think this movie poses many questions: “What is happiness? Do riches equal happiness? If I have plenty of money and possessions, can I be truly happy?”

What about Paul? Will he be able to smile by the end of the movie?

Written by Song Seo-hyeon, Senior Program Officer, Korean Studies Department

MovieDownsizingMatt Damon