An irresistible fright flick, this mixes broad comedy, nicely played family sentiment and sweaty-palmed horror to become yet another Korean movie that begs the question, why can’t we make them like that?

Opening with a sly swipe at US militarism, an arrogant American general orders an underling to pour gallons of toxic waste down the sink.

The resulting spawn of this noxious cocktail is unleashed in a gangbusters scene of gruesome comic nastiness, as the amphibian with attitude munches on locals sunning beside the river.

Director Bong Joon-ho stages the monster attacks with the same gleeful bravura Peter Jackson did in King Kong, showing off his leviathan in broad daylight and notching up an impressively high body count of victims.

Bong is not above ripping off Jaws, Piranha, Alligator and Alien, but like Tarantino firing on all cylinders brings something to the party himself – a strong thread of family loyalty played to the hilt by a pitch perfect cast.

As the layabout dad Song Kang-ho has the right amount of underdog charm, and when he teams up with his antagonistic brother (Park) and archery champion sister (Bae) to bring the daughter home The Host becomes the sweetest monster movie since Cronenberg’s The Fly.

Special mention must go to Ko as the daughter, whose nail-biting scenes in the monster’s sewer lair, protecting a young lad from the slavering beasty, guarantee a US remake.

Bong clearly realized he needed a memorable mutant, and recruited Lucasfilm FX artist Kevin Rafferty to supervise impressive CGI and animation sequences.

A virus subplot (the beasty may also be contagious) and political swipes (a UN-headed taskforce threaten to use a chemical weapon on the monster and civilians) are nicely woven in, reminding you that Bong’s previous film was the grim serial killer thriller Memories of Murder.

Also, being a Korean film there are surprisingly hard edges (lots of key characters don’t make the closing credits) and a tragic-happy ending that will split audiences right down the middle.

A creature feature with brains as well as bite and one of the wildest films of the year, the queue for the cult starts here.

Rob Daniel