MANILA, Philippines – Bong Joon-Ho’s Okja hasn’t been released yet, but it’s already making headlines.

The movie about a young South Korean farmgirl trying to save her 7-ton pig from the slaughterhouse is a touching “love story,” as Bong called it, between a girl and her pet. (IN PHOTOS: Tilda Swinton, Steven Yeun, more at ‘Okja’ Korean red carpet)

But Okja, a $50-million Netflix original produced by Brad Pitt’s Plan B Entertainment, was the subject of controversy at the Cannes Film Festival 2017, where it competed against the winning Swedish film The Square for the highly coveted Palme d’Or.

Traditional judges and committee members cried foul and disappointed audience members booed at the screening as Okja would not be shown in French cinemas. In France, subscription services like Netflix must wait 3 years to stream movies after they have shown in cinemas. (READ: Netflix told their films should not win Cannes as festival opens)

Instead, Okja will get theatrical releases only in the US, UK, and Korea, and it will be available everywhere else through streaming on Netflix.

On the movie, Spanish director and Cannes jury president Pedro Almodovar said at a press conference: “Digital platforms are a new way of offering paid content, which in principle can be good and enriching. This new way shouldn’t try to suppress the already existing ones, like going to the movies. It shouldn’t alter the habits of spectators. I think this is the debate. The solution is a simple one: the new platforms should assume and accept the existing rules of the game, which involve accepting the current windows to the various exhibition formats, as well as the investment policies that currently govern in Europe. For me it would be a paradox if the winner of the Palme d’Or in Cannes, or any other award, couldn’t be seen in cinemas.”

A few weeks later, in Korea, Okja would meet another hurdle, as major theater owner CGV announced it wouldn’t release the film in its cinemas if it were to be released on Netflix on the same day.

“A 3-week hold-back period [between theatrical opening and online release] is an important business practice in Korea,” said Cho Sung-jin of CGV to Variety. “There are films that are simultaneously running in both physical theaters and online platforms, but they don’t open on the same date. If one exception is accepted, it will disturb the entire distribution system in Korea.”

But at a press conference in Korea on June 14, Bong was unfazed, saying that it would be good if Okja made an impact on the industry and – to the laughter of the media in attendance – that Cannes should have fixed the rules before inviting them to compete.

Cannes has since announced a change of rules, to be implemented in 2018: “Any film that wishes to compete in competition at Cannes will have to commit itself to being distributed in French movie theaters.” (READ: Cannes to ‘ban’ streaming-only films from competition)

Okja, however, is more than just the controversy that surrounds it. Before you catch the Korean-American movie on Netflix on June 28, here’s what you need to know about it.

What is ‘Okja?’

The movie is named after 14-year-old Mija’s 7-ton pet pig, a fictional genetically modified animal that was inspired by animals like the hippo, elephant, and manatee.

Okja is Mija’s pet, but is also one of many giant pigs that were created for consumption by a multinational company, Mirando. After 10 years of raising Okja for a contest, Mija’s grandfather gives the pig back to Mirando.

What follows is Mija’s adventure to Seoul and New York to save Okja from the slaughterhouse.

Meet Ahn Seo-Hyun

Thirteen-year-old Ahn Seo-Hyun is the young Korean actress who plays Mija. She’s had roles in the TV series Single-minded Dandelion (2014) and the movie The Housemaid (2010).

It was in the 2014 movie Monster that Bong saw Ahn and decided he wanted to work with her.

Okja is the first time Ahn and Bong have worked together. In an interview with Rappler, Ahn, through a translator, said Bong respected his actors and she was in awe of him every time they were on set together. “She realizes, in simple terms, why director Bong is director Bong to other people,” said the translator for Ahn.

Bong added, laughing, that he mostly spoke to her about eating on set: “I keep asking what you wanna eat: ‘I wanna eat this, I wanna eat that.'”

Star-studded cast

Aside from Ahn, Okja also stars Tilda Swinton, Jake Gyllenhaal, Lily Collins, Steven Yeun, Giancarlo Esposito, Choi Woo-shik, and many more.

Bong and Tilda team up

This movie is the second time Tilda has worked with Bong, and she’s a producer on Okja as well. They previously worked together on Snowpiercer (2013).

“I know that he’s a modern master, I know that his work is what I wanna see,” said Tilda in an interview with Rappler.

“His cinema is so nourishing. He does this incredibly radical thing, I think, in modern cinema, which is that he notices the specificity and the complicatedness of every single beat of human experiences and doesn’t have any truck with generica. He’s not interested in assumptions. He likes to show how complicated and interesting every single person’s life is and puts it on a big screen.

“There are people who know this, who are interested in this, but who feel that it can only be shown on a smaller screen, can only be shown using a smaller budget, to a smaller audience, but Bong has the wisdom to know that the general populace knows how complicated life is and wants to see it. And so I think that’s quite a rocking new vibe he’s sporting in world cinema. It’s big and it’s properly kinda humanistic.”

Lost in translation?

The Okja cast and crew are a mix of Koreans and Americans, and straddling the two cultures is Korean-American actor Steven Yeun. Steven was born in Seoul to South Korean parents before his family moved to America. He’s known for his role as Glenn Rhee in The Walking Dead.

In Okja, Steven plays K, a member of the Animal Liberation Front (ALF), who translates Korean for the group’s English-speaking members.

On whether certain themes or jokes in the movie may have gotten lost in translation, Steven said at a press conference: “I think what Director Bong does such a brilliant job of is that he sets up what is and not what he wants you to or manipulates you to try to see or feel. And in that same way, I think all the things that do get lost in translation kind of force in a beautiful way for people to focus not on the extra little tidbits here and there but it forces you to engage into the main core story which is this non-language relationship between an animal and this young girl.”

Bromance?

At the same press conference, actor Daniel Henshall, who plays ALF member Blond, was asked to speak about the “bromance” between his character and another ALF member, Silver (Devon Bostick).

Daniel got straight to the point: “There’s definitely more than a bromance. I think the character of Blond and Silver are lovers, so well picked up on that; yes, it goes beyond friendship, I think.”

Becoming pescetarian

Towards the end of the movie, scenes of a slaughterhouse may leave some viewers with a bad taste in their mouths.

Bong and Ahn themselves weren’t comfortable with eating meat while filming those scenes.

Bong joked at the press conference that he now only eats chicken and beef when no one’s watching, but turned serious and said that while filming, they could already smell the slaughterhouse from afar. His decision to stay away from meat for two months wasn’t philosophical, but was because he felt that the smell had seeped into his clothes and that he could smell it even when he was away.

In an interview with Rappler, Ahn said through a translator that her decision not to eat meat was because of how she felt as her character: “She didn’t crave meat and didn’t really want to eat meat, because of what she felt as Mija. And all those emotions lingered in her and she kept getting reminded of what it was like and all those feelings that she had for Mija.”

When Bong first had the idea for Okja, he had a vision of a giant sad animal. The rest of the story stemmed from there – why was it sad? Who was her best friend? Why was she so big?

Weeks before its release, Bong’s game-changing work has already become that and more.

Okja won’t be shown in Philippine cinemas, but you can catch it on Netflix starting June 28 at 11 pm in the Philippines! Will you be streaming the movie once it’s out? Let us know what you think in the comments! – Rappler.com