Middle-manager Park Dong-won saved up for 11 years to buy a home in Seoul for his family of three. When the Parks move in to their condo, they notice some structural glitches, like a slanted floor. But they are more alarmed by their weird neighbour Man-su. As Park’s co-workers gather for his housewarming party, the building collapses and sinks into a nearly bottomless pit below. The survivors have to improvise and cooperate to get out alive.

South Korea’s second highest grossing domestic film of 2021 is directed by Kim Ji-hoon, whose remake of The Towering Inferno, The Tower (2012), was one of the country’s biggest disaster movies. Like The Tower, Sinkhole is packed with the kind of eye-popping visual effects that Korean cinema has mastered. Spectacular stunts alternate with dorky comedy that thrives on the cast’s simpatico chemistry. As a metaphor of the middle class collapsing into a mortgage abyss, the nightmare of homeownership in a skyrocketing property market as imagined by this film resonates universally.