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South Korean director Bong Joon-ho premiered his highly anticipated sci-fi dark comedy, Mickey 17, in London on Thursday, his first movie since the Oscar-winning Parasite.

Based on the novel Mickey7 by Edward Ashton, the film stars Robert Pattinson as Mickey Barnes, a former pastry chef who finds himself in the unusual predicament of having to die for a living. As a so-called “expendable” on a mission to colonise a distant planet, Mickey is required to die and come back to life, each time as a new version of himself.

“The film asks the question of we are all humans but how do we live a more human life,” Bong told Reuters via a translator.

“This guy is someone who is too nice for his own good, just unfortunate things happen to him and in the film he somehow manages to find his own journey of reclaiming his selfhood and I think in that process a lot people who also have quite extreme jobs might find comfort in Mickey’s journey.”

Bong made history at the 2020 Oscars when Parasite, a dark social satire about the gap between rich and poor in modern Seoul, became the first non-English language film to win the best picture award, the movie industry’s highest honour. It won a total of four Oscars, including best director and original screenplay for Bong.

Asked what pressure he felt in making his next film, Bong said: “I was already in my 50s (when) I won the Oscars and I tend not to get excited as a person. I just maintained my calm and did the same thing and it was the same for this film.”

In the film, Mickey’s suicidal missions include being exposed to a deadly virus and a colony of part-insect, part-mammal creatures.

“Sci-fi scripts normally … follow a certain pattern and with this, I was like ‘What is happening?’ every page,” Pattinson said. “Bong has such unique take on reality and story-telling, it just felt very exciting.”

Mickey 17, which also stars Toni Collette, Naomi Ackie, Mark Ruffalo and Steven Yeun, begins its cinema rollout on February 28 in South Korea, and other countries from March 5.