An actress is cast in a film that’s described as a cross between Korean art-house auteur Hong Sangsoo and the Jason Bourne action franchise. She arrives at the idyllic seaside shooting location with her young son in tow, only to be thrust into rigorous martial-arts training. As she acclimates to her quickly developing new skills, she finds herself at an existential crossroads between her roles as mother and performer. The lines that separates fiction and reality are soon blurred, inciting a transfixing amalgam of popcorn action and experimental drama. With nods to pop-cultural phenomena as disparate as cyberpunk and Filipino stick fighting, _Barbarian Invasion _marks an unforgettable return to filmmaking for director-star Tan Chui Mui, a Malaysian New Wave pioneer.