"Parasite" Review
(10/10)
Snowpiercer director Bong Joon-ho has made a South Korean social satire that's also a genre-bending Palme d'Or-winning thriller of class struggle. It's best to go into "Parasite," the Cannes Film Festival grand-prize winner by Korean filmmaker Bong Joon-ho, not knowing too much about what you're about to see; the better to let its sly power sneak up on you. A dark satire of the class divide in contemporary South Korea, it's the story of two families of four. You'll watch knowing you're in the hands of a master filmmaker; only wondering when it's over how certain effects were achieved (a sequence near the end is a wonder), and losing yourself in these characters: particularly the gentle, wide-eyed anxiety of Mrs. Park and the way that Ki-woo's father, a man who cheerfully recites his string of failed businesses, remains determined to somehow find a way to make his family prosperous again. The title metaphor becomes abundantly clear, is filled with vivid conversations that remind us how the Parks can't imagine (or don't care to imagine) how the other half lives. In one scene, they coolly discuss how poor people smell; like an old radish, says Mr. Park, or a rag that's been boiled. Ki-woo's family, however, seems to understand the rich all too well. What keeps you rapt in Parasite is the visual wit, every shot distills the movie's themes, and the richness of the characters and performances: Song's stricken expression as Kim Sr. is driven to murder by class resentment, Lee Jeong-eun's swift transformation from a calmly efficient housekeeper to a keening madwoman, and Choi's eloquent helplessness as his teenage protagonist watches this new world order gorily combust. At the heart of Parasite is the most gnawing evolutionary fear of all, the inability to protect one's family. Parents work to save their children but lose them, as children lose their parents and wives their husbands. The bonds are firm but can withstand only so much pressure before they fracture. Who are the real parasites? The poor who attach themselves to the rich or the rich who suck the marrow of the poor? The movie dissects the universal gap between the haves and the have-nots with shocking wit, stinging topicality and gut-wrenching violence. It's explosive filmmaking on every level.
Snowpiercer director Bong Joon-ho has made a South Korean social satire that's also a genre-bending Palme d'Or-winning thriller of class struggle. It's best to go into "Parasite," the Cannes Film Festival grand-prize winner by Korean filmmaker Bong Joon-ho, not knowing too much about what you're about to see; the better to let its sly power sneak up on you. A dark satire of the class divide in contemporary South Korea, it's the story of two families of four. You'll watch knowing you're in the hands of a master filmmaker; only wondering when it's over how certain effects were achieved (a sequence near the end is a wonder), and losing yourself in these characters: particularly the gentle, wide-eyed anxiety of Mrs. Park and the way that Ki-woo's father, a man who cheerfully recites his string of failed businesses, remains determined to somehow find a way to make his family prosperous again. The title metaphor becomes abundantly clear, is filled with vivid conversations that remind us how the Parks can't imagine (or don't care to imagine) how the other half lives. In one scene, they coolly discuss how poor people smell; like an old radish, says Mr. Park, or a rag that's been boiled. Ki-woo's family, however, seems to understand the rich all too well. What keeps you rapt in Parasite is the visual wit, every shot distills the movie's themes, and the richness of the characters and performances: Song's stricken expression as Kim Sr. is driven to murder by class resentment, Lee Jeong-eun's swift transformation from a calmly efficient housekeeper to a keening madwoman, and Choi's eloquent helplessness as his teenage protagonist watches this new world order gorily combust. At the heart of Parasite is the most gnawing evolutionary fear of all, the inability to protect one's family. Parents work to save their children but lose them, as children lose their parents and wives their husbands. The bonds are firm but can withstand only so much pressure before they fracture. Who are the real parasites? The poor who attach themselves to the rich or the rich who suck the marrow of the poor? The movie dissects the universal gap between the haves and the have-nots with shocking wit, stinging topicality and gut-wrenching violence. It's explosive filmmaking on every level.