Parasite Review

Prior to Parasite, I had never seen a Bong Joon-ho movie – and in fact the only one I’ve ever even been close to watching is Snowpiercer (soon to get a television series adaptation on TNT) – and that may simply be because I don’t watch very many foreign films in general.  This isn’t (as I think it is for many) due to the fact that I don’t like reading subtitles – the subtitles are typically on whenever I’m watching scripted TV, as it were – but more because I think I’m generally exposed to them a lot less than other movies.  Other than a semi-recent viewing of Hirokazu Koreeda‘s Shoplifters at the suggestion of a friend – the very same friend who I saw Parasite with – and distant-past viewings of L’Enfant, After the Wedding, Good Bye Lenin!, and an absolutely disastrous encounter with The Pervert’s Guide to Cinema (which is as dreadful as it sounds, albeit in an altogether unexpected way), my catalog of viewed movies from across any pond is thin, but Parasite, which is garnering rave reviews from pretty much anyone who runs across it, seemed as good a candidate as any with which to expand my horizons.  In retrospect, I’d say I was right about that, and while I think I have a bit less to say in the manner of concrete details, I want to pontificate a bit about it if that’s alright.

The Park family – the unsuspecting victims of the Kim’s Matchstick Men-style con.

After taking a trip to the theater to see this film, the most interesting thing about it also happens to be the thing that makes it difficult to write a review about, and that’s the fact that Parasite doesn’t seem to fit into any conventional genre box.  While it’s apparently billed as a comedy, Parasite is for the most part only comedic in the first half, with a midpoint reversal (no spoilers) that instead takes its viewers into suspense thriller territory.  Indeed, you’re as likely to laugh while watching it as you are to be on pins and needles (at one point in the viewing I was quite literally on the edge of my seat), but the common thread that ties the experience together is that socioeconomic themes – ones that I’m told tend to commonly permeate Bong Joon-ho’s existing filmography, Snowpiercer included – are challenged throughout, and are found to be what drives the humor and the horror alike.  Though I make this correlation hesitantly, I’m at times reminded of Jordan Peele‘s recent work as I look back on my Parasite viewing in that his work is largely branded as horror but also contains a lot of other elements that make it a bit harder to make that distinction, especially given his comedy roots and his well-founded insistence on tackling difficult social issues in the process.  The Cabin in the Woods would be another similar genre-bending experience, albeit with slightly less of a head on its shoulders.

That faraway gaze immediately preceded by looking into an empty pizza box is of course one that I know well.

I can understand, though, why Parasite is billed as a comedy, both because it is genuinely funny – even with the potentially-neutering fact that I’m reading the jokes instead of hearing them, and therefore timing and delivery tend to take a backseat to writing – and because calling it such eliminates any possibility of foretelling what the second half of the film will be like.  Again, I won’t spill the beans here, but what I will say is that the relationships between most of the characters and the class-war themes that the movie pervasively grapples with turn into struggles if they aren’t already, and are overall kicked completely into overdrive, motivating some wild character choices.  I do feel that the ending does get away from itself a bit, and of course it wouldn’t be a foreign art film if there weren’t a number of things I didn’t feel I completely understood, but the transition from happy-go-lucky caper film with no regards for consequences to…what it is after that is something else to watch, and no doubt enjoyable.  It’s also well-written, with more layers of metaphor than a literary parfait, with each layer ranging from obtrusively prominent to (to me) entirely invisible.  Its plot holes, which are few but present, are easily forgotten and readily abandoned in favor of what they give way to, and similarly, the fact that the Wikipedia plot summary (obviously spoilers here) reads like the rantings of a lunatic seems like a shockingly unimportant detail.

Tfw when you only get Wifi in the bathroom, but you don’t have to poop.

As was the case with my Shoplifters experience, another thing that I noticed quite often in my unavoidable penchant for comparing Parasite to American cinema was the difference in composition.  The camera work is largely far more static than things here typically are, employing wide shots that rely primarily on the viewer to track any action – characters moving from one point or another, etc. – rather than spoon-feeding.  This of course lies in sharp contrast with much of what Hollywood produces, with movies like Kingsman going so far as to ensure that all action is at the center of the frame to ensure that audiences don’t miss anything.  What results from the former approach, though – at least in the case of Parasite – is a more ambient insertion of the viewer into the story, with most things laid bare enough that they can be seen by anyone who wants or chooses to see them.  Quick cuts are seldom, if ever, found, and the camera is never used as an agent of emphasis or a character in its own right.  The visual style is also aurally complemented by a soundtrack that’s both eclectic and well-curated for punctuating lighter and tenser moments alike.

For anyone who has seen this movie – what does the rock even mean?  Leave me a comment, thanks

Parasite is South Korea’s entry for Best International Film consideration at the 92nd Academy Awards, and on top of that it’s the first film to win the Cannes Film Festival’s Palme d’Or in a unanimous vote since 2013 (Blue is the Warmest Color), so if you’re into high-profile award-y movies that track record alone makes it worth watching.  Even outside of that, though, it has legitimate everyman merit that should keep anyone from balking at the potential snootiness of the 99% Rotten Tomatoes score, and it’s perhaps that merit that has vaulted it into commercial success (a $113 million box office haul on an $11 million production budget ain’t bad) that’s unheard of for anything resembling an art film.  While a certain measure of opacity probably remains, it’s an expectation-defier in a number of ways that include its accessibility, and I’d myself recommend it to foreign film viewers ranging from novice (like me) to global cinephile.