Korean Director Bong Joon-ho has created some of the most interesting and well thought out movies to come out of South Korea since his feature film debut with Barking Dogs Never Bite. But his next movie Memories of Murder, was what made him a director to keep an eye on. He proved over the next few years that his first two films weren’t just a fluke with Mother, The Host, Showpiecer, and Okja (Snowpiercer and Okja being his most recognised and popular works as they were directed in English). His latest film, Parasite, is making major waves within the film industry, with critical success and even nabbing the Cannes Palme d’Or at the Cannes film festival, (One of the most impressive awards to win in film) beating out Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. With this movie, it’s quite easy to see why Bong Joon-ho’s Korean speaking movies are a lot more critically successful than his English speaking movies. But I think that the best way to experience this movie is without knowing anything about it.
(Minor story spoilers)
The story of Parasite revolves around Ki-taek’s struggling family in South Korea who are all unemployed. When an opportunity arrives for his son to teach an extremely wealthy family’s daughter how to speak English, the rest of the family create a facade to obtain jobs within the wealthier family’s house, but eventually find themselves entangled in an unanticipated incident.
Written and Directed by Bong Joon-Ho himself, This movie evolves into something so gripping and unusual. While this would be seen as a thriller by many, its also a dark comedy. This can often be seen as quite dangerous as to many tones can often leave an audience confused and disengaged. It also plays to audiences expectations only to then completely subvert them when you think you know whats going to happen. Parasite executes this all of these elements amazingly through Bong Joon-Ho’s incredible direction and writing. Society and economic backgrounds, and family are the three most common themes of Parasite, Although nothing gets lost in translation and explains everything the audience needs to know culturally to understand it. The themes that Parasite is exploring really hit home by the end of the movie and takes us to some unexpectedly emotional resolutions of character arcs. The cast which consists of Woo-sik Choi, Hye-jin Jang, So-dam Park and long term collaborator Kang-ho Sang, are all at the top of their game here, with an especially phenomenal performances by Kang-ho Sang. Cinematographer Kyung-pyo Hung returns with might be his best work yet. The sound design is great and the score fits perfectly and helps add to the tension of the movie. All of these elements combine to make an incredibly satisfying movie, while also being highly re-watchable. When introducing someone to foreign language movie, this would be one the first i’d recommend.
“A small league of heavyweight countries dominates the export of film and television programs to the import markets of other countries, whereas the latter have only a featherweight trade capability or none at all.” (Fu, 2006). This statement relates to Cultural Homogenisation, which is the concept that the culture of richer countries (eg America and Hollywood) are perceived to be of superior quality. Korean Cinema has become increasingly popular over the past few years. Movies like Oldboy, I Saw the Devil, Mother and The Wailing have all gained well deserved recognition and positive reactions from western audiences and critics. All of these movies are insanely good and in some ways, surpass most Hollywood movies. Parasite being another example. Its quality is proven by the reception of audiences, critics and film academies, and as stated previously, even won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes film festival. The stigma that Hollywood creates superior work compared to other countries is ridiculous, and is often proven wrong, and Parasite definitely proves this.
References-
Wayne Fu, W, 2006, ‘Concentration and Homogenization of International Movie Sources: Examining Foreign Film Import Profiles’ https://eds-b-ebscohost-com.ezproxy.uow.edu.au/eds/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=5&sid=f6c161ee-118d-4215-b9d0-23ce9c1cd407%40pdc-v-sessmgr01 [26 August 2019]
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