Directed by Bong Joon Ho
Okay so this is a pretty unique intro I’ll give but here it is, don’t read the rest of this review if you want to be completely blind going in. Parasite is a great movie with twists and turns and if you plan to see it I would recommend not reading this and just going to see it. I’m not planning on spoiling anything significant but, better safe than sorry. So with that out of the way, time to talk vaguely about a great film, Parasite!
Parasite is the charming tale of two families, one very poor and the other excessively wealthy. After an opportunity arises for the poor Kims to make some cash off the Parks, the Kims decide to see how far they can take their new plans and end up colliding with another bizarre scheme. Sorry but I really can’t say much more than that without spoiling things so hopefully, that gives you enough to slightly figure out what is going on.
Of all the surprises that Parasite held for me, almost none were as shocking as the fact that it is hilarious! If I hadn’t known this was supposed to be a horror film, I would have thought the first hour was just an excellently crafted satire about the haves and have-nots in Korea. If all this was was a great comedy I would still recommend it, but there’s so much more here than that, and that all comes down to one scene which I will not spoil wherein the switch flips and all that comedic tension transforms instantly into thriller tension. The amount of directorial skill needed to craft that one moment is so great that this sequence alone would make the movie a must-watch. Luckily for us, the film keeps moving, ratcheting up the intensity to near ludicrous levels.
Part of what makes this all work so well is the cast as well as their characters. The cast is just phenomenal, every performance is a pitch-perfect rendition of players in a high stakes game, whether or not they know they’re playing, and the characters are my favorite kind, fools. I’m not being dismissive here, no one, except maybe one or two people, is just stupid, everyone is driven by their desires and prejudices and social standing to make choices that may not be the most sensible long term solution to their problems. Its a real understanding of how people interact with each other and themselves and I’m a huge fan of when movies understand that and get it right.
I am going to keep this review kind of on the shorter side because I don’t want to talk about things that are spoilery because it is definitely best to go into this movie knowing as little as possible so I’ve tried to be vague. But don’t you worry, the visuals are great, the acting is phenomenal, the pace is brisk, there’s plenty of symbolism and satire to be found, and oh yes, it is really creepy once it gets going. If you can catch it in theatres then please, by all means, see it, if you can’t then wait for it on streaming services and check out one of the best movies I’ve seen in quite some time.
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