By Vincent Abbatecola
In 2014, director Bong Joon-ho delivered the imaginative sci-fi action film, “Snowpiercer,” a fascinating view of class struggles in a futuristic setting that had an abundance of inventiveness in the world that it presented. Since that was five years ago, one might expect it a little too soon for Bong to tackle the subject of class tensions again, but with his newest movie, there isn’t such thing as “too soon.”
Bong delivers his latest social commentary with the subversive dark-comedy thriller, “Parasite,” a film that comes loaded with inescapable tension and unexpected laughs. To say that this movie is unpredictable would be a disservice, as it’s better to say that you’ll be nothing short of blindsided at every turn.
Kim Ki-taek (Song Kang-ho), his wife Park Chung-sook (Jang Hye-jin), their son Kim Ki-woo (Choi Woo-shik), and daughter Kim Ki-jung (Park So-dam), live in squalor in a semi-basement apartment. When Ki-woo begins tutoring a high-school girl from the wealthy Park family, he soon helps his family scheme their way into working for the Parks to earn a living. While they enjoy their new lives at first, their fragile plan soon begins to fall apart.
It’s difficult to talk about each of the four lead performances individually within the Kim family because they exhibit a perfect connection amongst them. The bond that they share displays the love that they share and the notion that they will do anything for each other. The family is on screen together for most of the movie, so we’re able to dissect their dynamics as they work together to keep their plan on track. What’s most effective about this collection of performances is how we see the desperate moves that they take to keep up this change in their lifestyle, showing how much they long for an easier life as they create a heartbreaking view of a family that’s trying to survive. There’s an authenticity to this family because of how real they seem, and the superb work that’s accomplished by these cast members is one of the main things that helps this movie linger with you long after it’s over.
The performances from those portraying the members of the Park family are all just as good, but the one who gets to stand out the most is Cho Yeo-jeong, who plays Mrs. Park. It’s the funniest performance in the film, by far, because you’re always waiting to see what will make her character uncomfortable next, and seeing her reactions to certain events offers many laughs. Cho presents a character who always seems to be in an upper-class bubble and out of touch with the real-world difficulties from which here upscale life has sheltered her, and it’s fun to watch her as she tries to handle issues that threaten to uproot the tranquility of her family.
The screenplay by Bong and Han Jin-won create a story that entices you with its relevant premise, but then begins to shake you around about halfway through without end as the wild events begin to take shape. With all of the shifts in tone, don’t even begin to predict where the narrative is going to take you because that will be an exercise in futility. What makes this movie so terrific is how it’s not only entertaining as a movie, but hard-hitting it is in its timeliness. This is an exploration of the lack of upward mobility for the lower class and the frivolity that can be seen in the upper class, and it’s all presented in such a way that doesn’t feel clichéd at all, but is instead a narrative by two individuals who have a passionate voice about the subject. They paint those subjects as a close-knit family and offer small details about each of them (their talents and dreams) that make their situation more heartrending than I anticipated.
The cinematography from Hong Kyung-pyo (who worked with Bong on “Okja” and “Snowpiercer”) invites us into the two worlds in which the Kim family finds itself inhabiting. He captures the cramped and intrusive conditions of the Kims’ semi-basement living arrangement, where the family never seems to have any privacy; and he then captures the expansiveness of the Parks’ house, with its spacious rooms and lush landscaping that at once seemed unobtainable to the Kims. The way in which Hong frames the details of both lifestyles heightens the effect of how drastic the change in lifestyle feels as it happens to the Kims.
Bong does unforgettable work in balancing the aforementioned shifts in tone, going between humor, thrills, heartbreaking drama, social commentary, and even a few touches of horror, and all of this works because the concept is something that invites each of these factors in their own way. This gives Bong’s movie the chance to offer something memorable each minute, always steering your expectations in another direction as the plot becomes more surprising and intense. He constructs sequences with such exactitude in order to draw out the biggest impact out of them, making flawless use of Hong’s cinematography and editing from Yang Jin-mo (who collaborated with Bong on “Okja”) as he puts the pieces in place for each major moment with total carefulness to ensure that the depth of the story is given the technical precision that it deserves.
As you watch Bong’s latest film, it will take over your body as you feel the need to recoil or squirm in your seat as the Kims’ dream life devolves into a nightmare of harsh consequences. Compared to other movies that you’ll see in 2019, this parasite is a different specimen from the rest.