Parasite, a cinematic tour de force

Parasite is an Oscar winning movie that came out in 2019. Director Bong Joon-ho is the one who produced the film and has produced many other films earlier. Actors such as Song Kang-ho, Lee Sun-kyun, Cho Yeo-jeong, Choi Woo-shik, Park So-dam, Jang Hye-jin, and Lee Jung-eun are all-stars in this film. It follows a poor family who creates a scheme to infiltrate a wealthy family home to gain a higher upstanding in today’s society.

 

The storyline and the characters are all fascinating and relatable to real life. From Ki-Jung who is a character we all which could replicate with her cunning attitude, Mrs. Park who is a person we have all met before who is extremely gullible and naive but a good person, Choong-sook, the mother of the Kim family who is willing to do anything for her family and is brutal and unforgiving but we all are like that at times, Mr. Park who cares for his family but has an aura of arrogance at times and Mr. Kim is the most resentful of those who are wealthy. He is the father of the household and has been extremely stressed trying to gain a life for his family. This need and ambition are what leads him down the path he goes. Finally, Ki-Woo is a person who wants success in his life. All these characters we can relate to ourselves as sometimes we are brute, gullible, aggressive, cunning and an inherent desire we all have is to be successful in our lifetime.

 

Although the movie has its cultural roots in Korea, it has issues that breach cultural barriers. Poverty sadly is an issue that affects us globally. The Kim’s are a poor family struggling to make ends meet. You see them live in a sub-basement which is a depiction of how the poor are viewed in society. This is sadly the reality for so many in the world where they are struggling to even put food on the table let alone a roof over their heads. The inequality between the poor and the rich is a constant gap that has continued to grow. This leaves the rich able to do anything in the world and the poor having a lesser standard of living, increased risk of infant mortality, and exposure to environmental harms. This concept of inequity and the difficulty of moving up the economic ladder is shown desperately on the ending scene, where we know that no matter how hard Ki-Woo tries, he will never be able to purchase that house. The cinematics was exceptional and the number of scenes that have a deeper meaning than what they may seem at first was amazing. Parasite is a film that broke through the language and cultural boundaries. It allowed so many people to become interested in Korea and Korean film.

 

 

Written by: Samantha Garcia. From New York , United States . Current 4th year student at John Jay college of Criminal Justice .Pursing an International Criminal Justice B.A and a minor in Psychology. Intern at VANK (Voluntary Agency Network of Korea)