“It’s a very opportune gift.”
A true statement for both members of the #BongHive and the Kim family at the heart of the 2019 Palme d’Or winner (a first for Korean cinema!).
The Kims — patriarch Ki-taek (Bong’s regular Song Kang-ho), matriarch Chung-sook (Jang Hye-jin), son Ki-woo (Choi Woo-shik) and daughter Ki-jeong (Park So-dam) — don’t have much, and so their days are dependent on the surroundings that they can leech off. The Wi-Fi upstairs. The fumigation outside. That might soon be the past, however: One day, Ki-woo is asked to become the English tutor for the daughter of the prosperous Park family and, from there, he hatches a scheme to replace them. Class warfare begins. Perhaps deadly consequences to follow (don’t think that’s jam on the brioche in that final shot, folks…).
Bong departs sci-fi and returns to the social drama he is also an expert in, the proof being Mother, Memories of Murder and Barking Dogs Never Bite — all great films that are a part of a modest-but-faultless directing career. And Parasite might be his greatest achievement after snatching praise-after-praise wherever it debuts. $10 for this battle of the haves and have-nots, which many lucky viewers have said are layered and full of surprises, being an essential watch of 2019?
NEON nabbed Parasite last year and has scheduled the film to infect audiences Oct. 19. For more on the film and an eventual review, stay with The Young Folks.
Advertisement