Last night I saw Bong Joon Ho's Parasite (or Gisaengchung, as I'm reliably informed it is in Korean). We all know it's done well in the BAFTAs, Oscars, and whatever else... I'd heard some people saying it was amazing, some people saying it was overhyped, but I went along with very realistic expectations (unusual for me...). I was just happy to go see a film, frankly, and, although I'd seen a few clips, I was pretty clean of influence, and could just take everything for what it was. I enjoyed it very much, and thought that it was a fairly potent exploration of class issues, about as political as you can get while still getting mainstream release. It was such a mix of elements, my review is just going to be a cascade of impressions, but hey... And watch out for those spoilers - they're sprinkled throughout these musings.
There was lots of humour. Some of it slapstick, some of it farcical, some of it dark, some of it satirical - so in a couple of parts I laughed out loud, other bits I was sadlyamused because a mirror was held up to the absurdity of human life (I completely see it as universal, and relatable, although some people I've spoken to reckon it's 'very South Korean'), and sometimes I smiled because of the film creativity. Some bits were so on the nose, I thought 'are they really doing that, like this' - but I'm not saying it was bad writing - for me it often created a dream-like quality, hyper-real oddness. Or something... I suppose a good example of what I mean is one of the pivotal scenes where Kim Ki-taek (our protagonist family's head) stabs Mr Park (the film's rich family man and owner of the house that the Kims infiltrate) because he compains of 'that smell' (the smell of lower class people) again - it's too much, but, in that instance at least, it's a release of the tensions that have been building up.
One thing I really liked (which I've noticed in most of the 'Asian literature' (I'm not saying there's an all-encompassing idea of what that is, I just mean the literature from Asia that I've read. Which isn't masses, admittedly) that I've read) is the way that there were points of repetition, references to certain 'essences', which served as exposition, story beats (sort of like act markers), thematic reinforcement... maybe other things, too. These act as structural points - like bones - that the muscles and skin hang on, they give it a proper roundedness, but it didn't feel like a standard 'three act' film like I'm used to seeing. One of the most important repetitions was 'the smell' - many references are made to the smell of the Kim family, a perceptible but tantalisingly indefinable malodorousness that comes from the 'semi-bunker' that they live in, which, like public transport use, indicates that they are of lower class than the Parks. As I've just mentioned, the smell reference culminates in a narrative flash-point, which to me felt satisfying, and led to a moment of character clarity, where they realise what's important in life (as I feel little things can do in life. Not all epiphanies come from god, they come from the turning over of small stones).
There's a slight fixation on peaches. I love this in many ways; fruit, forbidden fruit, fresh food as luxury, symbols of wealth, Adam and Eve's apple, the idea that the housekeeper Moon-Gwang becomes ill because of fresh fruit is kind of an irony - it should be a healthy aspiration, but she's allergic - sweet supple sex... It's like a meditation, a haiku, boiling things down to a pregnant image...
I also like the use of what's known as a 'scholar stone' that is introduced by an antagonist in the beginning (this does act as a pretty blatant narrative arc marker), which is said to bring material wealth (no possibility of defining 'wealth' as 'love' or 'family' - this is material wealth only). It features almost a little clunkily (there's the line where Ki-woo is asked why he's carrying the stone around with him, and he says, "It's clinging to me," which is an obvious way of showing how greed messes us up. But I liked how it features in the false ending - he puts the stone in a river, and is part of a happy scene, the implication being that he has shared the wealth, 'planted a tree, the shade of which he'll never feel' - there was something very feng shui about that), but it's a visual media, after all, and I thought it was reasonable overall. Also it's notable for its playful quality, the flirting with the idea of the supernatural, as if the rock's really magical.
Last thing I'll mention in this vein is daddy Park's fixation on 'crossing the line'. I love this as an element of character exposition and managing audience expectations. Reminds me of mob characters - like Johnny Caspar - who are obsessed with appearing/behaving a certain way, and (like Ki-taek says at the end about plans made are plans doomed), only find it their undoing. So Park's faith in people's respect for 'the line' (i.e. not going too far in any given situation) sets him up to be disappointed, because inevitably people let him down - indeed, the more faith you have, the more you bring betrayal on (?) (although, actually his driver Yoon never does cross the line, it is the Kim family who are aware, through their willful lying, of where the lines lie, and are in that sense constantly operating beyond them, but from Park's point of view, Ki-taek, like a dog who breaks his lead, shoots across the line in dramatic fashion). These are classic ingredients in painting his picture, but Joon Ho handles them so well, and it felt refreshing to me.
There's sort-of horror elements I really enjoyed, too; all the sneaking around, the darkness, the bloody heads... Again there's a sort of flirting with the supernatural, when the young 'prince' of the family - Da-song - is worried about seeing another ghost, and we are shown a recreation of the haunting, as if it was a real event. It's a pleasing way of examining what makes us human, because you see people how they are when they're relaxed, and when they're in stressful situations.
Then, in the sense of shooting, there were a lot of stairs/levels shots. Some of the pre-watch media I'd consumed had said something about the importance of 'levels' in Parasite for its class commentary. I tried to pick up on some discernible instances of 'this is this, that subverts that', but I was too busy concentrating on the thing as a whole for that. Obviously you have a man (Geun-se) hidden in a bunker, institutionalised to the point of not wanting to leave his restrictive environment - because he's comfortable - despite the fact that he has an awfully menial and repetitive task to do (switching lights on and off for the family above, who he can't even see, only hear). He believes is an adequate way of expressing himself, but in reality the target of his reverence is unaware of his existence. This reminded me of our zero-hours culture in a meaningful way, but anyway, my point is that all uber-wealth and top class levels are always built on the crippled backs of others (and I'm not talking about fictional 'utopias'. I look at Lancaster - a city nearby to where I live - which, sure, acknowledges its part in the triangular trade, but still the town hall stands, and still the slaves' lives that were used to make it were wasted...
The ending was just at the border of credibility, for me. It was always going to be a hard narrative to end satisfactorily, because of how the strands all screw downwards, but it just managed to make it feel natural to itself. There is one ending that is magic, everything turns out well without any explanation - but this turns out to be a false ending, and the happy ending is (only potentially) yet to happen. So our hope that things can get better are deferred and we realise that the message is true to life once more - things are bleak, and we're going to have to work and change if we want that to be different. In this sense, one could go on at (further) length examining allegories within the film (the 'prince' thing I alluded to earlier, the strange invocation of war general's tactics in the setting out of garden furniture...), but that's it for me. Joon Ho said he wanted people to talk over the ideas they had while watching his film, and he's certainly provoked that reaction with me and the friends I saw Parasite with.
In fact, as we left the cinema, we chatted into the night. Storm Dennis was still pelting the streets, and big puddles were formed everywhere. People would have been worried about the river flooding again. As I walked to my friend's car, we passed a homeless person in the doorway of a greetings card shop. They were wrapped up in a brown sleeping bag, facing away from the street. Our talk of the film momentarily hushed. We were being careful not to wake the sleeper, or we were ashamed to be discussing the artistic merits of a film about class disparity, going back to our warm houses while this poor fucker had nothing except a sleeping bag and a doorway. And who knows what the rest of the night brought them. The rest of life...
And then I was home. I switched on the lights, locked the doors, took my big coat off, poured a drink, sat down on a comfy sofa, turned on my laptop, and started to write this.
Here is a link to the homeless charity Shelter - please donate if you can: https://england.shelter.org.uk/donate?reserved_appeal_code=20190401-DF-10&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIyKaM2P7e5wIVSrDtCh1sVQG-EAAYASAAEgLEtPD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds
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