parasite movie review quora

To revisit this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories

10 reasons why Parasite is so excellent

By Joshua Rivera

1. For a certain type of person, urgency will be enough. I will attempt that here. If you read writers because you trust them, allow me to thank you – I’m flattered, truly – and then implore you: Parasite , the new film from Korean director Bong Joon-ho , is a tremendous work that might be the most pleasurable experience you have in a movie theatre this year. It’s so top-to-bottom satisfying that even being completely spoiled couldn’t ruin it – but if you can come to it cold, you’ll be floored. Don’t even watch a trailer. Trust me, and go.

2. If you must know more – there will be no spoilers – the premise is simple enough. The Kim family, underemployed and eager for any opportunity to scrape together a little more cash, aren’t having the best time of things. Kim Ki-taek, the patriarch, is an unemployed driver. Together with his wife and two children, the family does odd jobs, such as folding pizza boxes. Then, an opportunity falls into his son Ki-woo’s lap when a friend offers to recommend Ki-woo to replace him as an English tutor to the daughter of the extremely wealthy Park family. Once he settles into his posh new job, Ki-woo gets an idea: What if he can trick the Parks into hiring his entire family?

3. Bong Joon-ho makes movies that ruin other movies for you. His films disregard the boundaries of genre; their characters resist familiar archetypes. Each one – be it the monster movie The Host , the science fiction thriller Snowpiercer, or the strange drama Okja – begins with one ostensible set of rules before discarding them one at a time in a way that should be disorienting. Instead, you wonder why we bother with rules at all.

4. Parasite is a movie about illusions, which is to say, it is about class and wealth. In watching it, you’ll begin to anticipate some of its jabs, and assume the direction in which it will cut. Maybe you’ll be right, for a little while. And then you won’t be.

5. Before we continue, it’s worth underlining in red ink: This movie is funny. Wickedly so. Parasite spares no one in its criticism, it dresses down every target with withering wit and ease. It’s also tense, thoughtful, humane, and perhaps frightening. If there is a feeling that a movie can elicit from us, odds are Parasite does so.

6. Much of Parasite ’s magic comes from the clever ways it puts the wealthy in intimate proximity with the sort of poor people that aren’t supposed to interact with them. Is the Kim family cheating with their gambit to become upwardly mobile? Can the Parks even be honest people with such wealth? “Money,” as one character notes, “irons out all the wrinkles”.

7. Watching this film, I think of the professors and employers and fathers of girlfriends I have stood in front of and listened to as they compliment me on being so articulate and well-spoken. I had stepped across a threshold they did not expect someone like me to haunt, and they had sized me up, and deemed me acceptable. The part that no one ever talks about is the one where I’ve sized them up too, and decided they were suckers just waiting to hear the right author mentioned, the right album, the right headlines. But that’s okay. They’re supposed to have the power in this story, and I can let them have it.

8. Maybe if the playing field was truly level we’d all eat each other just the same.

9. Few things in Parasite are as abundantly evident as the way money rewires the brains of those who have it in excess as well as those in desperate need. Wealth buys you out of the social contract – the need to behave a certain way, to tolerate others. Poverty imposes more rules, limitations and boundaries that, if unchecked, will suffocate. There is conflict in this – the wealthy become acutely aware of the inconvenience of empathy; the poor laugh darkly at those who plan for the future. “With no plan,” Ki-taek says late in the film, “nothing can go wrong… and nothing fucking matters.”

10. At one point in the film, Ki-woo gets a gift. It’s a beautiful, decorative stone that barely fits in his family’s cramped basement apartment, prone to exposure from both fumigators and pissing drunks alike. Despite his lack of space or use for it, Ki-woo quietly holds it in high regard, keeping it with him throughout the film despite its sheer size and weight. “This stone,” Ki-woo says. “It keeps clinging to me.” And then I felt a familiar fracture in my chest for envying that same stability, playing the same song for the same set of people, knowing that the game is rigged and always will be. After a while, it becomes exhausting, envying the wealthy. And accommodating them.

2020 movies: the eleven things we’re most excited to see

Why 1917 and Uncut Gems are the best kind of theme park rides

The most chilling (and brilliant) horror films to watch on Netflix UK

By Jack King

By Xuanlin Tham

By Sam Moore

By Conrad Quilty-Harper

By Iana Murray

By Andrew Nagy

Movie Reviews

Tv/streaming, collections, great movies, chaz's journal, contributors.

Now streaming on:

It’s so clichéd at this point in the critical conversation during the hot take season of festivals to say, “You’ve never seen a movie quite like X.” Such a statement has become overused to such a degree that it’s impossible to be taken seriously, like how too many major new movies are gifted the m-word: masterpiece. So how do critics convey when a film truly is unexpectedly, brilliantly unpredictable in ways that feel revelatory? And what do we do when we see an actual “masterpiece” in this era of critics crying wolf? Especially one with so many twists and turns that the best writing about it will be long after spoiler warnings aren’t needed? I’ll do my best because Bong Joon-ho ’s “Parasite” is unquestionably one of the best films of the year. Just trust me on this one.

Bong has made several films about class (including " Snowpiercer " and " Okja "), but “Parasite” may be his most daring examination of the structural inequity that has come to define the world. It is a tonal juggling act that first feels like a satire—a comedy of manners that bounces a group of lovable con artists off a very wealthy family of awkward eccentrics. And then Bong takes a hard right turn that asks us what we’re watching and sends us hurtling to bloodshed. Can the poor really just step into the world of the rich? The second half of “Parasite” is one of the most daring things I’ve seen in years narratively. The film constantly threatens to come apart—to take one convoluted turn too many in ways that sink the project—but Bong holds it all together, and the result is breathtaking.

Kim Ki-woo (Choi Woo-sik) and his family live on the edge of poverty. They fold pizza boxes for a delivery company to make some cash, steal wi-fi from the coffee shop nearby, and leave the windows open when the neighborhood is being fumigated to deal with their own infestation. Kim Ki-woo’s life changes when a friend offers to recommend him as an English tutor for a girl he’s been working with as the friend has to go out of the country for a while. The friend is in love with the young girl and doesn’t want another tutor “slavering” over her. Why he trusts Kim Ki-woo given what we know and learn about him is a valid question.

The young man changes his name to Kevin and begins tutoring Park Da-hye (Jung Ziso), who immediately falls for him, of course. Kevin has a much deeper plan. He’s going to get his whole family into this house. He quickly convinces the mother Yeon-kyo, the excellent Jo Yeo-jeong, that the son of the house needs an art tutor, which allows Kevin’s sister “Jessica” ( Park So-dam ) to enter the picture. Before long, mom and dad are in the Park house too, and it seems like everything is going perfectly for the Kim family. The Parks seem to be happy too. And then everything changes.

The script for “Parasite” will get a ton of attention as it’s one of those clever twisting and turning tales for which the screenwriter gets the most credit (Bong and Han Jin-won , in this case), but this is very much an exercise in visual language that reaffirms Bong as a master. Working with the incredible cinematographer Kyung-pyo Hong (“ Burning ,” “Snowpiercer”) and an A-list design team, Bong's film is captivating with every single composition. The clean, empty spaces of the Park home contrasted against the tight quarters of the Kim living arrangement isn’t just symbolic, it’s visually stimulating without ever calling attention to itself. And there’s a reason the Kim apartment is halfway underground—they’re caught between worlds, stuck in the growing chasm between the haves and the have nots.

"Parasite" is a marvelously entertaining film in terms of narrative, but there’s also so much going on underneath about how the rich use the poor to survive in ways that I can’t completely spoil here (the best writing about this movie will likely come after it’s released). Suffice to say, the wealthy in any country survive on the labor of the poor, whether it’s the housekeepers, tutors, and drivers they employ, or something much darker. Kim's family will be reminded of that chasm and the cruelty of inequity in ways you couldn’t possibly predict. 

The social commentary of "Parasite" leads to chaos, but it never feels like a didactic message movie. It is somehow, and I’m still not even really sure how, both joyous and depressing at the same time. Stick with me here. "Parasite" is so perfectly calibrated that there’s joy to be had in just experiencing every confident frame of it, but then that’s tempered by thinking about what Bong is unpacking here and saying about society, especially with the perfect, absolutely haunting final scenes. It’s a conversation starter in ways we only get a few times a year, and further reminder that Bong Joon-ho is one of the best filmmakers working today. You’ve never seen a movie quite like “Parasite.” Dammit. I tried to avoid it. This time it's true.

This review was filed from the Toronto International Film Festival on September 7th.

Brian Tallerico

Brian Tallerico is the Managing Editor of RogerEbert.com, and also covers television, film, Blu-ray, and video games. He is also a writer for Vulture, The Playlist, The New York Times, and GQ, and the President of the Chicago Film Critics Association.

Now playing

Clint Worthington

The Last Stop in Yuma County

Matt zoller seitz.

The Idea of You

Back to Black

Peyton robinson.

Monica Castillo

Sweet Dreams

Film credits.

Parasite (2019)

132 minutes

Song Kang-Ho as Kim Ki-taek

Lee Sun-Kyun as Park Dong-ik

Cho Yeo-jeong as Yeon-kyo ( Mr. Park's wife )

Choi Woo-shik as Ki-woo ( Ki-taek's son )

Park So-dam as Ki-jung ( Ki-taek's daughter )

Lee Jung-eun as Moon-gwang

Chang Hyae-jin as Chung-sook ( Ki-taek's wife )

• Bong Joon-ho

Director of Photography

• Hong Kyung-pyo

Original Music Composer

• Jung Jae-il
• Yang Jin-mo
• Han Jin-won

Latest blog posts

Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2 Wastes Its Potential

Living Through Words: Ethan Hawke on His Career, Poetry, and Wildcat

Cannes 2024: The Apprentice, The Shrouds

Cannes 2024: Blue Sun Palace, Julie Keeps Quiet, Simon of the Mountain

• International edition
• Australia edition
• Europe edition

Parasite review – searing satire of a family at war with the rich

Members of an unemployed family target a wealthy household in Bong Joon-ho’s superbly written, horribly fascinating comedy-drama

I n all its delicious cruelty and ingenuity, Bong Joon-ho’s satirical suspense thriller Parasite has arrived in the UK from Korea, having won the Palme d’Or in Cannes last year and dominated the connoisseur conversation from then on – at the expense, rightly or wrongly, of every other non-English-language film.

This really is a horribly fascinating film, brilliantly written, superbly furnished and designed, with a glorious ensemble cast put to work in an elegantly plotted nightmare. Its narrative engine hums with the luxurious smoothness of the Mercedes-Benz that one character is fatefully given the chance to drive. In my original review from Cannes , I wondered if the narrative was a little over-extended, but, on a second viewing, I can see how that amplitude of detail is what gives the film its flavour.

Parasite is a scabrous black comedy-slash-farce that resonates beyond its generic limits – a movie about status envy, aspiration, materialism, the patriarchal family unit and the idea of having (or leasing) servants. More than this, it is about the suppressed horror of the overclass for its underlings and its morbid distaste for the smell of people who have to use public transport. The satirical reflex extends to a vision of South and North Korea living together in paranoid, resentful intimacy, and its climax is precipitated by an almost Biblical climate-emergency catastrophe.

The parasites in question are a dodgy unemployed family living together in a scuzzy, stinky basement flat, with the teenage son and daughter periodically roaming around, holding their smartphones up to the ceiling to pinch the non-password-protected wifi of neighbours and nearby businesses. The dad is Ki-taek (a lovely performance from veteran player Song Kang-ho), a laidback loafer married to former track star Chung-sook (Chang Hyae-jin). The son is Ki-woo (Choi Woo-sik), a shiftless young guy who has flunked the university entrance exams; and the daughter is Ki-jung (Park So-dam), a smart, cool customer with an artistic gift for web-based fraud.

One summer, by posing as a college student, Ki-woo gets the chance to tutor the teenage daughter of a very rich family in a spectacularly grand modernist house, owned by business high-flier Mr Park (Lee Sun-kyun). Ki-woo’s student is the demure Da-hye (Jung Ji-so), whose instant crush on him is something Ki-woo does nothing to discourage. The somewhat distraite mistress of the house, Yeon-kyo (Cho Yeo-jeong), asks if this smart young man might also recommend an art tutor for Da-hye’s negligibly talented kid brother Da-song (Jung Hyun-jun). He passes off his sister as the cousin of a friend and her brazen grifter-sense of when and how to be confident, and even arrogant, bags her the job.

Soon, these wicked kids have cunningly contrived to get the family chauffeur fired and replaced with their dad. They then dislodge the housekeeper Moon-gwang (Lee Jeong-eun) and install their placidly smiling mum. A whole family of cuckoos in a brand new nest, pretending to be strangers to each other. But then the artless little kid points out that they all smell alike – and they smell of poor people.

Parasite is a movie that taps into a rich cinematic tradition of unreliable servants with an intimate knowledge of their employers, an intimacy that easily, and inevitably, congeals into hostility. Joseph Losey’s The Servant invokes a comparable transgression, nightmarishly amplified here by the subterfuge and by the sheer numbers of people getting up close and personal.

Parasite is also in a Korean tradition of pictures such as Kim Ki-young’s classic thriller The Housemaid from 1960, remade in 2010 by Im Sang-soo, and also Park Chan-wook’s servant-class con-trick drama, The Handmaiden . A second viewing of this film also put me in mind of the claustrophobic horror in Park’s Oldboy .

And there is something else, too. The Park family love to play Handel on the music system in their lovely home – the Spietati, io vi giurai aria from his opera Rodelinde. It is so expansive, so airy, caressingly sumptuous and wealthy, and not a million miles from the Care selve arioso from Handel’s Atalanta – listened to by the smug wealthy couple in Michael Haneke’s home-invasion horror Funny Games , before their own appointment with dark destiny.

The home invaders here gaze on their super-rich employers and see themselves in a distorting mirror that pitilessly reveals to them how wretched they are and shows them what could and should be theirs. It is almost a supernatural or sci-fi story: the invasion of the lifestyle snatchers. Parasite gets its toxic tendrils into your skin.

• Peter Bradshaw's film of the week
• Bong Joon-ho
• Horror films
• Drama films
• World cinema
• South Korea
• Comedy films

Comments (…)

Most viewed.

Review: Thrilling and devastating, ‘Parasite’ is one of the year’s very best movies

• Show more sharing options
• Copy Link URL Copied!

The first thing you see in Bong Joon Ho’s “Parasite,” a thriller of extraordinary cunning and emotional force, is an upper window in a tiny underground apartment. From this high, narrow vantage the Kims, a resilient family of four, peer onto a grubby Seoul street strewn with garbage bags and electrical wires — an ugly view made worse by a drunk who often turns up to relieve himself right outside. Sometime later the Kims will stand before a much larger window, as big and beautiful as a cinema screen, in an enormous house with a gorgeous sunlit garden. It’s not just a different view; it’s a different world.

From the outset of this deviously entertaining movie, which recently became the first South Korean film to win the prestigious Palme d’Or at Cannes, every detail of the Kims’ hardscrabble existence is on blunt display. In an early scene, high school graduate Ki-woo (Choi Woo Shik) and his sister, Ki-jung (Park So Dam), scurry around their cramped bathroom with their phones held aloft, hunting for a free Wi-Fi signal. You register the clutter of their apartment with its discarded clothes, mildewed tiles and skittering stinkbugs. You watch the Kims fold and assemble pizza boxes for a nearby restaurant, the closest any of them has recently come to landing a job.

But you also notice the close bonds between brother and sister, as well as the easy rapport they share with their boisterous father, Ki-taek (Song Kang Ho), and sharp-witted mother, Chung-sook (Chang Hyae Jin). Living together in close quarters has bred in them a matter-of-fact intimacy and a wily self-sufficiency.

Bong has never been one to ennoble or romanticize his characters’ poverty, but he does invest them with a terrific rooting interest. “Parasite,” with its tough, unsentimental view of people doing what they must to survive, initially suggests an evil twin to “Shoplifters,” Hirokazu Kore-eda’s lovely drama about a family of petty thieves (which, incidentally, won the Palme last year).

From ‘Knives Out’ to ‘Parasite’: Why movies are tackling income inequality and class warfare

In a range of fall releases, including “Joker,” “Parasite,” “Hustlers” and “Knives Out,” major movies take on issues of class and income inequality

Oct. 7, 2019

But the movie swiftly establishes its own unpredictable agenda not long after Ki-woo inherits an English tutoring job from a college-student friend (Park Seo Joon). The pupil in question is an upper-class teenage girl, Park Da-hye (Jung Ziso), and their lessons will take place in the gated modernist fortress she calls home. Ki-woo just barely manages to keep a lid on his awe the first time the Parks’ formidable housekeeper, Moon-gwang (Lee Jung Eun), ushers him inside. Designed and formerly inhabited by a famous architect, the house is a masterwork of real-estate pornography with its beige walls, marble floors and vast, cavernous spaces.

But it is also a warren of secrets, full of telling details that Bong, a superb storyteller and a master of camera movement, unwraps with elegance and economy. (The cinematography is by Hong Kyung Pyo.) He calls your attention to the toy arrows fired by Da-hye’s younger brother, Da-song (Jung Hyeon Jun), and also to a framed magazine article about her father, Dong-ik (Lee Sun Kyun), a millionaire tech titan. But no one embodies the family’s glossy pretensions more nakedly than Dong-ik’s wife, Yeon-kyo (Cho Yeo Jeong), whether she’s idly stroking one of the family’s three dogs or peppering her everyday speech with English affectations.

Yeon-kyo’s breezy entitlement hides a naive, nervous streak, and Cho’s performance suggests just how gullible and vulnerable the very rich can be behind their high-tech security systems. When Yeon-kyo lets drop that her mischief-making young son is in need of an art tutor, Ki-woo, thinking fast, suggests a distant acquaintance for the job — and, within days, has succeeded in installing his sister in the house as well. Ki-jung, the most intuitive grifter in a family full of them, shows up with a coolly professional demeanor and a mouth full of therapeutic gobbledygook. (She got it all from Google, she later announces to her family’s amusement.)

The Kims enjoy their sudden boost in income, but their ambitions — and the dramatic stakes — only escalate from there. I wouldn’t dream of disclosing the stunning, multilayered surprises that await you in “Parasite,” though it gives away nothing to note that it’s about two families on warring sides of the class divide. Certainly it says nothing about the dexterity with which Bong shuffles tones, moods and genres, or the Hitchcockian precision with which he and his co-writer, Han Jin Won, have booby-trapped their narrative. Taking cues from classics of domestic intrigue such as Kim Ki-young’s “The Housemaid” (1960) and Joseph Losey’s “The Servant” (1963), they send this domestic drama vaulting into satire, suspense, terror and full-blown tragedy.

The first hour or so of “Parasite” is simply the most dazzling movie about the joys of the con I’ve seen in years. It’s a heist thriller of the quotidian, in which no everyday object — a piece of fruit, a child’s drawing — is too trivial to be weaponized. Bong, his camera at once ecstatic and controlled, brings the pieces together with the brio of a conductor attacking a great symphony. But even as he lures us into a wicked sense of complicity with the Kims, he also suggests that they aren’t the only ones with something to hide.

As this allegory of class rage plays out, you may find yourself wondering about the exact meaning of the movie’s title. At first it seems the parasites must be the lowly Kims, who are so interdependent that they often seem less like individuals than members of a single, unified organism. (Watch the way they sometimes squat and crawl around in private, like stealthy four-legged insects — or perhaps just people accustomed to low ceilings.) But then, surely the title more truthfully describes the Parks, whose lives of extravagant luxury represent the real moral and financial scourge in a ruthless late-capitalist society.

Yet Bong refuses the crutch of an easy target. He peels back the layers of privilege to expose the tremendous sadness and patriarchal cruelty of the Park household, where Yeon-kyo lives in fear of her husband and instinctively prioritizes her son’s needs over her daughter’s. The Kims are a model of functionality and egalitarianism by comparison, and while they may covet their employers’ prosperity, there is never any real doubt here about which is the more loving, stable family unit.

Bong has never been one for uncomplicated heroes or easy villains: Think of the sympathetic grotesques Tilda Swinton played in “Snowpiercer” and “Okja,” the dystopian eco-thrillers the director made before this film. He has always had a knack for fusing genre pleasures and liberal polemics, as he did in his brilliant 2006 monster movie, “The Host.” With their cleverly linked titles and their shared star (Song, one of Korea’s best actors), “The Host” and “Parasite” feel like natural companion pieces, right down to the haunting echoes in their respective final shots: At heart, they’re both movies about downtrodden families doing what they must to survive in a cold, indifferent world.

What distinguishes “Parasite” even within Bong’s body of work is its discipline: This is a tighter, more intimately scaled picture than “Snowpiercer” and “Okja,” and it proceeds like clockwork without ever feeling airless or mechanical. That’s a tribute to the note-perfect ensemble, especially Park So Dam, Cho Yeo Jeong and the astonishing Lee Jeong Eun as three women driven to three unique states of desperation. But it’s also a tribute to a filmmaker whose understanding of the world is as persuasive in its cruelty as it is trenchant in its humanity. “Parasite” begins in exhilaration and ends in devastation, but the triumph of the movie is that it fully lives and breathes at every moment, even when you might find yourself struggling to exhale.

Best of the 2019 Toronto Film Festival: There was ‘Parasite’ and there was everything else

L.A. Times writers Glenn Whipp and Justin Chang discuss their Toronto festival highlights including “Marriage Story,” “Knives Out,” “Uncut Gems” and “The Lighthouse.”

Sept. 13, 2019

(In Korean with English subtitles) Rating: R, for language, some violence and sexual content Running time: 2 hours, 11 minutes Playing: ArcLight Cinemas, Hollywood, and the Landmark, West Los Angeles

More to Read

A movie star, a suicide and a nation’s war on drugs

Feb. 13, 2024

Director Bong Joon Ho, Korean artists call for probe into ‘Parasite’ actor’s death

Jan. 11, 2024

‘Beyond Utopia’ tracks desperate North Koreans trying to escape to freedom

Jan. 1, 2024

Only good movies

Get the Indie Focus newsletter, Mark Olsen's weekly guide to the world of cinema.

You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.

Justin Chang was a film critic for the Los Angeles Times from 2016 to 2024. He won the 2024 Pulitzer Prize in criticism for work published in 2023. Chang is the author of the book “FilmCraft: Editing” and serves as chair of the National Society of Film Critics and secretary of the Los Angeles Film Critics Assn.

More From the Los Angeles Times

Entertainment & Arts

Nina Dobrev hospitalized after e-bike accident; says a ‘long road of recovery’ awaits

Fred Roos, ‘Godfather Part II’ producer and longtime Coppola collaborator, dies at 89

May 21, 2024

This year’s Los Angeles Latino International Film Festival to feature women-led movies, a film market

‘The Apprentice’ team fires back after Trump campaign threatens lawsuit

• Skip to main content
• Keyboard shortcuts for audio player

Movie Reviews

Movie review: 'parasite'.

Bob Mondello

Snowpiercer director Bong Joon-ho has made a South Korean social satire that's also a genre-bending Palme d'Or-winning thriller of class struggle.

Copyright © 2019 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.

NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.

Advertisement

Supported by

Critic’s Pick

‘Parasite’ Review: The Lower Depths Rise With a Vengeance

In Bong Joon Ho’s new film, a destitute family occupies a wealthy household in an elaborate scheme that goes comically — then horribly — wrong.

• Share full article

‘Parasite' | Anatomy of a Scene

The director bong joon ho narrates a sequence from his film..

“Hello, this is Bong Joon Ho, director of ‘Parasite.’ This is the story about infiltration. One family infiltrates to other family. This is in the middle of that process. —that kind of moment.” “Simply speaking, it’s just something like ‘Mission: Impossible,’ the TV series when I was a little kid. I was a huge fan. And this some kind of nerdy family version of ‘Mission: Impossible.’” “In this moment for the young son, he is kind of manipulator. He controls everything. And he has a plan. When they rehearse, it looks like a kind of filmmaking. It is like the son is director, the father is the actor.” “I intentionally shoot those shots very quickly and some very spontaneous reaction and sudden, small, improvised. And something happened very naturally. Rolling the camera, that kind of momentary feeling is very important.”

By Manohla Dargis

Midway through the brilliant and deeply unsettling “Parasite,” a destitute man voices empathy for a family that has shown him none. “They’re rich but still nice,” he says, aglow with good will. His wife has her doubts. “They’re nice because they’re rich,” she counters. With their two adult children, they have insinuated themselves into the lives of their pampered counterparts. It’s all going so very well until their worlds spectacularly collide, erupting with annihilating force. Comedy turns to tragedy and smiles twist into grimaces as the real world splatters across the manicured lawn.

The story takes place in South Korea but could easily unfold in Los Angeles or London. The director Bong Joon Ho ( “Okja” ) creates specific spaces and faces — outer seamlessly meets inner here — that are in service to universal ideas about human dignity, class, life itself. With its open plan and geometric shapes, the modernist home that becomes the movie’s stage (and its house of horrors) looks as familiar as the cover of a shelter magazine. It’s the kind of clean, bright space that once expressed faith and optimism about the world but now whispers big-ticket taste and privilege.

“Space and light and order,” Le Corbusier said, are as necessary as “bread or a place to sleep.” That’s a good way of telegraphing the larger catastrophe represented by the cramped, gloomy and altogether disordered basement apartment where Kim Ki-taek (the great Song Kang Ho) benignly reigns. A sedentary lump (he looks as if he’s taken root), Ki-taek doesn’t have a lot obviously going for him. But he has a home and the affection of his wife and children, and together they squeeze out a meager living assembling pizza boxes for a delivery company. They’re lousy at it, but that scarcely matters as much as the petty humiliations that come with even the humblest job.

The Kims’ fortunes change after the son, Ki-woo (Choi Woo Shik), lands a lucrative job as an English-language tutor for the teenage daughter, Da-hye (Jung Ziso), of the wealthy Park family. The moment that he walks up the quiet, eerily depopulated street looking for the Park house it’s obvious we’re not idling in the lower depths anymore. Ki-woo crosses the threshold into another world, one of cultivated sensitivities and warmly polished surfaces that are at once signifiers of bourgeois success and blunt reproaches to his own family’s deprivation. For him, the house looks like a dream, one that his younger sister and parents soon join by taking other jobs in the Park home.

Take being the operative word. The other Kims don’t secure their positions as art tutor, housekeeper and chauffeur, they seize them, using lies and charm to get rid of the Parks’ other employees — including a longtime housekeeper (a terrifically vivid Lee Jung Eun) — in a guerrilla incursion executed with fawning smiles. The Parks make it easy (no background checks). Yet they’re not gullible, as Ki-taek believes, but are instead defined by cultivated helplessness, the near-infantilization that money affords. In outsourcing their lives, all the cooking and cleaning and caring for their children, the Parks are as parasitical as their humorously opportunistic interlopers.

Bong’s command of the medium is thrilling. He likes to move the camera, sometimes just to nudge your attention from where you think it should be, but always in concert with his restlessly inventive staging. When, in an early scene, the Kims crowd their superior from the pizza company, their bodies nearly spilling out of the frame, the image both underscores the family’s closeness and foreshadows their collective assault on the Parks. Nothing if not a rigorous dialectician, Bong refuses to sentimentalize the Kims’ togetherness or their poverty. But he does pointedly set it against the relative isolation of the Parks, who don’t often share the same shot much less the same room.

Bong has some ideas in “Parasite,” but the movie’s greatness isn’t a matter of his apparent ethics or ethos — he’s on the side of decency — but of how he delivers truths, often perversely and without an iota of self-serving cant. (He likes to get under your skin, not wag his finger.) He accents the rude comedy of the Kims’ struggle with slyness and precision timing, encouraging your laughter. When the son and daughter can’t locate a Wi-Fi signal — the family has been tapping a neighbor’s — they find one near the toilet (an apt tribute to the internet). And when a cloud of fumigation billows in from outside, an excited Ki-taek insists on keeping the windows open to take advantage of the free insecticide. They choke, you laugh. You also squirm.

The lightly comic tone continues after the Kims begin working for the Parks, despite ripples of unease that develop into riptides. Some of this disquiet is expressed in the dialogue, including through the Kims’ performative subservience, with its studied courtesies and strategic hedging. (Bong shares script credit with Han Jin Won.) The poor family quickly learns what the rich family wants to hear. For their part, Mr. and Mrs. Park (Lee Sun Kyun and Cho Yeo Jeong) speak the language of brutal respectability each time they ask for something (a meal, say) or deploy a metaphor, as when he gripes about people who “cross the line” and smell like “old radishes.”

The turning point comes midway through when the Parks leave on a camping trip, packing up their Range Rover, outdoor projector included. In their absence, the Kims bring out the booze, kick back and take over the house, a break that’s cut short when the old housekeeper returns, bringing a surprise with her. The slapstick becomes more violent, the stakes more naked, the laughs more terrifying and cruel. By that point, you are as comfortably settled in as the Kims; the house is so very pleasant, after all. But the cost of that comfort and those pretty rooms — and the eager acquiescence to the unfairness and meanness they signify — comes at a terrible price.

Rated R for class exploitation and bloody violence. In Korean, with subtitles. Running time: 2 hours and 12 minutes.

Manohla Dargis has been the co-chief film critic since 2004. She started writing about movies professionally in 1987 while earning her M.A. in cinema studies at New York University, and her work has been anthologized in several books. More about Manohla Dargis

Explore More in TV and Movies

Not sure what to watch next we can help..

“Megalopolis,” the first film from the director Francis Ford Coppola in 13 years, premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. Here’s what to know .

Why is the “Planet of the Apes” franchise so gripping and effective? Because it doesn’t monkey around, our movie critic writes .

Luke Newton has been in the sexy Netflix hit “Bridgerton” from the start. But a new season will be his first as co-lead — or chief hunk .

There’s nothing normal about making a “Mad Max” movie, and Anya Taylor-Joy knew that  when she signed on to star in “Furiosa,” the newest film in George Miller’s action series.

If you are overwhelmed by the endless options, don’t despair — we put together the best offerings   on Netflix , Max , Disney+ , Amazon Prime  and Hulu  to make choosing your next binge a little easier.

Sign up for our Watching newsletter  to get recommendations on the best films and TV shows to stream and watch, delivered to your inbox.

Log in or sign up for Rotten Tomatoes

Trouble logging in?

By continuing, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from the Fandango Media Brands .

By creating an account, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from Rotten Tomatoes and to receive email from the Fandango Media Brands .

By creating an account, you agree to the Privacy Policy and the Terms and Policies , and to receive email from Rotten Tomatoes.

Email not verified

Let's keep in touch.

Sign up for the Rotten Tomatoes newsletter to get weekly updates on:

• Upcoming Movies and TV shows
• Trivia & Rotten Tomatoes Podcast
• Media News + More

By clicking "Sign Me Up," you are agreeing to receive occasional emails and communications from Fandango Media (Fandango, Vudu, and Rotten Tomatoes) and consenting to Fandango's Privacy Policy and Terms and Policies . Please allow 10 business days for your account to reflect your preferences.

OK, got it!

Movies / TV

No results found.

• What's the Tomatometer®?
• Login/signup

Movies in theaters

• Opening this week
• Top box office
• Coming soon to theaters
• Certified fresh movies

Movies at home

• Fandango at Home
• Netflix streaming
• Prime Video
• Most popular streaming movies
• What to Watch New

Certified fresh picks

• Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga Link to Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga
• Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes Link to Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes
• Babes Link to Babes

New TV Tonight

• Evil: Season 4
• Trying: Season 4
• Tires: Season 1
• Fairly OddParents: A New Wish: Season 1
• Stax: Soulsville, U.S.A.: Season 1
• Lolla: The Story of Lollapalooza: Season 1
• Jurassic World: Chaos Theory: Season 1
• Mulligan: Season 2
• The 1% Club: Season 1

Most Popular TV on RT

• Outer Range: Season 2
• Bodkin: Season 1
• The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power: Season 2
• Bridgerton: Season 3
• Fallout: Season 1
• Dark Matter: Season 1
• The Sympathizer: Season 1
• Baby Reindeer: Season 1
• The 8 Show: Season 1
• Best TV Shows
• Most Popular TV
• TV & Streaming News

Certified fresh pick

• Bridgerton: Season 3 Link to Bridgerton: Season 3
• All-Time Lists
• Binge Guide
• Comics on TV
• Five Favorite Films
• Video Interviews
• Weekend Box Office
• Weekly Ketchup
• What to Watch

Mad Max Movies Ranked by Tomatometer

Mad Max In Order: How to Watch the Movies Chronologically

Asian-American Native Hawaiian Pacific Islander Heritage

What to Watch: In Theaters and On Streaming

Weekend Box Office Results: John Krasinski’s IF Rises to the Top

Hugh Jackman Knew “Deep in His Gut” That He Wanted to Play Wolverine Again

• Trending on RT
• Furiosa First Reviews
• Most Anticipated 2025 Movies
• Cannes Film Festival Preview
• TV Premiere Dates

Parasite Reviews

Parasite is the movie we will look back on as the movie of 2019. It crosses over to every culture because it’s simply about human beings struggling to survive in an unfair system.

Full Review | Apr 4, 2024

It is sadistic, angry and dark and has a lot to say about the system. This is the world we live in.

Full Review | Aug 11, 2023

"Parasite" has already made history for South Korea as the country's first film to win a Best Picture Academy Award. There are some moments I can't wrap my head around though, and one of them was the inclusion of Illinois State into the dialogue.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/4 | Jul 28, 2023

Cinematography, score, editing… everything’s absolutely perfect. Nothing is placed without purpose. Not a single line of dialogue is wasted. It would be a shame if anyone fails to watch this magnificent movie just because it’s in a foreign language.

Full Review | Original Score: A+ | Jul 24, 2023

Radically different films such as Knives Out, Us and Joker ... have all expressed the same social criticism. Parasite is perhaps the most pointed, explicitly showing how economic inequality brings out the worst in everyone, rich and poor alike.

Full Review | Jul 20, 2023

Bong Joon Ho’s many-sided, dark social satire is a cunning and resourceful commentary on South Korea’s economic inequality. Why it works is the relevance of that system across societies of every nation.

Full Review | Jun 14, 2023

These tiny details underline the inherent horror, and concur with the genre-defying essence of the story...

Full Review | May 15, 2023

Parasite will move you like nothing else.

Full Review | Mar 31, 2023

It is the last good thing that has happened since the shutdown...

Full Review | Mar 1, 2023

Visually stunning and searing satire...

Full Review | Dec 7, 2022

Incredible storytelling and examination of the class structure in Korea... Strong characterisation and performances create empathy from audiences, themselves becoming parasites to the film as host. Clinging on for dear life until the thrilling conclusion.

Full Review | Original Score: 5/5 | Nov 12, 2022

Delicate directing and immaculate production design make Parasite the masterpiece it is. Its social-study script belongs in a lab, as it comes with storytelling lessons that transcend language. Reason why it became universal. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Original Score: 10/10 | Oct 21, 2022

With a delicious black comedy edge, some surprising jolts of heartfelt emotion, and a violent throat punch when you’re least expecting it, “Parasite” is a movie that keeps you engaged and guessing.

Full Review | Original Score: 4.5/5 | Aug 24, 2022

Here is a dark comedy from the great Bong Joon-Ho about class warfare that, depending on your mood, you may find to be a work of genius or too self-indulgent. One thing is certain, you’ve never seen anything quite like it.

Full Review | Original Score: 4.5/5 | Aug 20, 2022

Bong Joon-ho's Parasite is a wryly detailed and superbly scripted portrait of contemporary class rage.

Full Review | Jul 20, 2022

This is a filmmaker working at the top of his game, aided by brilliant satirical writing that feels as culturally relevant as it is emotionally resonant. It is a flawless knockout in every sense of the word.

Full Review | Original Score: 10/10 | Jun 14, 2022

Though Bong calls Parasite a "tragicomedy" and layers the material with lively humor and his signature tonal playfulness, it's also his most furious and most fatalistic picture to date.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/4 | Feb 23, 2022

Bong Joon-ho has created something with Parasite thats darkly humorous, compelling, dramatic, poignant, and bittersweet all at the same time.

Full Review | Original Score: 9.5/10 | Feb 14, 2022

Episode 52: Jojo Rabbit / The Lighthouse / Parasite

Full Review | Original Score: 96/100 | Dec 1, 2021

A twist-laden narrative that effortlessly shapeshifts from comedy to drama to thriller with liquid ease.

Full Review | Original Score: A | Sep 7, 2021

Common Sense Media

Movie & TV reviews for parents

• For Parents
• For Educators
• Our Work and Impact

Or browse by category:

• Get the app
• Movie Reviews
• Best Movie Lists
• Best Movies on Netflix, Disney+, and More

Common Sense Selections for Movies

50 Modern Movies All Kids Should Watch Before They're 12

• Best TV Lists
• Best TV Shows on Netflix, Disney+, and More
• Common Sense Selections for TV
• Video Reviews of TV Shows

Best Kids' Shows on Disney+

Best Kids' TV Shows on Netflix

• Book Reviews
• Best Book Lists
• Common Sense Selections for Books

8 Tips for Getting Kids Hooked on Books

50 Books All Kids Should Read Before They're 12

• Game Reviews
• Best Game Lists

Common Sense Selections for Games

• Video Reviews of Games

Nintendo Switch Games for Family Fun

• Podcast Reviews
• Best Podcast Lists

Common Sense Selections for Podcasts

Parents' Guide to Podcasts

• App Reviews
• Best App Lists

Social Networking for Teens

Gun-Free Action Game Apps

Reviews for AI Apps and Tools

• YouTube Channel Reviews
• YouTube Kids Channels by Topic

Parents' Ultimate Guide to YouTube Kids

YouTube Kids Channels for Gamers

• Preschoolers (2-4)
• Little Kids (5-7)
• Big Kids (8-9)
• Pre-Teens (10-12)
• Teens (13+)
• Screen Time
• Social Media
• Online Safety
• Identity and Community

Real-Life Heroes on YouTube for Tweens and Teens

• Family Tech Planners
• Digital Skills
• All Articles
• Latino Culture
• Black Voices
• Asian Stories
• Native Narratives
• LGBTQ+ Pride
• Best of Diverse Representation List

Celebrating Black History Month

Movies and TV Shows with Arab Leads

Celebrate Hip-Hop's 50th Anniversary

Common sense media reviewers.

Brilliant Korean social satire has dark comedy, violence.

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

Messages have complex layers, but movie asks point

While clever and often likable, most characters he

Brief scenes of intense gore. Stabbing, skewering.

A married couple engages in sexual activity on a c

Multiple uses of "f--k," "s--t," "a--hole," "bitch

Mention of WhatsApp.

An entire family drinks heavily in one scene, whis

Parents need to know that Parasite is a brilliant social satire from acclaimed South Korean filmmaker Bong Joon-ho ( Snowpiercer , The Host ). It's alternately funny, shocking, and thoughtful, but it's also quite mature. Expect a few scenes of extremely strong violence, blood, and gore, with…

Positive Messages

Messages have complex layers, but movie asks pointed questions about the rich and their tendency to insulate themselves from others' problems and the yearning of the poor to become just like the rich. The poor must scheme, ask for help to get by, but as soon as anyone gets the upper hand, they attempt to crush the poor and stop them from advancing. Why are we like this? Is it possible to change, become more aware of suffering and needs of fellow humans?

Positive Role Models

While clever and often likable, most characters here are satirical in nature. They are capable of unsavory deeds, though there are consequences.

Violence & Scariness

Brief scenes of intense gore. Stabbing, skewering. Characters fight and hit each other with blunt objects. Lots of blood. A fall down concrete stairs. A character gets a concussion; another is briefly trapped in a noose. Characters die. A character suddenly swipes all the food and drink from a table, smashing it on the floor. A man grabs his wife by her shirt in pretend anger.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.

Sex, Romance & Nudity

A married couple engages in sexual activity on a couch; he touches her breast, and she touches his crotch, moaning and saying sex-related things. A young man kisses a teen girl. A young woman removes her underwear in the back of a car. A man grabs his wife's buttock. Strong sex talk.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Sex, Romance & Nudity in your kid's entertainment guide.

Multiple uses of "f--k," "s--t," "a--hole," "bitch," "piss," "screwed," "scumbag," and "oh God," all translated in the English subtitles.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Language in your kid's entertainment guide.

Products & Purchases

Drinking, drugs & smoking.

An entire family drinks heavily in one scene, whiskey and other kinds of liquor. Some of them become slurring drunk. Young character smokes cigarettes. A staggeringly drunk character urinates in an alleyway. Mentions of hard drugs (meth, cocaine).

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Drinking, Drugs & Smoking in your kid's entertainment guide.

Parents Need to Know

Parents need to know that Parasite is a brilliant social satire from acclaimed South Korean filmmaker Bong Joon-ho ( Snowpiercer , The Host ). It's alternately funny, shocking, and thoughtful, but it's also quite mature. Expect a few scenes of extremely strong violence, blood, and gore, with stabbing, fighting, hitting with blunt objects, and death. One character gets trapped in a noose, and another is knocked down concrete stairs. English subtitles include multiple uses of "f--k," "s--t," "a--hole," "bitch," and more. A married couple gets frisky on a couch; he rubs her breast, and she grabs his crotch. There's also kissing, plus other sexual situations and sex-related talk. One scene shows an entire family drinking heavily and getting drunk; a young woman smokes cigarettes, and a staggeringly drunk man urinates in an alleyway. To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails .

Where to Watch

Videos and photos.

Community Reviews

• Parents say (34)
• Kids say (83)

Based on 34 parent reviews

Dark comedy with violent ending for some characters.

What's the story.

In PARASITE, the Kim family -- father Ki-taek ( Song Kang-ho ), mother Chung-sook (Hyae Jin Chang), daughter Ki-jung (Park So-dam), and son Ki-woo (Choi Woo-sik) -- are all unemployed, folding pizza boxes in their dumpy, basement-level apartment to earn a little cash. Through a friend, Ki-woo gets the chance to tutor Park Da-hye (Jung Ziso), the daughter of a wealthy family, even though he's not a student. Turning on the charm, Ki-woo gets the job. Then, he and Ki-jung scheme to score a position for her, too, as an art therapist for the family's precocious youngest son. More plotting results in the firing of the family's driver and maid, providing jobs for Chung-sook and Ki-taek. Things seem to be looking up at last for the Kims -- until a bizarre secret turns everything totally sideways.

Is It Any Good?

South Korean filmmaker Bong Joon-ho already has an impeccable track record, but he's stepped up his game with this brilliant, powerfully revealing social satire. Certainly Parasite might feel uneven to some audiences because of its radical shifts in tone -- from clever comedy to violent, dark tragedy -- but it's more likely that Bong has executed everything as planned. Each insignificant detail, from the young boy Da-song's love of Native Americans to a peach allergy to the Kim family's sad little half-basement apartment, has been planted for some specific, exacting reason.

Cleanly and slickly constructed, Parasite takes perverse pleasure in scamming the rich during its leisurely, funny first half, and that pleasure is contagious. When the second half comes, it's not only a narrative shock, but it also forces viewers to ask hard questions about why the first half was so enjoyable. In earlier films like The Host , Snowpiercer , and Okja , Bong slyly explored the impact that humans have had on our environment. In Parasite , he looks at an even bigger picture. He wonders why humans tend to look away from, or insulate themselves from, others' troubles and suffering. In this movie, reaching the high ground is certainly desirable, but those occupying the low ground aren't going anywhere.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

Families can talk about Parasite 's violence . Is it shocking, or thrilling? How did it make you feel? How did the filmmakers achieve this effect? What's the impact of media violence on kids?

What does the movie have to say about class differences? How do the rich and poor view each other? How do they relate to one another?

How is sex depicted? What values are imparted?

How is drinking depicted? Is it glamorized? Are there consequences? Why does that matter?

Are any of the characters admirable? Can non-admirable characters still be interesting?

Movie Details

• In theaters : October 11, 2019
• On DVD or streaming : January 14, 2020
• Cast : Kang-ho Song , Park So-dam , Choi Woo-sik
• Director : Joon-ho Bong
• Inclusion Information : Female actors, Asian actors
• Studio : Neon
• Genre : Comedy
• Run time : 132 minutes
• MPAA rating : R
• MPAA explanation : language, some violence and sexual content
• Awards : Academy Award , BAFTA , Golden Globe
• Last updated : May 7, 2024

Did we miss something on diversity?

Research shows a connection between kids' healthy self-esteem and positive portrayals in media. That's why we've added a new "Diverse Representations" section to our reviews that will be rolling out on an ongoing basis. You can help us help kids by suggesting a diversity update.

Suggest an Update

Our editors recommend.

Sorry to Bother You

Phantom Thread

Cult classics, offbeat animated movies.

Common Sense Media's unbiased ratings are created by expert reviewers and aren't influenced by the product's creators or by any of our funders, affiliates, or partners.

• International
• Today’s Paper
• Join WhatsApp Channel
• Movie Reviews
• Tamil Cinema
• Telugu Cinema

Parasite movie review: A subtle and subversive depiction of class

Parasite movie review: bong joon-ho, who has also co-written the story, has several surprises and twists up his sleeve. and many metaphors..

Parasite movie cast: Song Kang-ho, Lee Sun-kyun, Cho Yeo-jeong, Choi Woo-shik, Park So-dam Parasite movie director: Bong Joon-Ho Parasite movie rating: 4 stars

Korean director Bong Joon Ho’s latest film, a top Oscar contender, is a subtle and subversive depiction of class. The setting is Korean, and Ho brings out that country’s obsession with America, English, North Korea and aspirations succinctly. But in depicting the many layers that divide, and blind, the rich from the poor, the poor from the rich, men from women, and husbands from wives, Parasite is universal. And very, very unsettling.

The rich are not all bad, and the poor not all good. However, it is in keeping up appearances, of both goodness and badness, and “not crossing the class line”, that we maintain what passes off as societal order. And so it is that the well-to-do Parks welcome into their house, one by one, an entire family who take up various jobs around their home without them being any wiser to what is happening. The husband (Ho-Song) takes no interest in running the household, the wife’s (Jo) worth lies in ensuring that he doesn’t have to. That everything from kids’ grades to their artistic talents, the cooking to the washing, even the hiring and the sacking, doesn’t demand any exertion from him.

The family they hire, the Kims, lives in a “semi-basement”, out of work but smart, ambitious and willing to cut corners to get ahead. The first to make his way into the Park home is Kevin (Choi), a smart man whose English can rival any university student’s but who is held back for lack of a degree. He is hired as the Park daughter’s tutor. He gets his sister (Park) in for the Park son, a little boy whose mother is convinced he has eccentric artistic talent. The sister, Jessica, convinces the Park wife that what her son’s scribblings actually indicate is childhood trauma, which “art therapy”, costing a little extra, will cure. Kim (a Ho favourite) comes in as the chauffeur and man about the Park house, and his wife ultimately as the housekeeper.

One night when the Parks are on a camping trip, Kim and family decide to have a nice little party at their home. They talk about how nice the Parks are, and whether it’s the money that makes them so, or whether it’s the fact that money means they are left with “no resentments”. Looking on at the front yard through large French windows, as a storm builds, they are imagining owning a house such as this, when their nightmare starts.

Ho, who has also co-written the story, has several surprises and twists up his sleeve. And many metaphors. About parasite, host. Upstairs, downstairs. Loyalty, love. Virtue, vice. Gutter, smell. Casual affluence, deliberate offence. Rain/sun for some, floods/heat for the other. And about the wool we pull over our eyes as we turn the other way, telling ourselves some lies to help us do that.

Ho strips that wool off, thread by thread. Right down to the only truth there is — not education, not degree, not work, but money.

Follow us on Telegram for the latest Entertainment news

What the upswing in J-K voter turnout could mean for Subscriber Only

Former WHO chief scientist at Idea Exchange Subscriber Only

Tavleen Singh writes: Competitive populism in Lok Sabha Polls Subscriber Only

How welfare vs welfare is shaping politics in Andhra Pradesh

The history of SC orders against illegal mining in Sariska Subscriber Only

OpenAI’s GPT-4o and Google’s Project Astra make real-life strides Subscriber Only

UPSC Key | Equity options, Bishkek violence, chir pine, and Subscriber Only

‘If Chinese threat would disappear, US & India wouldn’t be Subscriber Only

From the Opinions Editor: 3 leaders, 3 narrowing images Subscriber Only

More Entertainment

Best of Express

May 22: Latest News

• 01 Porsche crash: ‘What will people on streets do? Something needs to change in this situation,’ say judge
• 02 Pune crash: Realtor father of teen driving Porsche arrested
• 03 Kathmandu Post chairman held over ‘citizenship misuse’ issue
• 04 Long queues outside petrol stations on the third day of CNG shortage
• 05 Worker dies while cleaning water tank in Jogeshwari; family suspects electrocution, negligence
• Elections 2024
• Political Pulse
• Entertainment
• Movie Review
• Newsletters
• Web Stories
• Premium Stories
• ⏪ Election Rewind
• Express Shorts
• Maharashtra HSC Result
• Brand Solutions

Review by Brian Eggert November 3, 2019

From their half-basement dwelling, the Kim family looks out a narrow window onto their impoverished neighborhood in Seoul, where passers-by urinate in the street and insect foggers release noxious gases that float into homes. Inside, they dry their socks on a mobile-like hanger and fold pizza boxes for money. When they need to get a Wi-Fi signal, they hold their smartphones in the air and search their underground apartment for a signal by climbing on the toilet. It would be funny if it weren’t so sad. With the family’s conditions dire, each of them, the parents and two adult children, search for an edge, which presents itself with the Park family. An upper-middle-class couple with a teenage daughter and a young boy, the Parks live in a modernist house of cold, geometric stone and austere design, elevated in a walled space and a lush, enclosed yard that feels removed from the reality of the outside world. The juxtaposition between the underclass and the advantaged, and the events that entangle these two families in Bong Joon-ho’s brilliant  Parasite , recalls a similar class and genre dynamic as the 1963 Japanese thriller High and Low . That film, directed by Akira Kurosawa, tells the story of a privileged family whose kidnapped son is held for ransom in a poor criminal’s act of class revenge. Bong’s film might be called Low and High , with its perspective situated in the sub-levels, looking up at the disparity between the rich and the less fortunate. Though, the impetus of Parasite ’s class struggle materializes in a far more surprising, unconventional way. 

But before this consideration of Bong’s film continues, a word of warning: After Parasite debuted at the Cannes Film Festival earlier this year, where it unanimously won the Palme d’Or, Bong asked that critics not reveal certain story elements. As much as any film, if not more, experiencing this remarkable picture without prior knowledge will enhance your impressions. Consider yourself warned that this assessment will explore the plot of Parasite with detail, less as a betrayal of Bong’s request than a celebration of his intricate, exhilarating film, whose many layers keep unfolding into the final shot. However, it should be noted, as ever, that criticism and review aggregators tend to set expectations, and the less you know about this film and its themes beforehand, the better. With little or no knowledge of what Parasite entails before seeing it, I was nonetheless drawn to the material because of its filmmaker—a master at blending genres and tones into a sophisticated cinema. Bong’s multifaceted approach is, to borrow a repeated line from a character in his latest, “so metaphorical,” reflecting the intricate and entangled nature of his characters and, to a greater extent, all human beings. So while seeing it unspoiled is ideal, seeing it again may be essential. 

At the film’s center are the two families, the Kims and the Parks, but as suggested, Bong aligns the viewer with the Kims’ perspective. We understand their motivations and family dynamics, whereas the Parks have a curious, if not morbid undercurrent to their lives. The Kims’ paterfamilias, Ki-taek, played by the great South Korean actor Song Kang-ho, spends his days with his family in their cramped basement abode, barely eking out an existence yet never overwhelmed by their situation. But their fortunes change when the son, Ki-woo (Choi Woo-shik), learns of a chance to work as a well-paid English tutor for the Parks’ teenage daughter, Da-hye (Jung Zi-so). When the opportunity presents itself, Ki-woo ensures his employment by enlisting his sister to forge college documents, while Ki-taek and his wife, Chung-sook (Jang Hye-jin), look proudly on their children who have learned to survive with ingenuity and criminal cunning. Of course, Ki-woo lands the job after interviewing with the gullible Mrs. Park (Cho Yeo-jeong), who insists on calling him “Kevin” in the way some slave owners would rename their servants. Once he’s established, Ki-woo learns that the Parks’ youngest, a rambunctious boy, needs help becoming the next Basquiat. Ki-woo makes up a story about so-and-so who knows a well-respected art teacher, a role to be played by his sister, Ki-jung (Park So-dam). Before long, Ki-woo and Ki-jung have convinced the Parks to hire their entire family, while the Parks remain unaware of their true identities. But “convinced” is the wrong word. The Kims lie, cajole, and manipulate to secure Ki-taek as the chauffeur of Mr. Park (Lee Sun-kyun) and Chung-sook as the Park family’s maid. Rather than identifying with Moon-gwang (Lee Jung-eun), the longtime housekeeper, out of lower-class solidarity, they’re happy to exploit her allergy to peaches to convince Mrs. Park that she has tuberculosis—a condition that quickly gets her fired. Setting up the former employees to sabotage them, the Kims stick to an elaborate plan, but their scheme is not to rob the Parks or to murder and replace them as doppelgängers, but to earn a lucrative income. At one point, Ki-taek observes that fifty college graduates compete for a lousy security guard post, so what chance does he have until he takes such a job? It’s as though one pilot fish has convinced the shark to eat his predecessor in order to replace him. Their cutthroat actions are those of a capitalist society that has made everyone desperate to accumulate more wealth, to survive and prosper, even if it means sacrificing your morality or willfully ignoring the humanity of others to attain it. Thus, the lower classes have no choice but to engage in a parasitic relationship with the more prosperous. But opportunistic as the Kims may seem, the Parks, too, are parasites, feeding off the less fortunate to supply themselves with an outsourced lifestyle. 

But then, there is  a troubling secret beneath the surface of the Park home. A sudden turn in the film arrives around the midpoint in Parasite , when the Parks leave on a camping trip and the Kims unwind in the extravagant, minimalist house. They drink expensive booze and chow-down on snacks, feeling “cozy” in their new space. But the return of the former housekeeper upsets their homey little scene. She has not returned for revenge or anything so obvious; rather, she has come to reclaim her husband, who has long evaded debt collectors by hiding in a frightening concrete sub-basement, constructed in secret by the original starchitect-owner, Namgoong, as a shelter in case of an attack by North Korea. Another parasite, Chung-sook’s husband, has lived down there for years, surviving on secret deliveries of food and supplies by his wife. The idea cannot help but bring to mind Jordan Peele’s Us from earlier this year, where a forgotten world of underground doubles emerges from below to take over the world they were supposed to control. Although, Bong’s film situates itself in the real world, where the chasm between the rich and poor continues to extend. The approach is no less thrilling, however, as the Kim family must scramble to prevent the former housekeeper from exposing them, while the space below the house serves a kind of situational timebomb.  

Bong’s deft touch as a filmmaker never forgets the emotional, purely entertaining stakes, though his formal skill is that of a mathematical technician who always knows where to place the camera. Parasite ’s careful ratcheting of tension shifts the material into a Hitchcockian suspenser, where the Kims attempt to keep another secret from the Parks—they’ve now confined the housekeeper and her husband in the sub-basement. Hong Kyung-pyo’s cinematography glides the camera around the elaborate sets, built by production designer Lee Ha-jun, so convincing in their construction that the viewer would assume the locations were real. Instead, Bong’s vision is at once intentional and chambered, each camera movement and angle the approach of a cinematic tactician. Subtle, calculated imagery such as eyes peering out from a stairway or the Kim family hiding beneath a large table as the Parks sleep on a nearby couch leave the viewer in breathless suspense, while they’re also “so metaphorical.” Likewise, so is Bong’s script, as when Mr. Park compliments his new driver for not “crossing the line”—an imaginary divide between the classes, which Bong indicates in visual space. And while often such elaborate premeditation can result in a feeling of formal coldness, Parasite develops its characters with humor and humanity in a way that recalls Alfred Hitchcock or Brian De Palma. 

Though Bong calls Parasite a “tragicomedy” and layers the material with lively humor and his signature tonal playfulness, it’s also his most furious and most fatalistic picture to date. But limiting this film to any genre definition defies the uniqueness of Bong’s filmmaking—at once laugh-out-loud funny and capable of inducing gasps, delightfully engaging yet unflinching in its social critique. Still, Parasite is Bong’s most compassionate and harrowing study of contemporary powerlessness. His other films have featured characters capable of improving their class conditions by some small, hopeful measure—the mourning father in The Host who adopts a homeless child; the escape from the train in Snowpiercer ; the survival of the superpig in Okja . But the final moments here articulate Bong’s sense that the economic hierarchies that constitute the foundation of a capitalistic society will remain in place. Moreover, Bong’s other films have handled these themes in the context of genre-inflected worlds, elaborate and comparatively escapist, but with Parasite, he confronts our modern-day dystopia that, if portrayed in a film decades ago, might not look so different than a work of science-fiction. The deep passion he feels for his subject enriches every frame of this outstanding film, a work of stealth and vision marked by its melancholy and rage.  

Related Titles

The Definitives

• In Theaters

Recent Reviews

• Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga 4 Stars ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆
• Patreon Exclusive: The Strangers: Chapter 1 1 Star ☆
• Babes 3 Stars ☆ ☆ ☆
• Evil Does Not Exist 4 Stars ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆
• Coma 3.5 Stars ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆
• Nightwatch: Demons Are Forever 3.5 Stars ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆
• I Saw the TV Glow 3 Stars ☆ ☆ ☆
• The Last Stop in Yuma County 3 Stars ☆ ☆ ☆
• Back to Black 1.5 Stars ☆ ☆
• Stress Positions 2 Stars ☆ ☆
• Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes 3 Stars ☆ ☆ ☆
• Humane 3 Stars ☆ ☆ ☆
• Short Take: Unfrosted 1.5 Stars ☆ ☆
• The Fall Guy 2.5 Stars ☆ ☆ ☆
• The Idea of You 3 Stars ☆ ☆ ☆

Recent Articles

• Guest Appearance: The LAMBcast - The Fall Guy
• The Definitives: Paris, Texas
• Reader's Choice: Saturday Night Fever
• MSPIFF 2024 – Dispatch 4
• MSPIFF 2024 – Dispatch 3
• Guest Appearance: KARE 11 - 3 movies you need to see in theaters now
• MSPIFF 2024 – Dispatch 2
• Reader's Choice: Birth/Rebirth
• MSPIFF 2024 – Dispatch 1
• MSPIFF 2024

Thanks For Rating

Reminder successfully set, select a city.

• Nashik Times
• Aurangabad Times
• Badlapur Times

You can change your city from here. We serve personalized stories based on the selected city

• Edit Profile
• Briefs Movies TV Web Series Lifestyle Trending Medithon Visual Stories Music Events Videos Theatre Photos Gaming

Post divorce with Shoaib Malik, Sania Mirza drops photo of the new name plate of her house and adorable moments with son Izhaan - Pics inside

Authorities probe supply chain of Ketamine in Matthew Perry's case: Report

Suhana Khan receives heartfelt birthday wishes from BFFs Navya Naveli Nanda, Ananya Panday and Shanaya Kapoor

From Amitabh-Tabu to SRK-Alia: Bollywood on-screen pairs with huge age gaps

Shah Rukh Khan, Suhana Khan, AbRam, Ananya Panday and Shanaya Kapoor celebrate KKR's entry to its fourth IPL final

Raveena Tandon reveals she shot Taqdeerwala with Venkatesh in Mauritius with a crew of 9 people: 'Hindi films require 200 crew members'

• Movie Reviews

Movie Listings

Boonie Bears: Mumma Ki...

The Sabarmati Report

Desh Ke Gaddar

Auron Mein Kahan Dum T...

Rosy Maam I Love You

​Sonam Bajwa exudes elegance in traditional attire​

​Alluring looks of Aaditi Pohankar​

Don't miss these beautiful pictures of Anushka Shetty

Inside pics; Aarohi Singh's birthday bash

Samantha sums up her summer in 10 photos!

Kiara Advani is a sight to behold in an orange gown for her second look at Cannes 2024​

Rewind: Aditi Rao Hydari's top Cannes look from 2022 and 2023

Flawless looks of Vyoma Nandi

Kajal Aggarwal’s Effortless Elegance Sets an Unmissable Fashion Standard

Tejasswi Prakash's stunning saree looks

Kartam Bhugtam

Pyar Ke Do Naam

WOMB: Women Of My Billi...

Main Ladega

Luv You Shankar

Do Aur Do Pyaar

Padikkadha Pakkangal

Inga Naan Thaan Kingu

Uyir Thamizhukku

Aranmanai 4

Ninnu Vilaiyadu

10 Great Movies Recommended by Alex Garland

From horror films to war dramas, the 'Ex Machina' and 'Civil War' director has some interesting picks.

Even if he is not planning to get behind the camera again in the foreseeable future (according to The Independent ), English author, screenwriter, and filmmaker Alex Garland has established himself as one of the best directors working today, providing audiences with a few captivating films essentially in the sci-fi genre. His latest film, A24's dystopian action drama Civil War has garnered great reviews from critics and general audiences alike.

Garland's movies, which range from 28 Days Later through Ex Machina to Annihilation , are undeniably compelling, naturally making audiences wonder what is the inspiration behind them. In two conversations with Far Out Magazine and ScreenRant , the director has named some of his favorite movies, from Phantasm to the Oscar-winning Parasite , and highlighted what makes them great. Fans of the filmmaker's work may want to check out the great movies recommended by Alex Garland .

10 'Phantasm' (1979)

Director: don coscarelli.

Don Coscarleli 's cult classic Phantasm blends the sci-fi, fantasy, and horror genres in a compelling tale about loss and mortality, illustrating a teenage boy ( A. Michael Baldwin ) and his friends' journey as they face off against a mysterious grave robber, known only as the Tall Man ( Angus Scrimm ) who wields a lethal arsenal of supernatural weapons that they must overcome to survive.

According to the acclaimed director , Phantasm 's "trippy" quality is one of the aspects that stands out the most in the 1979 movie . While it was released to mixed (mostly bad) reviews , Phantasm later garnered a cult following and became an essential surrealist film due to its bizarre imagery and intriguing but surreal plot. Although not everyone's cup of tea, this charming independent movie is likely to appeal to a handful of horror fans.

Watch on Peacock

9 'The Lighthouse' (2019)

Director: robert eggers.

Robert Eggers ' The Lighthouse is one of A24's best horror movies . Featuring haunting black-and-white cinematography, the horror film sees Robert Pattinson and Willem Dafoe in two of their best and most challenging performances as it depicts two lighthouse keepers isolated on a remote and mysterious New England island in the 1890s — the two attempt to keep their sanity in what seems like eternity.

The Lighthouse is the perfect pick for anyone who likes unsettling, truly atmospheric horror films. As Far Out Magazine reported , Eggers' memorable movie is an Alex Garland favorite (even if it doesn't appeal to many thanks to its truly bizarre narrative and strange but effective execution): "There are some amazing people working today, and I think [Robert Eggers] is one of them," Garland revealed. "I thought The Lighthouse was fantastic. It was incredibly funny and strange but most of all, incredibly original."

The Lighthouse

Watch on Max

8 'Walkabout' (1971)

Director: nicolas roeg.

In Nicolas Roeg 's 1971 film Walkabout , two siblings ( Jenny Agutter and Luc Roeg ) are stranded in the Australian Outback, where they learn to survive with the aid of a teenage Aboriginal boy ( David Gulpilil ) on his "walkabout", which means a ritual separation from his tribe. It deals with topics of identity and the self, providing audiences of all ages with a thought-provoking time in front of the screen.

According to the celebrated British Film Institute who included it on their list , Walkabout is one of the "50 films you should see by the age of 15." This survival epic has captured the attention of many, and understandably so; at the top of its list of admirers is Garland , who thinks it is "virtuoso filmmaking." He continues: "It has one of the strangest unannounced or unanticipated scenes in any kind of film I’ve ever seen," the director revealed to Far Out . "It can be really shocking, but it’s also really touching and very sort of oddly charming."

Watch on Criterion

7 'All That Jazz' (1979)

Director: bob fosse.

Another essential worth checking out is undoubtedly All That Jazz , a must-see Bob Fosse musical drama and semi-autobiography. Drawing inspiration from aspects of Fosse's life and career as a dancer, choreographer, and director, All That Jazz 's story centers around the womanizing dancer Joe Gideon, played by Roy Scheider in one of his most unexpected roles .

This Palm d'Or and Oscar winner (it won four out of nine nominations, including Best Original Score, Best Art Direction, Best Costume Design, and Best Film Editing) is no doubt mandatory viewing in the musical genre, so audiences who are keen on the category might want to give this a watch. It's not surprising that Garland would name All That Jazz as a favorite — he described it as "brave," for one — especially considering how incredibly executed the acclaimed movie is, particularly when it comes to its astounding editing and central performance.

All That Jazz

Buy on Amazon

6 'Kes' (1970)

Director: ken loach.

This British family drama by Ken Loach based on the 1968 novel A Kestrel for a Knave introduces audiences to the story of Billy, played by David Bradley , who comes from a dysfunctional working-class family and struggles at school. However, things start to change when he embraces happiness after adopting a fledgling kestrel, truly caring for him and proceeding to train it in the art of falconry.

For Garland's confirmed threequel 28 Years Later , the bleak but intriguing Kes is reportedly a big inspiration . "It's a very moving film," the filmmaker said. "It's a very honest film." No doubt, this realist tragedy is a compelling watch throughout, featuring a captivating story to keep audiences invested (especially those who enjoy great though saddening coming-of-age tales).

Rent on Apple TV

5 'Anatomy of a Fall' (2023)

Director: justine triet.

One of 2023's best, the critically acclaimed, Oscar-winning Anatomy of a Fall , has quickly earned a spot among the finest courtroom dramas. The film stars Sandra Hüller in an Oscar-nominated performance. She steps into the shoes of a writer who's trying to prove her innocence in her husband's ( Samuel Theis) death with the help of her lawyer ( Swann Arlaud ).

Although its screenplay is a memorable aspect of the incredible Justine Triet murder mystery, as it manages to keep audiences asking questions and persuades them to wait for more, Anatomy of a Fall is an excellent film for plenty of reasons, among them are the astounding acting performances (which Garland could not help praising) and striking cinematography. "Had beautiful performances," the Civil War director revealed to ScreenRant . "And underneath it, there was this incredible intelligence."

Anatomy of a Fall

Watch on Hulu

4 'Spirited Away' (2001)

Director: hayao miyazaki.

Hayao Miyazaki 's Spirited Away is easily one of Studio Ghibli's most popular features , and for good reason. This touching, beautifully animated Japanese movie provides valuable messages about environmentalism — a recurring theme in Ghibli's movies — identity, and the fear of the unknown. The plot centers around a little girl named Chihiro, who wanders into the world of the gods and spirits after losing sight of her parents.

Spirited Away is many's favorite film when it comes to the animation genre, Alex Garland included . "It’s got probably close to among the most striking imagery I’ve ever seen in a film," the Ex Machina filmmaker remarked . "It got under my skin in a particular way. As sheer pleasure, it’s probably the film on this list I’ve enjoyed the most." It's not difficult to grasp why this Oscar-winning feature is a Garland favorite.

Spirited Away (2001)

3 'the third man' (1949), director: carol reed.

Set in post-war Vienna, this expressionist 1949 film noir directed by Carol Reed is one of the best of its genre. The story revolves around pulp novelist Holly Martins, played by Joseph Cotten , who travels to the shadowy city only to find himself investigating the mysterious death of an old friend, Harry Lime ( Orson Welles ).

According to Garland , The Third Man has “real moral murkiness” that he appreciates. The movie benefits from striking black-and-white cinematography, harsh lighting that makes it atmospheric, and an intriguing premise centering around friendship. There is no doubt that the Carol Reed film makes for a memorable time in front of the screen, particularly for those keen on film-noir mysteries.

The Third Man

Watch on Tubi

2 'Come and See' (1985)

Director: elem klimov.

Come and See is mandatory viewing in the war genre . This Soviet feature by trailblazer director Elem Klimov depicts the disturbing journey of a young boy ( Aleksey Kravchenko ) who joins the Soviet resistance movement against German forces and experiences the horrors of World War II, illustrating all the Nazi atrocities and human suffering he undergoes.

This 1985 movie is definitely not an easy watch. However, anyone who enjoys well-executed war films will probably want to check out Come and See , be it for its incredible direction or the heart-shattering narrative illustrated with stomach-turning precision. As Garland puts it , Klimov's movie is a "really complicated game between the absolute sharp edge of reality and the strangeness of interior surrealism." He also describes it as "extraordinarily powerful."

Come and See

1 'parasite' (2019), director: bong joon-ho.

Next is Bong Joon-ho 's Oscar-winning and groundbreaking Parasite , a masterfully executed dark comedy thriller film that meditates on capitalism and wealth imbalances, particularly in South Korea. The compelling story centers around the relationship between the wealthy Park family and the struggling, working-class Kim clan. The latter came up with a meticulous plan so that their paths cross with life-changing consequences.

Joon-ho's incredible feature made Oscars history by being the first non-English language movie to win Best Picture. There is no denying that Parasite was a fantastic achievement, propelling the director to further fame and persuading audiences all over the globe to dip their toes in the wonderful Asian cinema. "The thing I loved about Parasite was that it felt complicated and profound and really, really surprising," Garland admitted . "I just thought Parasite was a really good instruction in terms of how free you can be in film."

NEXT: 10 Underrated Movies Recommended by Denis Villeneuve

'Anora' Review: Sean Baker Whips Up a Wild Stripper Romance Thriller Comedy, or Something Like That

I f you think that Sean Baker is the guy who makes gritty, naturalistic little movies about marginalized communities, "Anora" will give you reason to think you're right. But once it's done that, it may turn around and make you change your mind, because the film is also big and bold and glossy and very funny, a raucous comedy unlike anything else in Baker's filmography.

It's one of the most entertaining movies to play in Cannes this year, and also one of the most confounding: part character study of the title character (Mikey Madison), a sex worker from Brighton Beach who falls for rich Russian playboy Ivan (Mark Eydelshteyn); part look into the world of the super-rich, an arena Baker has studiously avoided in films like "Tangerine," "The Florida Project" and "Red Rocket"; part escalating nightmare comedy reminiscent of '80s gems like "After Hours" and "Married to the Mob." It swings wildly back and forth while also hanging onto its heart, and it's just too much fun to worry about how much Baker is cramming into its two hours and 18 minutes. (It justifies the length.)

The title character, who goes by Ani because she thinks Anora is "a stupid Uzbek name," works in a strip joint outside New York City and freelances after hours selling more intimacy. Ani is a matter-of-fact sex worker who chews gum and blows bubbles while giving lap dances — and because she speaks a little Russian, her boss in the club asks her to wait on Ivan Zakharov, the son of a Russian oligarch who loves the lap dance enough that he asks her to come to his stunning mansion the next day.

A couple more dates and a wild New Year's Eve party turns into a week-long, $15,000 gig to be his "horny girlfriend," and somehow they're both smitten enough that they tie the knot during a whirlwind, spur-of-the-moment trip to Las Vegas. And then word gets back to mom and dad in Russia that their son has married a hooker. And then things get crazy.

While Ani's milieu isn't an unfamiliar one in the Sean Baker filmography, the mansion and the private plane and the high-roller suites are — and so is the style, with Baker's usual rough energy replaced by a choreographed, almost music-video slickness at points. The film adapts to its settings and gets all sleek until a trio of the oligarch's fixers arrive to annul the marriage by any means necessary. And that's when things go completely off the rails.

Baker has put plenty of raucous, comedic sequences on screen in the past — Simon Rex in "Red Rocket" was a blast, and the kids in "The Florida Project" were wild things — but he hasn't done a set piece as hysterical as the extended one that takes place when top-dog enforcer Toros, sad-sack Garnick and thuggish Igor invade Ivan's mansion to bring an end to the newlyweds' bliss.

Ivan splits and leaves Ani to fend for herself, and the result is uproarious. It's marvelously plotted chaos on a classic slapstick level, but with beats in which we actually learn things about these characters. (A single word from Igor, played by Yura Borisov, is enough to suggest that there's more to him than we realize.)

The motley crew forge though an escalating and wildly entertaining series of catastrophes, from vomiting (always funny) to parking tickets (unexpectedly hilarious). They also give Madison ("Scream 5," "Better Things") countless chances to make Ani a real force of nature, and to let Borisov ("Compartment No. 6") very quietly steal the second half of the film.

At a certain point, "Anora" seems to be slowing down and dragging out — but as Ani demonstrates to Ivan early in their relationship, sometimes slowing down can make things more pleasurable. What initially seemed to be an anticlimactic homestretch turns into a surprisingly moving and emotionally complicated coda, the likes of which you don't expect after the craziness that had preceded it.

"Anora" is one of two movies in Cannes' Main Competition that are being released by Neon, the company that has distributed the last four Palme d'Or winners, "Parasite," "Titane," "The Triangle of Sadness" and "Anatomy of a Fall." (The Iranian film "The Seed of the Sacred Fig" is the other 2024 Neon film in competition.) That doesn't mean that Baker's film should be considered a Palme frontrunner at this point, but it's something just as valuable: a thoroughly fun and provocative time at the movies.

The post 'Anora' Review: Sean Baker Whips Up a Wild Stripper Romance Thriller Comedy, or Something Like That appeared first on TheWrap .

The Definitive Voice of Entertainment News

Subscribe for full access to The Hollywood Reporter

site categories

Cannes halftime report card on films’ awards prospects — for fest and fall prizes.

Scott Feinberg, The Hollywood Reporter's executive editor of awards, weighs in on potential recognition for 'The Substance,' 'Emilia Perez,' 'Bird' and many other titles.

By Scott Feinberg

Scott Feinberg

Executive Editor of Awards

• Share this article on Facebook
• Share this article on Twitter
• Share this article on Flipboard
• Share this article on Email
• Show additional share options
• Share this article on Linkedin
• Share this article on Pinit
• Share this article on Reddit
• Share this article on Tumblr
• Share this article on Whatsapp
• Share this article on Print
• Share this article on Comment

As the 77th Cannes Film Festival (May 14-25) arrives at its halfway point, here is THR executive editor of awards Scott Feinberg’s assessment of the awards prospects — at the Cannes closing ceremony and later in the fall — of the films that have screened at the fest so far.

The Two That Popped

Related Stories

'lula' review: oliver stone chronicles the dramatic rise, fall and rise again of brazil's current president, emotional david cronenberg unveils horror-filled meditation on grief 'the shrouds' at cannes.

The first is The Substance , a body-horror flick from French filmmaker Coralie Fargeat that might be described as Sunset Blvd. meets Freaks , and an instant classic . Demi Moore , in a gutsy career-best turn that could bring her the fest’s best actress prize — and perhaps even the first Oscar nomination of her career, if her film’s U.S. distributor MUBI can put together a real campaign — plays Elisabeth Sparkle, a movie star and fitness guru who begins to be spurned as she ages. Offered an injection that promises to transform her into “a better version” of herself, she takes it, and begins to spend every other week as a younger and more “desirable” woman ( Margaret Qualley ) — but not without consequences.

The film balances commentary on sexism and ageism with copious amounts of blood and gore — I mean, enough to make David Cronenberg blush — and would be right up there with 2021 Palme d’Or laureate Titane as one of the festival’s most dark and twisted award winners.

And then there’s Emilia Perez , a Spanish-language trans gangster musical (yes, you read that correctly) from past Palme d’Or winner Jacques Audiard (2015’s Dheepan ), which stars the trans actress Karla Sofia Gascón as a biological male who is a ruthless cartel leader, Selena Gomez as his wife and Zoe Saldaña as the frustrated lawyer he recruits to facilitate his secret wish: to leave his life of crime and live as a woman.

As for fall awards season prospects, the film will first need to find a U.S. distributor — I know of several that are interested, not least because of the film’s star-power and international appeal — but even once it does, it’s not going to be everyone’s cup of tea.

The Possibility

I’d also keep an eye on Bird , a coming-of-age tale from indie filmmaker Andrea Arnold — a three -time past winner of Cannes jury prizes — that stars ‘It’ guys Barry Keoghan ( Saltburn ) and Frank Rogowski ( Passages ) as the neglectful father and unlikely surrogate father, respectively, of a 12-year-old girl (newcomer Nykiya Adams ). Arnold, an auteur’s auteur, is always a threat to snag a top Cannes honor. And as we head into a big-budget/big-studio-heavy awards season, her little fairy tale, should it land in the right U.S. distributor’s hands, could find some traction.

The Long Shots

After the aforementioned films, there is a considerable drop-off in enthusiasm for the rest of the field, according to virtually every industry insider with whom I’ve spoken.

Paul Schrader brought to the fest Oh, Canada , his first film in competition since 1988’s Patty Hearst , which reunites him with Richard Gere 44 years after American Gigolo . Unfortunately, this adaptation of the 2021 novel Foregone , about a dying writer who agrees to be interviewed about his life for a documentary, doesn’t quite work. The man’s life, at least as depicted, was not interesting enough to justify the suggested level of interest on the part of the doc filmmakers or the arrogance of the subject himself; nobody in the cast, which also includes Uma Thurman , Michael Imperioli and Jacob Elordi , is likable; and the whole thing concludes in a rather anti-climactic way — all of which will make the film’s search for U.S. distribution harder.

The Wild Cards

It should not go unmentioned that Warner Bros. unveiled at the fest — out of competition, and therefore ineligible for awards — two soon-to-be-released epics, or to use their preferred nomenclature, “sagas”: George Miller ’s action-packed sequel Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (out in America on May 24) and Kevin Costner ’s Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter 1 (June 28), the first installment of what is intended to be a four-film series Westerns.

Miller, of course, has been making Mad Max films for 45 years now, none of which were better received than his last one, 2015’s Mad Max: Fury Road (which was nominated for 10 Oscars and took home six, all for below-the-line categories), so anticipation for Furiosa was through the roof and comparisons were inevitable. Unfortunately, the consensus is that the new Anya Taylor-Joy / Chris Hemsworth installment, while technically brilliant and sure to gross a fortune , is not quite up to the level of Fury Road , and will face a much steeper awards season climb.

The Back Half

As the fest enters its back half, buzzy titles to keep an eye on include Anora , Sean Baker ’s latest film related to sex work, which will be distributed in the U.S. by Neon, the U.S. distributor of the last three Palme d’Or winners ( Parasite , Titane and Anatomy of a Fall ); Ali Abbasi ’s The Apprentice , an origin story, of sorts, about Donald Trump , played by Sebastian Stan ; Paolo Sorrentino ’s Italian/French co-production Parthenope , the cast of which includes Gary Oldman ; and the aforementioned Cronenberg’s The Shrouds , a sci-fi/horror flick starring Vincent Cassel , Diane Kruger and Guy Pearce .

And hopefully, there will also be a surprise or two!

THR Newsletters

Sign up for THR news straight to your inbox every day

More from The Hollywood Reporter

Adam wingard not returning for ‘godzilla x kong’ sequel (exclusive), ‘parthenope’ review: paolo sorrentino’s taste for baroque virtuosity delivers a lavish banquet that’s too rich to digest, richard foronjy, convicted criminal turned character actor, dies at 86, awards season calendar: key dates for oscars, emmys, tonys and other major events, marvel’s ‘x-men’ movie lands ‘hunger games’ writer michael lesslie, jessica alba goes on revenge mission in netflix’s violent ‘trigger warning’ trailer.

‘The Substance’ Review: Demi Moore and Margaret Qualley in a Visionary Feminist Body-Horror Film That Takes Cosmetic Enhancement to Extremes

Coralie Fargeat works with the flair of a grindhouse Kubrick in a weirdly fun, cathartically grotesque fusion of "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" and "Showgirls."

By Owen Gleiberman

Owen Gleiberman

Chief Film Critic

• ‘The Shrouds’ Review: David Cronenberg Makes a Movie About Grief — and Body Horror, and Digital Gravestones — That in Its Somber Way Verges on Self-Parody 1 day ago
• ‘The Apprentice’ Review: Sebastian Stan Plays Donald Trump in a Docudrama That Nails Everything About Him but His Mystery 1 day ago
• ‘Horizon: An American Saga — Chapter 1’ Review: Sprawling Yet Thinly Spread, the First Part of Kevin Costner’s Western Epic Feels Like the Set-Up for a TV Miniseries 2 days ago

“The Substance” tells the story of an aging Hollywood actress-turned-aerobics-workout-host, named Elisabeth Sparkle and played by Demi Moore , who gets fired from a TV network because she is now deemed too old. In a rage of desperation, she calls a number that’s been handed to her anonymously and gets hooked up with a sinister sci-fi body-enhancement program known as The Substance. She is given a heap of medical equipment sealed into plastic bags (syringes, tubing, a phosphorescent green liquid, a gooey white injectable food product), and she’s told about the protocol regarding her new self — which, the program warns, will also be her old self. “The two of you are one,” say the instructions. What does that mean?

Popular on Variety

Fargeat, who has made one previous feature (2017’s “Revenge”), works in a wide-angle-lens, up-from-exploitation style that might be described as cartoon grindhouse Kubrick. It’s like “A Clockwork Orange” fused with the kinetic aesthetics of a state-of-the-art television commercial. Fargeat favors super-close-ups (of body parts, cars, eating, kissing), with sounds to match, and she also vacuums up influences the way Brian De Palma once did (though he, in this case, is one of them). We’ve all seen dozens of retreads of the Jekyll-and-Hyde story, but Fargeat, in her imaginative audacity, fuses it with “Showgirls,” and even that isn’t enough for her. She draws heavily on the hallucinatory moment in “The Shining” where Jack Torrance embraces a young woman in a bathtub, only to see her transformed into a cackling old crone. Beyond that, Fargeat‘s images recall the exploding-beast-with-a-writhing-face in John Carpenter’s “The Thing,” the bloodbath prom of “Carrie,” and the addiction-turned-dread of “Requiem for a Dream.”

What makes all of this original is that Coralie Fargeat fuses it with her own stylized aggro voice (she favors minimal dialogue, which pops like something out of a graphic novel), and with her feminist outrage over the way that women have been ruled by the world of images. At first, though, the over-the-top-ness does take a bit of getting used. Dennis Quaid plays the brash pig of a network executive, in baroquely decorated suit jackets, who has decided to fire Elisabeth, and when he’s having lunch with her, shoving shrimp in his mouth from what feels like four inches away from the audience, you want to recoil as much as she does. But Fageat is actually great with her actors; she knows that Quaid’s charisma, even when he’s playing a showbiz vulgarian as reprehensible as this, will make him highly watchable.

And Demi Moore’s performance is nothing short of fearless. She’s playing, in some very abstract way, a version of herself (once a star at the center of the universe, now old enough to be seen by sexist Hollywood as past it), and her acting is rippled with anger, terror, despair, and vengeance. There’s a lot of full-on nudity in “The Substance,” to the point that the film flirts with building a male gaze into the foundation of its aesthetic. Yet it does so only to pull the rug of voyeurism out from under us. Margaret Qualley makes Sue crisply magnetic in her confidence, and the fact that Sue knows how to package herself as an “object” is part of the film’s satirical design. She’s following the rules, “giving the people what they want.” It’s clear, I think, that Qualley is going to be a major star, and you see why here. She takes this stylized role and imbues it with a hint of mystery. For “The Substance” is finally a story of dueling egos, with Elisabeth’s real self and her enhanced self going at each other in a war for dominance.

“The Substance” does indeed play off “Showgirls” and the whole history of Hollywood cat-fight melodramas. The movie, in its visceral way, is deliriously ambitious (and, at 140 minutes, easily 20 minutes too long). But as it moves into the final chapter, its relatively restrained interface with body horror erupts into something cathartic in its extremity. Sue, at this point, has taken most of the life from Elisabeth, which means that Elisabeth has turned into a body so decrepit she makes the bathtub hag in “The Shining” look like Grace Kelly. But Fargeat is just getting started. The climactic sequence is set during the taping of the network’s New Year’s Eve special, which Sue has been chosen to host, and what happens there must be seen to be believed. Even if you watch horror movies all year long, this is still one of the rare ones to come up with a true monster , not just a mass of warped flesh but a deformation of the spirit. This, the film says, is what we’re repressing. It’s what we’re doing to ourselves.

Reviewed at Cannes Film Festival (In Competition), May 19, 2024. Running time: 140 MIN.

• Production: A Mubi release of a Working Title Films, A Good Title production. Producers: Coralie Fargeat, Tim Bevan, Eric Fellner. Executive producers: Alexandra Loewy, Nicolas Royer.
• Crew: Director, screenplay: Coralie Fargeat. Camera: Benjamin Kracun. Editor: Jérôme Eltabet. Music: 000 Raffertie.
• With: Demi Moore, Margaret Qualley, Dennis Quaid, Hugo Diego Garcia, Phillip Schurer, Joseph Balderrama, Oscar Lesage, Gore Abrams, Magtthew Géczy.

More From Our Brands

Louisiana house passes bill criminalizing life-saving pregnancy care pills, salt bae has closed his nusr-et steakhouse in n.y.c., angel reese joins dc power soccer ownership group, the best loofahs and body scrubbers, according to dermatologists, ratings: all american audience surges, sytycd dips with finale, verify it's you, please log in.