How PARASITE Diagnoses Human Nature (Spoilers)

With 2019 coming to an end, people who love films (as well as casual movie goers) are starting to think about which movies they enjoyed seeing the most this year. One that has been talked about a lot is Parasite. Directed by Bong Joon Ho who also directed such films as The Host, Snowpiercer and Okja, Parasite was one of the year’s most surprising and sudden stand-outs. The director is already known for spectacular films, but when you sit down and watch Parasite, there is nothing to prepare you for the direction it takes or the way it inspires the audience to react. It’s a movie about topics such as family, circumstance, class-structure and culture, but it’s also a movie about hatred. Stop reading here if you don’t want any spoilers and go see the film because I think it’s one of the must-watches of the year, or continue on for my attempt at unpacking the many layers of Parasite.

Parasite introduces us to both the Kim family, down on their luck and living in the slums, and the rich Park family, who just so happen to be losing their daughter’s English tutor as he goes to study abroad. The English tutor, Min, is a friend of the eldest child of the Kim’s, Ki-woo. And this is when the takeover begins. The Kim family slowly pushes out those employed by the Park family until the entire family has a role close to the Park's. An important aspect of the film is how good they all are at their jobs. It makes the viewer question the opportunities offered to the lower class. With enough money and schooling, could the family be living a good, honest, comfortable life? Or is it within a con—working the fast way to the top—that they really thrive? The movie doesn’t answer this for us, but a large rock that Min gives the Kim’s as a gift is supposed to be a symbol of material wealth and a shortcut to the top. It may symbolize the immorality of taking a shortcut when other people work hard to reach the upper classes. It may also be a social commentary on how taking the shortcut or finding a hidden path (or cutting one out for yourself through some immoral means) may be the only way for some lower class citizens to make a life of comfort for themselves. The system is not made equal. We see this through the juxtaposition of the cramped, dirty slums deep within the city, down flights of stairs and into darkness and debris, with the open space houses, wide streets and large yards of the rich citizens like the Park family. It’s beautifully filmed in this way to show how far the Kim’s must physically climb to get to the Park’s, which is in contrast to how low they have fallen if you consider living a life through lies and deceit a failure.

The title of the film, Parasite, could refer to a few things. It could refer to the Kim family infiltrating the Park family. It could also refer to the other poor people who have infiltrated their family. We come to find out that the housekeeper, Moon-gwang, who was replaced by Mrs. Kim has been keeping her husband in a secret bunker under the Park house. This “parasite” lives under the Parks, similar to how the lower class citizens live under them in the slums, and is being fed their food by the housekeeper (even though she insists she buys her own, Mr. Park makes the comment that she always eats enough for two). However, I believe the true parasite lives within each character in the film, and that parasite is hatred. The poor characters, even though they are on the same side of the divide between poverty and wealth, fight it out for control of the house. They also see each other as enemies, competing for the comfort they receive from the Park’s house and money. The fight is brutal and the housekeeper and her husband are locked in the basement, presumably to die because the Kim’s do not want to risk being found out. They could lose everything. Hatred can also be seen in the Park family toward the poor, but at a much less savage level. Mr. Park makes comments about how Mr. Kim smells like “the people who ride the subway”. The family also thinks they can easily buy more from their employees, such as offering them more money to attend their son’s birthday party, and Mr. Kim being told by Mr. Park to dress up as an Indian as a fun prank at the party. It is acceptable and must be done because he is being paid for it.

It seems on the surface that the Park's do not hate the poor but just have a distaste for them. But when we think about it, we come to realize that there’s no jealousy or injustice for the Park's to concern themselves with in relation to the people that work for them. The rich have much less to be angry about in circumstances like this. The most brutal form of hatred we see from Mr. Park is expressed through selfishness. When his son is having a seizure and they must take the car to get to the hospital, he demands it without caring that the youngest Kim child, Ki-jung, has been stabbed and is also dying. He expects Mr. Kim to leave her there and take only the Park family to the hospital. It’s cruelty. Mr. Park has a responsibility as the head of household and owner of the car to bring the severely injured to the hospital. But the life of one of his employees pales in comparison to his son. Sure, fatherly love has a role to play here and most parents would think of their child first, but there is no reason that Kim can’t also carry his daughter to the car. It’s a cruel, quick decision that Park makes to disregard her life, and Kim repays him for it by stabbing him, the most outright form of hatred Mr. Kim shows the Park family. Throughout the film, the way Mr. Park looks down on Mr. Kim becomes more and more apparent, with multiple comments about his smell and livelihood. It makes sense that Mr. Kim, as a father worried about his own child, would finally snap and take out the disdain his family has for the rich on the source of that wealth—the head of the Park household.

There are a lot of interesting symbols that the director uses to show the class struggle in Korea, though I believe that they are expressive of most countries' class structures. For example, the Park family has a lot of fruit, a symbol of wealth in Korea. Also, after a particularly stormy night, the Park family is able to let their son camp in their backyard while they watch the rain. They have an imported, waterproof tent from the United States. And, the next day, they are able to sit in their yard and enjoy the sun. The Kim family, however, must run home in the rain, down flight after flight of stairs, to find their home flooded and their possessions ruined. They spend the night trying to salvage their belongings, having a cigarette and staring at the wreckage, and then sleeping shoulder to shoulder in a shelter with others who have lost their homes. The Park’s son’s love for Indian’s is another symbol. It is something he has taken from American culture and made into a game, even though the American Indian symbolizes people being murdered and their territory taken. This is similar to how the wealthy claim large spaces for themselves on top of the many slums that house the majority of citizens who live in cramped quarters. The director makes the class difference obvious because it illustrates the motivations of the characters. It’s a class critique, but interestingly, it does not favour either the rich nor the poor.

Think about who you were rooting for as you watched this film. I, for one, was definitely rooting for the Kim family. The movie was very funny until the last half hour, where it drastically changed tone to feel horrifying and hopeless. The Kim family was getting away with a genius con, the Park family was often called simple, and it was fun to watch them being tricked. Then, as the two poor families fought it out to see who would benefit from the Park’s wealth, I rooted for the Kim family because I had already followed them on this journey and they were working so hard to make a comfortable life for themselves. But after the film, I stopped and thought for a bit. I was rooting for the people who were lying, cheating, and even passively murdering. Why did it seem like such an accomplishment that the Kim family was able to con the Park family? It’s because I too feel some sort of hatred for the very-rich. This is because I feel like the system is so skewed that they are undeservedly wealthy. But this isn’t true in all cases. Sometimes, wealth is earned. And it has happened many times that a family that started out poor can become wealthy through hard work, though it’s much less likely than dying in the same class you were born into. This is why I think the film is brilliant. Parasite illustrates the parasite of hatred that grows within us all, be it distaste for the poor or being jealous of the rich. We all have some sort of dissatisfaction with our country and our government because we feel they don’t serve our interests. The political climate is filled to the brim with hate. Each class is upset when their government does not have their best interest at heart, but how is it possible for a government to perfectly serve every single class when each one wants such different things?

The ending of Parasite does not suggest hopelessness, but neither does it promise happiness, which I think is a pretty accurate depiction of life in general. Will Kim Ki-woo be able to get rich the long way and get his father back, who is now hiding in the Park’s bunker? It’s hard to say but the ending seems to put the Kim family back to square one, except now they have lost two members of their family in the process. Though it is bleak, the ending fits the movie and should not deter viewers. I think that watching Parasite will make the viewer more aware of the struggles of trying to create equality in a world that is decidedly unequal. I think it will also make you take a step back and seek out that hatred within yourself and confront it. Hate is a disease, the director is quite clear on that, and it’s a huge part of why our world is falling apart. As human self-interest continues to overtake our responsibility to our planet and our fellow humans, the parasite grows until it is incurable. This is why I highly recommend you see Parasite. Then, take the time to reflect. Perhaps if we were all to become more aware of the hate that drives us daily, we can begin to find ways to combat it and treat ourselves, and others, with more understanding and compassion.

Rating: 5/5

Did Parasite make your list of top movies this year? Do you think the movie has a hopeful ending, or does the ending just make it seem like nothing has changed? Let me know in the comments!

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