Why you should make tracks for Parasite right away

Parasite was first released in Australia eight months ago, but off the back of it’s history-making Best Picture win at the Oscars, this twisty mystery is getting a wide re-release. And you need to see it.

Scene from the Korean film Parasite, directed by Bong Joon-Ho. Madman Films.

Great to see a wide re-release is finally in order for Parasite, the international box-office phenom which made history thisweek as the first foreign-language movie to win the Best Picture Oscar.

This is yet more head-spinning, heart-stopping cinema from the great Bong Joon-ho (best known recently for his Netflix global hit Okja).

The mystery that takes hold of your mind here — and then masterfully twists it this way and that — endures well after the closing credits.

So just who is leeching the life force from whom in Parasite? There is no definitive answer forthcoming, and that might just be the very point of this funny, strange, sobering and distinctly original social satire.

We open in a back alley of the South Korean capital city Seoul, where a desperate family is subsisting on an improvised combo of the help-yourself (an important regular task is the nicking of some nearby wi-fi) and the hand-to-mouth (pre-folding pizza boxes to secure their next meal).

So just who is leeching the life force from whom in Parasite?

So far, so down-and-out, right? Not so fast: things suddenly are looking up when eldest son Ki-woo (Choi Woo-sik) scores a job home-tutoring the daughter of a wealthy CEO, Mr Park (Lee Sun-kyun).

One by one, the rest of Ki-woo’s family start to infiltrate Park’s lavish designer home in a series of menial positions.

So far, so here comes the happy ending, right? Wrong again.

An ever-blackening dark comedy seeping from just beneath the surface of Parasite starts hinting Ki-woo and his clan may merely be swapping one form of daily desperation for another.

PARASITE (MA15+)

Director: Bong Joon-ho (Snowpiercer)

Starring: Choi Woo-sik, Song Kang-ho, Lee Sun-kyun, Park So-dam, Cho Yeo-jeon.

Rating: ****

Second chance for Seoul survivors

For all things movies follow Leigh on Twitter: @leighpaatsch

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