By Donald Kirk
The multi-Oscar-winning "Parasite" does not inspire total adulation among all those who have seen it. One Korean-American whom I met in Washington said she thought it represented a distorted, exaggerated image of class barriers, of differences between rich and poor in the country of her birth.
That opinion no doubt has a certain validity. The writer-director Bong Joon-ho has come up with a story so full of twists and turns that it's most unlikely in any real-life scenario. The plot is shocking, full of surprises, brutal yet funny at times. If nothing else, you have to credit Bong with the imagination to keep his audience entertained, enthralled, involved. That's what all films are supposed to do. Not all succeed.
Probably the woman objected to the film on quite different grounds. The film portrays a society cruelly divided between haves and have-nots, between an upper class living in a dream world and downtrodden masses struggling day to day. For this woman, the reality in Korea is quite different. The image of the Korean miracle is that of mass success, not of mass poverty.
"Parasite" makes us wonder about the validity of the hype. In the decades of rapid growth from the wreckage of the Korean War, a super-class of owners and their aides grew to dominate the economy. Some of them came from quite poor backgrounds, others had the advantage of family riches and privileged upbringing. All worked feverishly to make Korea a competitive global power. These upwardly mobile titans of business and industry passed their wealth, along with their titles, to their sons. By now a third-generation is in charge and the chaebol system is rigidifying.
Bong does not have his characters making speeches on the iniquities and inequities of Korean life. Were he to want to do that, he might have chosen a different line of work, perhaps as a politician or preacher, even a journalist. Nonetheless, he skewers the upper classes as a menace to upwardly mobile success. The inference is plain: Korea is reverting to the stylized class system that bound the Joseon Kingdom until it fell apart, weakened by inbreeding and in-fighting, unable to resist takeover by Japan.
It's not certain Bong would acknowledge any specific purpose other than that of telling a wild story with social implications. Viewers come out of the theater with mixed responses. For many, not all, the film raises serious questions about the society it depicts. Others, like the woman who told me the story presents quite a wrong impression, would disagree.
No denying, though, "Parasite," has broad implications. It would be extremely difficult to find any society in which class lines are not carefully delineated, in which the rich and poor are not divided and segregated, in which divisions within classes and groups are not subtly if not starkly drawn. Look at the U.S. where the simple statistics of savings, assets and income show far greater disparities than in Korea.
Facile comparisons, though, paper over cultural and historical differences. The top-down structure of Korean life has its own distinct characteristics, qualities that Bong conveys, without lecturing. The discipline within a family, within a group, within a corporation or a political party or government agency, draws inspiration from China, to which the Joseon dynasty kings paid homage, and from Japan, to which the last of the dynasty, stultified after five centuries of unbroken dictatorial rule, surrendered.
In all these ups and downs, twists and turns, the Korean character has endured as distinctively Korean. That's true in both Koreas, North and South, though parallels between the rule imposed by the Kim dynasty in Pyongyang and that within a Korean chaebol may be a stretch. No, chaebol chieftains cannot kill off their critics or consign them to some awful prison, but the difference between North and South may be one of degree or form.
Bong is not standing behind a podium giving a sermon. The power of the film lies in the story, as embellished by the dialog, the acting, the cinephotographic portrayal of one rich family and one poor family. The story may be crazy but veers close enough to reality to resonate. Viewers have to be thinking, yes, they know where Bong is coming from. Therein lies the power of a fictional saga with a universal message that Koreans and foreigners alike can recognize.
Donald Kirk (www.donaldkirk.com), as a journalist, has been trying to figure out life in Korea for decades.
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That opinion no doubt has a certain validity. The writer-director Bong Joon-ho has come up with a story so full of twists and turns that it's most unlikely in any real-life scenario. The plot is shocking, full of surprises, brutal yet funny at times. If nothing else, you have to credit Bong with the imagination to keep his audience entertained, enthralled, involved. That's what all films are supposed to do. Not all succeed.
Probably the woman objected to the film on quite different grounds. The film portrays a society cruelly divided between haves and have-nots, between an upper class living in a dream world and downtrodden masses struggling day to day. For this woman, the reality in Korea is quite different. The image of the Korean miracle is that of mass success, not of mass poverty.
"Parasite" makes us wonder about the validity of the hype. In the decades of rapid growth from the wreckage of the Korean War, a super-class of owners and their aides grew to dominate the economy. Some of them came from quite poor backgrounds, others had the advantage of family riches and privileged upbringing. All worked feverishly to make Korea a competitive global power. These upwardly mobile titans of business and industry passed their wealth, along with their titles, to their sons. By now a third-generation is in charge and the chaebol system is rigidifying.
Bong does not have his characters making speeches on the iniquities and inequities of Korean life. Were he to want to do that, he might have chosen a different line of work, perhaps as a politician or preacher, even a journalist. Nonetheless, he skewers the upper classes as a menace to upwardly mobile success. The inference is plain: Korea is reverting to the stylized class system that bound the Joseon Kingdom until it fell apart, weakened by inbreeding and in-fighting, unable to resist takeover by Japan.
It's not certain Bong would acknowledge any specific purpose other than that of telling a wild story with social implications. Viewers come out of the theater with mixed responses. For many, not all, the film raises serious questions about the society it depicts. Others, like the woman who told me the story presents quite a wrong impression, would disagree.
No denying, though, "Parasite," has broad implications. It would be extremely difficult to find any society in which class lines are not carefully delineated, in which the rich and poor are not divided and segregated, in which divisions within classes and groups are not subtly if not starkly drawn. Look at the U.S. where the simple statistics of savings, assets and income show far greater disparities than in Korea.
Facile comparisons, though, paper over cultural and historical differences. The top-down structure of Korean life has its own distinct characteristics, qualities that Bong conveys, without lecturing. The discipline within a family, within a group, within a corporation or a political party or government agency, draws inspiration from China, to which the Joseon dynasty kings paid homage, and from Japan, to which the last of the dynasty, stultified after five centuries of unbroken dictatorial rule, surrendered.
In all these ups and downs, twists and turns, the Korean character has endured as distinctively Korean. That's true in both Koreas, North and South, though parallels between the rule imposed by the Kim dynasty in Pyongyang and that within a Korean chaebol may be a stretch. No, chaebol chieftains cannot kill off their critics or consign them to some awful prison, but the difference between North and South may be one of degree or form.
Bong is not standing behind a podium giving a sermon. The power of the film lies in the story, as embellished by the dialog, the acting, the cinephotographic portrayal of one rich family and one poor family. The story may be crazy but veers close enough to reality to resonate. Viewers have to be thinking, yes, they know where Bong is coming from. Therein lies the power of a fictional saga with a universal message that Koreans and foreigners alike can recognize.
Donald Kirk (www.donaldkirk.com), as a journalist, has been trying to figure out life in Korea for decades.
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