“Reading Colonialism in Parasite”
February 18, 2020 12:00 PM Subscribe
Good piece. I saw Parasite. I've been wanting to read a Korean take on the movie. Many of the themes pointed out here were apparent, but I only watched it once and did not dissect it this closely. I'd be interested in hearing more about the Scholar's Rock, as that was something completely new to me. Guess I'll go to Google, just haven't gotten around to doing so.
Saw it on some streaming service Saturday night before the Oscars and never thought it would win because it was so unsettling.
I can't say it's one of my favorite movies, but it is almost a "perfect" movie. Nothing is wasted. There's zero padding. Every scene is clear and understandable. Every scene is engrossing, and I was constantly curious as to what was going to happen next. Hooked. No swelling, emotional music telling you what to think. And even though some of the actors were super beautiful, they all seemed like real people—especially the "poor" dad... he was SUCH a dad. Overall great acting. The houses felt like real houses where the characters lived—even the oppressive/beautiful rich house, and the "poor" house was amazing in its transformation.
Parasite is a fairy tale. An old fashioned, pre-Disney fairy tale, rambling and unsettling and full of menace. I read some doofus describe it as "implausible," but the plot mechanics that move the story along are Poisoned Apples, and Enchanted Princes. The movie makes its own internal sense.
I keep thinking about it. It's not a long session of Art Cinema School. It's not Oscar Bait. It's not a depressing downer. It's one of the best movies I've seen in a long time. But I can't say I enjoyed it.
(but, I did appreciate it and want to see it again, some day. Again: I keep thinking about it, and that's not true of most movies I see)
posted by SoberHighland at 12:49 PM on February 18, 2020 [14 favorites]
Saw it on some streaming service Saturday night before the Oscars and never thought it would win because it was so unsettling.
I can't say it's one of my favorite movies, but it is almost a "perfect" movie. Nothing is wasted. There's zero padding. Every scene is clear and understandable. Every scene is engrossing, and I was constantly curious as to what was going to happen next. Hooked. No swelling, emotional music telling you what to think. And even though some of the actors were super beautiful, they all seemed like real people—especially the "poor" dad... he was SUCH a dad. Overall great acting. The houses felt like real houses where the characters lived—even the oppressive/beautiful rich house, and the "poor" house was amazing in its transformation.
Parasite is a fairy tale. An old fashioned, pre-Disney fairy tale, rambling and unsettling and full of menace. I read some doofus describe it as "implausible," but the plot mechanics that move the story along are Poisoned Apples, and Enchanted Princes. The movie makes its own internal sense.
I keep thinking about it. It's not a long session of Art Cinema School. It's not Oscar Bait. It's not a depressing downer. It's one of the best movies I've seen in a long time. But I can't say I enjoyed it.
(but, I did appreciate it and want to see it again, some day. Again: I keep thinking about it, and that's not true of most movies I see)
posted by SoberHighland at 12:49 PM on February 18, 2020 [14 favorites]
I started to read (but did not finish due to possible spoilers) Su Cho's article Subtitles Can’t Capture the Full Class Critique in ‘Parasite’ .
(I really need to see the movie so I can read about it!)
posted by vespabelle at 1:00 PM on February 18, 2020 [5 favorites]
(I really need to see the movie so I can read about it!)
posted by vespabelle at 1:00 PM on February 18, 2020 [5 favorites]
Saw it twice in the theater and it definitely stands up to rewatches although I still felt like I was missing some things culturally specific.
posted by octothorpe at 1:37 PM on February 18, 2020
posted by octothorpe at 1:37 PM on February 18, 2020
Saw it yesterday - I am definitely curious about the subtleties for a Korean audience because the messages that came across to me are, well, not terribly subtle. The execution, however, is very very strong.
posted by atoxyl at 2:20 PM on February 18, 2020 [5 favorites]
posted by atoxyl at 2:20 PM on February 18, 2020 [5 favorites]
Agree with Atoxyl and SoberHighland. Loved the movie, as a pretty clear fable with a pretty unsubtle message.
posted by PhineasGage at 2:30 PM on February 18, 2020
posted by PhineasGage at 2:30 PM on February 18, 2020
I finally watched Parasite over the weekend and was meaning to read more in depth analysis of it, so thanks! Agree, very well done and very unsettling, but much to think about.
posted by blue shadows at 2:32 PM on February 18, 2020
posted by blue shadows at 2:32 PM on February 18, 2020
Oddball connection that did occur to me:
Ruling family of DPRK = Kim
Military dictator and founder of modern RoK (and of a more limited political dynasty in SK) = Park
But then I also know that simple statistics make it pretty likely that any story about Korea is going to involve a Kim and a Park.
posted by atoxyl at 2:37 PM on February 18, 2020 [3 favorites]
Ruling family of DPRK = Kim
Military dictator and founder of modern RoK (and of a more limited political dynasty in SK) = Park
But then I also know that simple statistics make it pretty likely that any story about Korea is going to involve a Kim and a Park.
posted by atoxyl at 2:37 PM on February 18, 2020 [3 favorites]
The cited English exam for Korean students is so interesting: an extract of dense, complex and inelegantly expressed text - followed by a series of questions written by somebody who doesn’t seem to have understood the extract, and who can’t express themselves clearly in English. To do well, candidates have to intuit whatever god-awful model answers the author had in mind.
It reminds me of a Vietnamese English teacher I once met. He had a perfect knowledge of a vast set of grammatical rules for the language - but his spoken English was hard to understand and his vocabulary much poorer than his teenage daughter who worked as a waitresses in a tourist cafe. It is strange to see English taught with an emphasis on rigid traps and arcane expressions , rather than for any idea of the love of communication and learning about another culture. A foreign language as a gatekeeper to higher levels of society rather than a gateway to understanding the wider world.
I suppose there are people thinking about making a Hollywood adaption of Parasite. Yes, there are elements that are universal- but I’d challenge them to convey notions such as this.
posted by rongorongo at 2:39 PM on February 18, 2020 [6 favorites]
It reminds me of a Vietnamese English teacher I once met. He had a perfect knowledge of a vast set of grammatical rules for the language - but his spoken English was hard to understand and his vocabulary much poorer than his teenage daughter who worked as a waitresses in a tourist cafe. It is strange to see English taught with an emphasis on rigid traps and arcane expressions , rather than for any idea of the love of communication and learning about another culture. A foreign language as a gatekeeper to higher levels of society rather than a gateway to understanding the wider world.
I suppose there are people thinking about making a Hollywood adaption of Parasite. Yes, there are elements that are universal- but I’d challenge them to convey notions such as this.
posted by rongorongo at 2:39 PM on February 18, 2020 [6 favorites]
It's an interesting piece, but it seems a bit strange to discuss the themes of colonialism in Parasite without mentioning the way it refers to the other imperialist power that colonised it for quite a while. From another analysis:
If anything, I read the film as allegorical for both the inevitability and the futility of class struggle - both families seem to be locked into the same cycle that ended up with the previous rich owner dead and the man living in the basement; the first thing the Kim family does when they take over the Park house is to spread rubbish everywhere; all that their insurrections get them is a hell of their own making buried under the lives of the next incarnation of the ever-present ruling class. It's Hegelian, in an 18th Brumaire kind of way.
(It's a great film, anyway.)
posted by A Thousand Baited Hooks at 2:41 PM on February 18, 2020 [10 favorites]
Table ArrangementsIsn't there a scene at Mr Park's media production company where people are standing around someone wearing a Sony VR headset? It's not that subtle.
Mrs. Park wanted the birthday table arrangements to mimic Admiral Yi’s crane formation in defeating the Japanese navy–back in the Imjin Wars of 1592.
One could REALLY be reaching out on a limb when she says Da-song’s tent is the Japanese warship. There have been accusations many times that South Korea’s current elite has ties to collaborators during the Japanese colonial period of the 20th century. Eh–forget I said it.
If anything, I read the film as allegorical for both the inevitability and the futility of class struggle - both families seem to be locked into the same cycle that ended up with the previous rich owner dead and the man living in the basement; the first thing the Kim family does when they take over the Park house is to spread rubbish everywhere; all that their insurrections get them is a hell of their own making buried under the lives of the next incarnation of the ever-present ruling class. It's Hegelian, in an 18th Brumaire kind of way.
(It's a great film, anyway.)
posted by A Thousand Baited Hooks at 2:41 PM on February 18, 2020 [10 favorites]
thanks for posting this! the extra clarification of the cultural aspects is so intriguing and makes the movie even more dark.
i watched it on a plane ride recently knowing absolutely nothing about it except the awards stuff and that it was korean. i went through a k-drama binge a while back and read up on korean culture. i'm glad i had that background bc it made most things make sense in this movie but there's a lot of additional subtext in the reivew i wasn't aware of.
idk that i'd want to watch it again, but it is a movie that will stick with me for a long time.
posted by affectionateborg at 2:45 PM on February 18, 2020
i watched it on a plane ride recently knowing absolutely nothing about it except the awards stuff and that it was korean. i went through a k-drama binge a while back and read up on korean culture. i'm glad i had that background bc it made most things make sense in this movie but there's a lot of additional subtext in the reivew i wasn't aware of.
idk that i'd want to watch it again, but it is a movie that will stick with me for a long time.
posted by affectionateborg at 2:45 PM on February 18, 2020
I'll add that the colonialism angle in Parasite is not at all subtle. That's not a criticism, but the linked essay sort of makes it seem that it is subtle to someone who had not seen the film.
Seconding that all the characters are indeed trapped in the rich house in the end.
posted by SoberHighland at 2:48 PM on February 18, 2020 [2 favorites]
Seconding that all the characters are indeed trapped in the rich house in the end.
posted by SoberHighland at 2:48 PM on February 18, 2020 [2 favorites]
I think the class critique was obvious, but colonialism less so. English is obviously used as a class marker, but less obvious is the critique of the US' role in the fallout of the Korean War and SK's incorporation into the neoliberal world economy.
posted by airmail at 3:13 PM on February 18, 2020 [3 favorites]
posted by airmail at 3:13 PM on February 18, 2020 [3 favorites]
I'm probably misunderstanding the Hegelian slant of A Thousand Baited Hooks' comment, but in Hegelian terms, shouldn't the dialectical inevitability, and futility of class struggle, at some point synthesize into some new sort of struggle that operates beyond class struggle? Or is class struggle more Nietzcshean (or Buddhist, or Hindu) in that it is bound to eternally return? Anyways, interesting observations!
posted by nikoniko at 3:15 PM on February 18, 2020 [2 favorites]
posted by nikoniko at 3:15 PM on February 18, 2020 [2 favorites]
Thanks vespabelle. That subtitle piece you linked doesn't have major spoilers as it doesn't really discuss plot points. It's a great essay because Cho writes from their experience as a bilingual speaker, and how the feeling (affect?) of certain words is hard to render as a translated subtitle.
Both pieces spotlight the classist/imperialist connotations of English language usage in Korea in important ways.
I'm still pondering the main link. At some bits I raised a skeptical eyebrow, but I also am excited to think more about their point on how Good Indian/Bad Indian operates in the film.
posted by spamandkimchi at 4:01 PM on February 18, 2020 [3 favorites]
Both pieces spotlight the classist/imperialist connotations of English language usage in Korea in important ways.
I'm still pondering the main link. At some bits I raised a skeptical eyebrow, but I also am excited to think more about their point on how Good Indian/Bad Indian operates in the film.
posted by spamandkimchi at 4:01 PM on February 18, 2020 [3 favorites]
An interesting article for sure. Some of the extra context is very helpful, though I feel some of the "parallels" are a stretch. But what's film criticism for if not to stretch in that way? Although the specifics may or may not strike me as important, the overall theme of colonialism seems more clear to me now. Though in my opinion the class themes are more immediate and highly intentional. Looking forward to watching this again with some of these ideas (and the subtitles thing) in mind!
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 4:28 PM on February 18, 2020
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 4:28 PM on February 18, 2020
I'm probably misunderstanding the Hegelian slant of A Thousand Baited Hooks' comment, but in Hegelian terms, shouldn't the dialectical inevitability, and futility of class struggle, at some point synthesize into some new sort of struggle that operates beyond class struggle?
Good question! I see the film as Hegelian in at least two different ways: in one, the film looks at various struggles (upper-class/working-class; coloniser/colonised; South Korea/North Korea, etc.) and distills out a common dialectic, then re-expresses that dialectic in terms of a personal drama with hints, of various levels of subtlety and abstraction, of the struggles that it comes from. The next form that the struggle will take will be different - different people, different personal relationships - but the spirit of the cycle will remain to be re-expressed.
There's a lot of Marx-style dialectical materialism here, although Parasite seems rather less optimistic than Marx about the prospects for a favourable evolution.
The other way is as a fable of the Master-Slave dialectic. The things the Kims do to "cross the line" are the things that threaten to force the Parks into self-consciousness.
posted by A Thousand Baited Hooks at 5:13 PM on February 18, 2020
Good question! I see the film as Hegelian in at least two different ways: in one, the film looks at various struggles (upper-class/working-class; coloniser/colonised; South Korea/North Korea, etc.) and distills out a common dialectic, then re-expresses that dialectic in terms of a personal drama with hints, of various levels of subtlety and abstraction, of the struggles that it comes from. The next form that the struggle will take will be different - different people, different personal relationships - but the spirit of the cycle will remain to be re-expressed.
There's a lot of Marx-style dialectical materialism here, although Parasite seems rather less optimistic than Marx about the prospects for a favourable evolution.
The other way is as a fable of the Master-Slave dialectic. The things the Kims do to "cross the line" are the things that threaten to force the Parks into self-consciousness.
posted by A Thousand Baited Hooks at 5:13 PM on February 18, 2020
It's strange reading these articles, I must admit, because at times, I'm forced to think, as a person closer to the people in the Parasite world than most of the Western commentators, that sis, it's not that deep. How not deep? Bong Joon-Ho is working on a HBO adaptation with Mark Ruffalo and possibly Tilda Swinton. (I'd still be interested, but we'll see)
Anyway, the handwringing about the subtleties of the language not adequately captured by subtitles, is also admittedly, personally hilarious. But that's because I survived all of last week's Twitter over this silly debate of subs vs dubs. And the only points that're worth respecting were concerning learning disabilities, disabilities and adaptive tech. The rest were just mired with monolingual, monocultural justification.
posted by cendawanita at 7:57 PM on February 18, 2020 [1 favorite]
Anyway, the handwringing about the subtleties of the language not adequately captured by subtitles, is also admittedly, personally hilarious. But that's because I survived all of last week's Twitter over this silly debate of subs vs dubs. And the only points that're worth respecting were concerning learning disabilities, disabilities and adaptive tech. The rest were just mired with monolingual, monocultural justification.
posted by cendawanita at 7:57 PM on February 18, 2020 [1 favorite]
The colonialist reading maps rather well and makes great points, but in doing that also kind of takes away from the classist/capitalist theme that most consider the movie's main issue.
posted by blue shadows at 9:04 PM on February 18, 2020
posted by blue shadows at 9:04 PM on February 18, 2020
Whether you love or loathe the film, Parasite is the opposite of subtle - I’m skeptical that the intention or purpose of the film goes as far as this neocolonial studies analysis claims.
Joon-ho himself has emphasized that the film is not metaphorical.
Yes, this movie seems to get a lot of meaning shoehorned into it. I'm reluctant to go much in that direction simply because there is a whole lot I suspect simply doesn't translate to this US-born Southern Californian. I mostly go at its face value, which is plenty entertaining in its own right and offers plenty to chew on.
posted by 2N2222 at 9:18 PM on February 18, 2020 [1 favorite]
Joon-ho himself has emphasized that the film is not metaphorical.
Yes, this movie seems to get a lot of meaning shoehorned into it. I'm reluctant to go much in that direction simply because there is a whole lot I suspect simply doesn't translate to this US-born Southern Californian. I mostly go at its face value, which is plenty entertaining in its own right and offers plenty to chew on.
posted by 2N2222 at 9:18 PM on February 18, 2020 [1 favorite]
This post should have a spoiler warning by the link, to be fair.
The article, while providing a great deal of context about South Korea, has to cover a great deal of the plot and turns of the film to do so.
posted by lon_star at 9:26 PM on February 18, 2020
The article, while providing a great deal of context about South Korea, has to cover a great deal of the plot and turns of the film to do so.
posted by lon_star at 9:26 PM on February 18, 2020
I've seen a lot of readings that take the movie as a morality tale: rich people are evil, and if you're a Marxist, then the Kims should have banded with the couple in the basement to take down the Parks. But personally, I read it as more of a depiction of the psyche of working people, as represented by the Kims - ambivalent but aspiring to the lives of the wealthy Parks, haunted by the fear of becoming the creepy, desperate bunker couple. You could go further and say it's about South Korea, which wants to present itself as shiny and modern but is haunted by the Korean War and the costs of its economic miracle, but I have a feeling that Bong would hate that reading because not every single piece of art has to be a metaphor for Your Country, dammit. But I mean, Death of the Author, etc.: even if my readings or the neocolonial readings in the article were unintended, your art can't help but reflect your environment.
(I do find the article's centering of the US and the US-aligned as the cause of all ills in SK suspiciously pat... and there's a tendency for lefty commentators to try to slot everything into their Grand Narrative. Like, ending US sanctions on North Korea will probably not solve the problems of the Kim family in Parasite. I likely have this view because I've followed the Lefty Twitter Discourse Wars on Hong Kong way too closely for my own good. But I digress.)
posted by airmail at 9:34 PM on February 18, 2020 [2 favorites]
(I do find the article's centering of the US and the US-aligned as the cause of all ills in SK suspiciously pat... and there's a tendency for lefty commentators to try to slot everything into their Grand Narrative. Like, ending US sanctions on North Korea will probably not solve the problems of the Kim family in Parasite. I likely have this view because I've followed the Lefty Twitter Discourse Wars on Hong Kong way too closely for my own good. But I digress.)
posted by airmail at 9:34 PM on February 18, 2020 [2 favorites]
(For those who are interested - you can put yourself against the questions in the 2018 College Scholastic Aptitude Test mentioned here. If you don't read Korean then you have to guess at the questions - but they seem to be along the line of "fill in the missing phrase that best fits", "describe the term highlighted", "summarise the gist of the article" and so on. A quick run through the readability level of the texts puts them at college sophomore level for native speakers. )
posted by rongorongo at 3:52 AM on February 19, 2020 [1 favorite]
posted by rongorongo at 3:52 AM on February 19, 2020 [1 favorite]
There's a lot of Marx-style dialectical materialism here
Fair bit of Marx-style too many people in a small space as well.
posted by flabdablet at 6:14 AM on February 19, 2020 [1 favorite]
Fair bit of Marx-style too many people in a small space as well.
posted by flabdablet at 6:14 AM on February 19, 2020 [1 favorite]
I know you posted that as a joke and maybe Parasite isn't quite a Marx Bros movie but a lot of it is pretty damn funny. A lot of these think pieces make it seem like a dry sociological study but it's really a fun watch that plays almost like a Coen Brothers movie.
posted by octothorpe at 6:32 AM on February 19, 2020 [5 favorites]
posted by octothorpe at 6:32 AM on February 19, 2020 [5 favorites]
i agree octothorpe. for me, that's what made it great. it WAS funny. and sad and horrifying and conflicted and full of love for family.
it was incredibly human.
posted by affectionateborg at 6:43 AM on February 19, 2020 [2 favorites]
it was incredibly human.
posted by affectionateborg at 6:43 AM on February 19, 2020 [2 favorites]
My favorite theme of it is how sad and shitty the Kims' grift is. Their big plan is that they con their way into jobs that pay normal wages and then they have to keep doing those jobs forever. That's it. There's no vault full of securities or diamonds to pilfer; just shitty jobs where they have to keep sucking up to horrible rich people until they either get found out or die.
posted by octothorpe at 6:58 AM on February 19, 2020 [10 favorites]
posted by octothorpe at 6:58 AM on February 19, 2020 [10 favorites]
It was a shitty grift, but IDK that the big plan was just to stay working at the job longterm.
posted by armacy at 8:10 AM on February 19, 2020
posted by armacy at 8:10 AM on February 19, 2020
i think that's the thing that is pretty cross-cultural - people not trying to get super rich and grift people like in Wolf of Wall Street or have some kind of ridiculous excessive wealth in Gatsby but just wanting a decent long term income situation for you and your family. their goal wasn't to necessarily be nouveau riche but just to have a decent standard of living and comfort.
posted by affectionateborg at 8:22 AM on February 19, 2020
posted by affectionateborg at 8:22 AM on February 19, 2020
I know you posted that as a joke and maybe Parasite isn't quite a Marx Bros movie but a lot of it is pretty damn funny. A lot of these think pieces make it seem like a dry sociological study but it's really a fun watch that plays almost like a Coen Brothers movie.
I'd say it's a dark comedy that pivots into being a thriller, yeah.
posted by atoxyl at 2:08 PM on February 19, 2020
I'd say it's a dark comedy that pivots into being a thriller, yeah.
posted by atoxyl at 2:08 PM on February 19, 2020
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