All I can think about is how I need to see this again because it’s just that damn good of a movie.

Score: 5 / 5

As I left the theater after watching director Bong Joon Ho’s Parasite, my mind was trying to come to terms with what I just watched. It’s a masterstroke of blended comedy, and drama that, by the end, I was feeling like my emotions were tugged into two opposing directions at once.

Parasite follows the unemployed Kim family as they embed themselves into the extremely rich Park family, and what starts off as a seemingly innocent desire to get work spirals down and down the morality staircase till we reach a powder-keg crescendo that makes you sit and ask, what the hell just happened? Needless to say, I don’t want to spoil the story as it’s such a fun watch going in with as little as possible.

What I can say is the situations in the story create this interesting balance, where it feels like this is 100% satire, but underneath, there is real depth and seriousness to the situation. A darkness lurking just under the surface. To make this all work is a stellar cast, the entire Kim family is excellent, with Kang-ho Song, the father of the Kim’s, having the most range. His character’s arc is something you can’t stop watching, no matter the outcomes. To play off this humorous family on the Park side, Yeo-jeong Jo plays the rich housewife character to perfection. Her interactions with the entire Kim family create endless laughs as she is a catalyst for many humorous moments.

And I can’t talk about this movie without mentioning how gorgeous it looks. Cinematographer Kyung-pyo Hong does an amazing job of framing scenes, and using interesting techniques to really give this movie a true cinema feel. It’s one of the best-looking movies of the year and paired with a great score by Jaeil Jung, you get a movie that keeps the audience on their toes at all times.

Going into Parasite, all I knew were two things: it was a South Korean film, and it was getting a crazy amount of praise. Leaving Parasite, the praise was right, but all I can think about is how I need to see this again because it’s just that damn good of a movie. Parasite stands as one of the best films of 2019 and is not to be missed.