AANHPI Heritage Month: Parasite (2019)
Director: Bong Joon Ho Run Time: 132 min. Rating: R Release Year: 2019
Starring: Cho Yeo-jeong, Choi Woo-shik, Lee Sun-kyun, Park So-dam, Song Kang-ho
Country: South Korea
Language: Korean with English subtitles
AANHPI Heritage Month 2024 at Gateway Film Center
Celebrating Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, throughout the month of May.
See the full lineupAbout the film:
By turns darkly hilarious and heart-wrenching, Parasite (2019) showcases a modern master at the top of his game. Internationally acclaimed and almost universally praised, the film received numerous accolades, including the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival and Academy Award wins for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay, and Best International Feature Film.
Meet the Park Family: the picture of aspirational wealth. And the Kim Family, rich in street smarts but not much else. Be it chance or fate, these two houses are brought together and the Kims sense a golden opportunity. Masterminded by college-aged Ki-woo, the Kim children expediently install themselves as tutor and art therapist, to the Parks. Soon, a symbiotic relationship forms between the two families. The Kims provide “indispensable” luxury services while the Parks obliviously bankroll their entire household. When a parasitic interloper threatens the Kims’ newfound comfort, a savage, underhanded battle for dominance breaks out, threatening to destroy the fragile ecosystem between the Kims and the Parks.
About the filmmaker:
Bong Joon Ho is a South Korean filmmaker known for the meticulous directing, social critique, blending of genres, and quick tonal shifts in his movies, many of which he also co-wrote. He gained a cult following with his darkly comedic feature debut Barking Dogs Never Bite (2000) before breaking box-office records in his homeland with crime drama Memories of Murder (2003) and monster movie The Host (2006). He followed up with the critically acclaimed Mother (2009) before making his mark on English-language cinema with the spectacular sci-fi fantasy Snowpiercer (2013) and the fantasy adventure Okja (2017), which premiered in competition at the Cannes Film Festival. His 2019 film Parasite is often hailed as his masterpiece; it won the Palme d’Or at Cannes and became the first foreign language film to receive the Academy Award for Best Picture. His newest film, Mickey 17 (2024), is based on the sci-fi novel Mickey7 by Ashton Edward.
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