Parasite
Bong Joon-ho, South Korea, 2019o
The proletarian family Kim lives in a shabby basement apartment in the lower town and is all the more interested in the lifestyle of the Park family, who live in a chic villa high up on the Million Hill. Thanks to a lucky coincidence, the Kim's son manages to get a job as an English teacher at the Parks. Through trickery and intrigue, the Kims gradually oust all Park employees. But the hostile takeover is met with resistance from an unexpected side.
The ludicrous exaggerations, which break through all genres and their unwritten rules, have a system in the work of Bong Joon-ho, by now the most successful among the wild young innovators of south korean cinema. Since the early stroke of genius Memoires of Murder, however, even Bong has not succeeded in making a comparable film. As in the previous work, Bong distils the message of the more than justified struggle of the poor wretches against the unrestrained greed and arrogance of the established from a simple dramatic starting point without unnecessary subtelties. But how he does this is pure cinephile pleasure: Surprise follows surprise, suspense and comedy mix with horror, the over-excitement never ends, but is systematically undermined by the great cast with dead pan acting. The highlight of the tour de force and epitome of Bong's cinematic brilliance is a never-ending tracking shot in the pouring rain from the soulless temple of the millionaires to the cellar cloaca of the have-nots. Needless to say, it gets to the heart of the film's message.
Andreas FurlerIn dem südkoreanischen Regisseur Bong Joon-ho steckt ein echter Klassenkämpfer, was man sehr blutig zum Beispiel in Snowpiercer sehen konnte. Hier geht es subtiler und realistischer zu, als sich die Leben zweier Familien in Seoul miteinander verstricken. (...) Die tragikomischen, stets überraschenden Intrigen zwischen Knechten und Herren, aber auch Knechten und Knechten wurden in Cannes sehr zu Recht mit der Goldenen Palme gefeiert.
Tobias KniebeUn peu à la manière d’Hitchcock ou de Chabrol, à qui le cinéaste sud-coréen a eu le bon goût de rendre hommage en recevant son prix, Bong Joon-ho réussit avec Parasite une sorte de tour de force : un film totalement limpide et, en même temps, complexe et mystérieux.
Thierry JousseBong Joon-ho réinvente le classique "film de maison", avec ses relations vénéneuses entre servants et employeurs, et fabrique un thriller au rythme fou, sans rien perdre de son regard attentif sur la société coréenne. Un coup de génie.
Julien Dugois