What do you think of the movie Parasite (2019)?

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Well it's just some things in the climax left me scratching my head, that's all. I talked about it with a friend of mine and he said maybe staying in a basement with no baths is better than going to prison, cause maybe in South Korea, perhaps the prison system is so horrible that maybe you only get one meal a week, to barely keep you alive, and maybe you don't get to bathe in a South Korean prison. Could that be it?

The same thing happened in Oldboy, where people would pay to stay in hidden rooms for the rest of their lives to avoid prison time, so maybe they prison system is SK is that bad, that no criminal will go under any circumstances?



Parasyte is a good movie. It is partly about the concept that people of very different socioeconomic backgrounds tend to view the other as not human. That is, it's about socially induced dehumanization.

It is interesting that people still get to throw around the term "capitalism" when the movie only talks about an issue people often have in any society (ancient or modern). This habit of blaming things on "capitalism" is just a reactionary reaction to modernity.

Well it's just some things in the climax left me scratching my head, that's all. I talked about it with a friend of mine and he said maybe staying in a basement with no baths is better than going to prison, cause maybe in South Korea, perhaps the prison system is so horrible that maybe you only get one meal a week, to barely keep you alive, and maybe you don't get to bathe in a South Korean prison. Could that be it?
No. South Korea has probably better prisons than the US does. People don't like staying in prison becuase you are, well, "in prison" no matter how comfortable it might look like.

The same thing happened in Oldboy, where people would pay to stay in hidden rooms for the rest of their lives to avoid prison time, so maybe they prison system is SK is that bad, that no criminal will go under any circumstances?
Well, maybe you prefer to stay "free" in a hidden room than "in prison".



SPOILER
Oh yes, I understand that it's allegorical, but what was Ki-Taek's personal reason for choosing to spend the rest of his life in a basement over prison?

Ki-Taek does not know he is in a movie, and would not make decisions based on allegories. When a person commits murder and has to go on the run, they make the decisions that are best for them, not decisions that would allegorically effect the story they are in. So why did Ki-Taek choose the basement over prison, when the basement would just be worse for him?
Because he murdered a person. So if he surrenders to the authorities his punishment is not going to be something that is feasible (I don't know the law in Korea but it's not possible he would get like 5 years in prison for murder). Hidding in the basement nobody knows exists is going to be the optimal strategy for him.

Also, going to prison is not like going to a hotel: it is a terrible environment full of psychopaths (in prisons where they send murderers in) where you might be under constant physical threat. It is an absolutely terrible place to be.



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Oh okay, well if it's better than an American prison probably, then why doesn't he just turn himself in so he can at least bathe, and have easier access to food, rather than suffer in a room where you can not bathe for the rest of your life, and more challenging access to food?

As for the prison sentence being a big sentence, wouldn't he still have to spend just as much time in a basement, being hidden though, compared to a prison sentence? If he gets say 30 years, he would still have to hide in the basement for 30 years, so why not go to the 30 year place, where you can at least bathe, and eat easier?



Oh okay, well if it's better than an American prison probably, then why doesn't he just turn himself in so he can at least bathe, and have easier access to food, rather than suffer in a room where you can not bathe for the rest of your life, and more challenging access to food?
Maybe he found a cupboard in the basement with a huge stash of his favourite tinned soup.



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There is one other thing I was wondering about. The movie is described as a dark comedy thriller on different sites. However, this movie doesn't seem that funny and seems more like a drama. Aside from a couple of funny parts I found it be pretty much a straight up drama, unless I'm wrong?



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I'd say that, while it shifts tones and modes a whole lot, it's fundamentally a satire and therefore a comedy.
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Oh okay, I thought it was satirical not a comedy, in the same sense that a movie like Natural Born Killers is a satire, but not a comedy. Unless that's a comedy too? Are all satires, comedies?



Welcome to the human race...
In short, yes. I would say that satire is a sub-genre of comedy that uses humour to make a greater point, but a satire need to strike the right balance between its point and its humour in order to be effective. You could redo Parasite with the same plot and make it a much broader comedy, but that is liable to make it a less effective. To this end, Natural Born Killers strikes me as the kind of satire that can't quite find that balance, either straining too hard to make that point or forgetting it completely at times.



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Oh okay, I thought Natural Born Killers was possibly trying to be more over the top in it's satire, but didn't have as big of a point to make in the end compared to something like Parasite, so maybe it was good for NBK to go more over the top?



Best of the year. What else can I say. I wish the jury gives it to Parasite.
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That being said, this year is firmly Netflix's year. So too will be 2020. Amazon has a lot of catching up to do, if it is really trying to compete that is.



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Oh okay, what does Netflix have to do with it?



The fact that they have a lot of nominations. He either meant to post this in the other Parasite thread, or was just referencing the awards talk in general.



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Oh but I thought that Parasite wasn't going to Netflix, or at least I couldn't find a release date yet. But I am Canadian, so maybe it's going to American netflix?



That's what I mean by "awards talk in general." He mentioned Parasite's award chances, then segued to saying that it's Netflix's year. He's not saying Parasite is a Netflix film, he's saying Netflix films might be one of the reasons it doesn't win awards.



Yeah that just popped up in my mind while I was typing. So threw it out there.






This describes Parasite really well. It's really short coz it's a top 10 video, but does a very fine job with few words.



Movie Forums Squirrel Jumper
That's what I mean by "awards talk in general." He mentioned Parasite's award chances, then segued to saying that it's Netflix's year. He's not saying Parasite is a Netflix film, he's saying Netflix films might be one of the reasons it doesn't win awards.
Oh I see. So the Oscars perhaps favors Netflix films more now?