Parasite, or What Remains after Class Antagonism

Abstract

In response to the prevalent reception of his latest film as a class allegory concerning the rich and the poor, Bong Joon-ho suggested that one instead look for Parasite’s appeal in its immanent dimension qua cinematic work. Taking the director at his word, this study traces the unfolding of the film’s plot, starting with the opening sequence, whose quasi-‘slice of life’ depiction of the protagonist (Kim) family’s squalor pans out to oppose the ensuing image of IT company CEO (Park)’s posh lifestyle, thereby laying the ground for the former’s infiltration of the latter’s residence in search of work. To insist on this apparent symbolism of economic disparity, however, is to overlook the narrative’s kaleidoscopic rhythm, which retroactively shifts the significative coordinates of the succeeding scenes. Thus, more than a symbol of affluence and high social standing, Park’s luxurious house functions as what Žižek termed the ‘organizational device’ around which the suspense heightens, giving rise to a continuous variation of filmic genres ranging from a family drama, a caper film, a suspense thriller, a black comedy and so on. This formal aspect of generic vicissitude finds its figurative embodiment in the changing configuration of oppositional dyads, in which groups of characters are continually pitted against one another until the climactic moment of violence, where suddenly rid of signification of the social, the confrontation of sheer bodies erupts. One way to account for this twisty narrative move would be to relate it to the post-revolutionary situation of South Korea in the wake of the 2016 candlelight protest, a condition in which the claims of history still hauntingly reverberate against the mundane backdrop of the post-historical (or post-human) sensibility; but the film’s bearings extend beyond the limits of geographical boundary to the extent that it problematizes our involvement in the film not only as its audience but as living agents caught up in the pulsating inertia of historical change even amidst the protracted impasse of a global pandemic.