the movie parasite

During winter break, I saw the movie Parasite (after reading Natalie's blog and seeing she recommended it - I had to). It's a South Korean film that's mostly a thriller, but with a little comedy too. The basic plot is that the son of the Kims, a family living in extreme poverty, gets an opportunity to work for a very very rich family (the Parks), and slowly convinces the Park family to employ his other family members, all while pretending to be skilled workers that are unrelated to one another. Essentially, the Kim family infiltrates the Park family. This movie stuck with me because it ultimately revealed how different life is for people living in poverty compared to people with wealth and how separation of classes and unequal distribution of wealth are simultaneously ludicrous and cruel. The mother of the Park family is self-centered and air-headed, and takes her wealth for granted. Her behavior and perception of her life and wealth makes a sharp contrast with the experiences of the Kim family, and highlights just how lucky she is to live in comfort and just how unjust it is that the Kim family is forced to live in the conditions they do. At one point in the movie, the Kim's tiny underground home is flooded with sewage water, and they desperately try to save their prized possessions as the watch their home be destroyed. The next day, the mother of the Park family calls Ki-Woo (the son of the Kim family) to ask for his help planning her son's party, and complains about how difficult the job of throwing the party is. The extreme differences between their situations is further illustrated as the mother of the Park family blabbers on and on about insignificant things that aren't real problems at all, and that if anything, she is lucky to get to worry about, to Ki-Woo, as he sits with the few damaged possessions he managed to save, in a gym surrounded by hundreds living in the same poverty with flooded homes just like his. The watcher sees with clarity that the the Park family lives in a cloud, something resembling a heaven, without real problems, and people like Ki-Woo and the Kim family are left destitute in a struggle for their livelihood.