Parasite

        Because I'm afraid to give away too much and spoil your experience this plot description is going to be extremely vague. Kim Ki-woo and his family reside in a rural area of South Korea. They struggle to get by as they accept any form of income that happens to come their way. The film begins with them complaining about their cellular data being shut off and their upstairs neighbor putting a password on their wifi. They fold dozens of pizza boxes to make some money, but an interesting opportunity comes along. A friend of Ki-woo's, who's had more academic achievement, comes by for a visit and as they share a drink outside of the apartment, Ki-woo is offered an English mentoring position. His friend is traveling abroad for a year and wants Ki-woo to replace him as the mentor for his student. This particular student belongs to an incredibly wealthy family which interests him and his family, but he's going to have to convince the mother that he is as good of a fit as his friend. That's all I give for plot. The story becomes more complicated as Ki-woo's whole family becomes involved, but this job offering is how the film starts. Don't be fooled though. This film, halfway through, takes a shocking turn where the stakes only get higher.
        I don’t know if you’ve already seen advertisements on your end, but on my end this is the most advertisement I’ve seen for a foreign film. All my social media walls have sponsored ads for this film and I think that's a good thing because EVERYONE should try to see this movie. It’s one of the best directed and one of the most original of the year. It’s written and directed by Bong Joon-ho who also made Snowpiercer and Okja. Those are his only English films, as far as I know, as he has many more films in his native Korean language. If you’re not a fan of subtitles then I don’t know what to tell you. I strongly recommend that you trudge through them because the movie is worth it.

        One thing I think I've learned  this year from seeing film after film is that directing is really important. Not that I ever perceived it as something that wasn't it's just that I used to never know how to tell the difference between good and bad directing. It's starting to become more clear to me nowadays and I could definitely tell that a lot of care went into the craft of this film. The pacing is steady and it reveals things to you at a strategic momentum so that everything maintains its shock value. The film dangles a hook in front of you for the first half as it slowly lures you into the lives and story of the two families and how they start to become more intertwined. At some point though, you don't even know you're caught on the hook and the film rips you out of the water. Motives and actions are questioned and secrecy couldn't be more difficult to maintain.
        If there's any advice I could give before going into this movie is to avoid all marketing. I think the trailers are fine, it's just that they are, in my opinion, a tad bit misleading for the tone of the film. I won't say how, but just avoid them if you can. Like, I said, as blind as possible. As far as issues go, I don't really have any. Because I watched the trailers beforehand, I was a little bit amiss when the product I got wasn't what I was expecting. I'm glad I got something unexpected, but it took some time for me to disassociate from those expectations and accept what was there. Once that happened, I immediately got more invested.
        This movie also demands to be discussed. It presents an intense dichotomy between the upper and lower social class, providing a foundation for what eventually becomes an observational and almost satirical look at class structures and how they view each other. It's interesting to see the juxtaposition of these two mindsets even if one may be a tad bit exaggerated but that;s just part of satire.
        On a larger scale, this film is a personification of the upper and lower class. What happens when one attempts to leech itself into the other? Is it inherently malicious or is it simply out of survival? You might find yourself questioning why your feeling a certain way towards the two families. I found myself switching between caring about both and hating both. This films plays with you and takes you on a thrilling ride. I only hope that this masterpiece isn't overlooked throughout the current awards season. 10/10