Two masterpieces, 16 years apart, what do they have in common?
The New Proletariat: The Unemployed
Long gone are the days when the working class meant a horde of angry farmers, taking to their feet to protest their evil landlords or launching an uprising against the middle class. The new proletariat (just a fancy term for working class) is the scapegoat of the suffering economy – unemployed, living in the semi-basement and a heathen for free wifi. Quite the irony to call them “working class” then, when they aren’t even working.
This seems to be the essence of what Bong Joon Ho is implying in his newest masterpiece, Parasite (2019). The dark comedy has many remarkable moments but at the heart of this tour de force is a pertinent theme that traverses through much of Korean cinema and culture: the widening income gap and the increasingly complicated power dynamics between the chaebols (the richest of the rich – think Samsung CEO) and the common man.
Realising this reminded me of another Korean classic, Oldboy (2003), though one could argue that both films could not be more different. So the point of this three part essay series then, is to show you, the reader, that even if Parasite and Oldboy diverge in the ways they argue capitalism has shaped Korean society, both films converge to mourn the tragedy of the class war.
Part I will focus on Parasite, Part II will be on Oldboy and Part III will tie together the loose strands before concluding the series of essays on the two Korean films.
Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire
According to Jean Baudrillard, in a capitalist society there are two ways of understanding worth: use value and symbolic exchange value. For instance, the use value of a cup of coffee would be its practical significance, which would be to help the drinker stay awake. But why do we spend 8 dollars on a cup of coffee from St**b*cks when we can get the same cup for 1 dollar from a vending machine? This is what Baudrillard considers symbolic exchange value. The green logo, though of no practical significance, signifies wealth, class and style and translates into the foundation of a multi-million dollar franchise.
Symbolic value also applies to humans, where the way we speak, our mode of dressing and the places we studied become markers of our class. The very real economic structure of class is connoted by these intangible signs. Since these aspects are largely symbolic, it would mean that one can easily overcome class by faking these signs. Then why do class and socioeconomic status still exist?
Because of the body.
The corporeality of the human body, which stands in stark contrast to the abstractness of the aforementioned signs, resists the person’s complete integration into the social construct of a different class (Shoutout to Dr Goh for introducing this idea). In other words, no matter how good a faker you might be, there will be an aspect of your real and physical body which you cannot control, that will give you away. So in a way, your body is the ultimate cockblock to your dreams of upward social mobility.
[SPOILERS ABOUND FROM HERE ON]
This is almost exactly what happens to the Kim family in Parasite, where their dreams of integrating into the rich upper class family that employs them is thwarted by their odour, or in Ki-Jung’s words: “the semi-basement smell”.
Min Hyuk, Ki Woo's rich friend, doesn’t just bring a lucky antique rock with him, but also offers Ki Woo a job opportunity as an English tutor to the teenage daughter of the Park family. This gets the ball rolling on the Kim family’s elaborate scheme to infiltrate and replace existing employees in the Park household, as they come up with air-tight alibis, fake English names and even doctor a university degree.
With the Machiavellian maknae (Ki Jung) as the brain of their devious plan, the Kims parody societal conventions signifying class to make a fool of their "young and simple" lady boss. By manipulating the symbolic value of markers of class, they reap real economic value in the form of the salaries and other benefits that they receive from the Parks for their labour. Bong reveals in a remarkable twist that Mr Park unwittingly feeds not one, not two, but three families, and hence the title: Parasite - which on a surface level, seems to refer to how the poor leech off the rich.
Everything goes according to plan until that fateful rainy day when all falls apart. As the Kim family teeters precariously on the edge of being exposed, hiding under the table, Father Kim listens intently to the intimate conversation between the Parks. Driver Kim is a decent worker Mr Park says, “[but] that smell crosses the line”, that scent you “sometimes smell on the subway”. “People who ride on the subway have a special smell”, he proclaims, before he and his wife indulge in a sexual fantasy where they imagine they are this debauched lower class, wearing cheap panties and abusing drugs.
You can fake your degree, you can fake your name, but you can't do sh*t about your natural body scent. With this one conversation, Bong shows how class is not an imaginary construct but very much a real physiological phenomenon inextricable from the bodies of each subject. The odour of the poverty-stricken body becomes a demarcation of socio-economic class. The line between employer and employee becomes set in stone and the earlier blurring of boundaries is erased in one fell swoop.
The next morning, there is a drastic shift in the previously carefree and timid Father Kim’s mannerisms. His awareness of his inferior status descends ominously upon the atmosphere of the film and hints of quiet anger at his polite employers begin to stir in his eyes.
As the film crescendos and chaos breaks out, true to character, Father Kim watches helplessly as his daughter gets stabbed, his injured son gets carried out and his wife wrestles with the madman who broke out of the basement. In a glaring juxtaposition between the two patriarchs, Mr Park rises to action to save his own family, demanding Driver Kim at least throw him the car keys if he can’t get up and drive.
Alas, the keys land underneath the body of the homeless man, who hasn’t showered in 4 years. Grudgingly extricating the keys from under the now-dead body, Mr Park visibly shudders at the unbearable stench.
This sets forth a breath-taking moment of unrestrained Marxist rage that propels Father Kim to drive a dagger straight into his employer’s heart. Fade to black.
In a rapidly progressing era of global capitalism, proletarian anger is no longer manifest in mass protests or mutiny. Nor does it disappear with promises of wealth. Instead, it is repressed under the veneer of social hierarchy, civility and manners. Through framing the intimate conversation between his rich couple from the voyeuristic perspective of their employee, Bong strips away social mores to reveal the dark and unfiltered reality of Korean economic inequality.
With this scene as a crucial turning point, Bong ensures that all the details of his masterpiece, down to the rhythm, editing and mis-en-scene all build-up to the pinnacle of the film: the catharsis of proletarian fury triggered by the odour of the poverty-ridden body.
Bong builds an intricate world in Parasite to satirically visualise the jarring discrepancy caused by the unequal distribution of wealth. Each of his characters is unmistakably human and real. So are their emotions and their bodies. At the end of the day, there are no winners in his cynical world. And so, Bong poignantly highlights the irreparable crack that capitalism has caused in humanity.
This article is the first of a three-part essay series on Parasite and Oldboy. Part II discusses class relations in Oldboy and Part III will deliberate on the endings of both films.
References
Baudrillard, Jean. “Sign Function and Class Logic.” For a Critique of the Political Economy of the Sign. Telos Press, 1972.
Dr Goh, Robbie. Writing Global India: (Dis)Posessions of Capitalism February, 2019.
Oldboy. Dir. Park Chan Wook. 2003.
Parasite. Dir. Bong Joon Ho. 2019.
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