Parasite: The Latest Greatest

Much has been made of Bong Joon-ho's most recent movie Parasite, which has picked up Best Film awards at a number of festivals including the prestigious Cannes. But when a reviewer proclaims that this movie is the director's masterpiece, you have to wonder: Have they seen anything by Bong Joon-ho before? Isn't Memories of Murder a masterpiece? How about Okja? Or The Host? I'd certainly argue on behalf of any of them. As for Mother, and Snowpiercer, and Barking Dogs Never Bite, I've no doubt that those have their champions too. Seriously... He hasn't got a stinker in the bunch. My point is that when you're dealing with a director like Bong — or Park Chan-wook or Pedro Almodovar or Federico Fellini — it ultimately becomes a matter of favorites since nearly everything they make is touched by genius. Is Parasite Bong's masterpiece? Well, it's definitely one of them.

And so, unsurprisingly, Parasite has no shortage of riches: it's got astute class commentary that portrays the rich as children insisting they be pampered; strong performances across the board, especially from the ever-reliable Song Kang-ho as the downtrodden patriarch; a suspense-laden crime story that challenges your alliances periodically; and plenty of visual gags to interrupt the ongoing tension with intermittent giggles. Will the poor Kim family usurp the rich Park family by taking over the roles of all their servants in their architectural wonder of a home? Well, yes and no. What that means exactly is answering in a distinctly Bongian manner, upstairs, downstairs, and in the basement. Now keep your dirty paws off those dog treats.

The Midnight Sun: The Kidnapped Son

Neo-noir film wasn't just a thing in the U.S.A. during the 1970s. South Korea had its own thing going on too if Lee Man-hui's The Midnight Sun is any indication, a rock-solid, dirty-noble-cop movie in which our antihero is a cranky commander with a short temper, a detached attitude, and some sort of medical condition that requires him to drink an unappetizing brown liquid out of a warmed-up baby bottle. The primary crimes that he's currently dealing with are a spate of motorcycle robberies involving a young woman who rarely isn't wearing a red mini-dress, and a grieving, heartbroken kidnapper who has targeted the cop's troublemaking son as his mark. Will the boss-cop nab the thieving lovers and prevent his own child's murder before he wins that upcoming departmental award? The suspense is pretty thick in The Midnight Sun so you're never totally sure until the dual finale arrives and it's so full of outlandish twists and turns that you'd likely dub this film improbable if it weren't so damned enjoyably crazy.

Indeed you'll cut this flick a lot of slack because it's so well paced and populated by so many entertaining secondary characters like a romantic police officer who's courting his supervisor's standoffish, tour-guide sister-in-law; a self-supporting orphan (with a pet squirrel) who's searching for his one living sibling; and a tormented ex-con who can't keep his sunglasses on straight or disguise his voice for the life of him. Another charm? The flick also has that strange Kodachrome palette that defined a generation of film and feels like a nostalgic Instagram filter. Of such tints are dreams made.