The Parasite and The Host: Makings of a Bong Joon-Ho Film

As a fan of South Korean cinema, the 92nd Oscars was an exciting event for me. Bong Joon-Ho, a Korean director, took home four Oscars and won Best Picture, making his movie the first foreign film to win this award. Bong's victory is not only a triumph for South Korean cinema, but cinema in general. It means that foreign films can be a staple in mainstream media without having to be dubbed or remade. Overseas productions can produce some of the most meaningful and original films, and Bong's recognition at the Oscars furthers this notion of cinema being an universal artform.  Bong, an already established director, has an unquestionably consistent filmography ranging from South Korean classics like Memories of Murder and Mother to acclaimed Hollywood films like Snowpiercer and Okja. His recent victory makes it an opportune time to examine one of the most impressive films in Bong’s archives. A film so good, it broke Korean box office records and crossed over to international markets. A film that effortlessly blends horror and comedy as it tells a story about class struggles and the importance of family. That’s right. I’m talking about 2006’s The Host.

It’s easy to draw connections between The Host and Bong’s Oscar-winning Parasite, making these two films perfect companion pieces. However, it’s the striking differences that make The Host its own unique film rather than a prototype of Parasite. The Host takes a less grounded approach as it’s essentially a monster film. Interestingly, the film ditches the towering goliaths capable of leveling cities and opts for a tamer but still grotesque monster. The unnamed monster appears to be a strange, minivan sized fish-lizard. Despite its stature, the monster is still capable of destruction but on a much smaller scale. This detail allows the film to take a personal look at the human characters who often get sidelined in monster flicks. Rather than a high tech military or a rival creature, the monster’s main opposition is the Park family. The Parks consist of an elderly father and three middle-aged siblings. The siblings are Gang-Du, a lazy snack vendor who still lives with his father, Nam-Il, a college graduate struggling to find employment, and Nam-Joo, an Olympic archer whose only able to win bronze medals. The three estranged siblings and their father band together to hunt down the monster who kidnapped the most beloved member of their pack, Gang-Du’s adolescent daughter.

The Host is gut-wrenching, terrifying, suspenseful, and hilarious all at the same time. One of Bong’s most successful trademarks is the effortless blend of comedy and horror, which The Host achieves in all the best ways. One of the most horrific scenes in the film depicts the monster attacking a group of picnic-goers by the Han river. The panicking crowd locks themselves inside a small trailer in an attempt to barricade the monster. The plan ultimately fails when the monster easily rips through the doors and charges inside the trailer. The camera pans to the exterior, and viewers are left hearing the screams of those trapped inside. A plethora of bloody arms reach through the cracks of the door as they plead for help, and nauseating sounds of crunching play in the background. This display of horror subsides when Gang-Du, with the help of a tourist, futilely launches rocks at the monster in slapstick fashion as they bumble around struggling to lift small boulders. Of course, this descends right back into horror as the monster pins down the tourist with its claw. Gang-Du, realizing the futility of his situation, leaves his ally behind to be shredded apart. Normally such drastic tonal shifts would seem uncomfortable or jarring, but Bong  implements this technique in a way that feels both natural and necessary. The humor isn’t cheesy or downplays the severity of a scene, but adds an authentic realness to the film. A singular tone throughout a movie can make the divide between our world and a cinematic world all the more obvious. From the overtly serious noir detective films to the upbeat brightness of comedies, these polar extremes make immersion difficult by indicating it’s another world we're watching. Whereas, the real world isn't constantly worry free nor terrible. It's human nature to find the humor in the bleakest events, and Bong achieves this idea through his portrayals of how people cope with personal or national tragedies. He reveals that horror and humor aren't complete opposites, but two sides of the same coin. Both depend on the subversion of an expectation, and operate through the same techniques. It's why The Host could make us laugh at a funeral scene or feel uneasy during a happy family dinner.

The Host, like all of Bong’s other films, is ripe with political subtext. In the film, the monster’s origins are traced to a U.S military base irresponsibly dumping formaldehyde into the Han river. This incident was inspired by a real event in 2000 when American military troops dumped 20 gallons of harmful chemicals into the Korean sewage system against regulation. This incident led to mass protests against the stationing of soldiers in Seoul. Meanwhile, the eponymous “hosts” of this movie refer to the victims of the attack. They are rounded up and quarantined by the government to keep the incident confidential. The film then implies that the parasite is the United State’s military presence in Korea as they attempt to kill the monster of their making by releasing a dangerous chemical into the air called Agent Yellow. Bong’s film also takes several shots  at the South Korean government depicting them as corrupt, incompetent, and detached. 

Parasite told the story of a modern Korea, where the nation has grown wealthy but left a large portion of its people behind. The Host is the story of a post-war Korea that was still burdened by a history of assassinations, and student protests. However, in both of these movies, Bong anchors his political criticism through a family unit. By viewing these political and class struggles through the lens of the average person, he makes these issues personal. His protagonists aren’t heroes trying to right a wrong, but people trying to survive and live. The Host ends on a bittersweet note. The Park siblings confronted their personal faults and changed for the better at the cost of two deaths in the family. Gang-Yu learns to be a responsible father, adopting a homeless boy whose father was also killed by the monster. At the end of The Host, Gang-Yu and his adopted son turn off a broadcast about the monster incident so they can focus on their dinner. After all, there’s no political stakes or greater mission left for them. They simply wish to continue living their lives.