“Life in South Korea can be hard,” says director Bong Joon Ho’s 2019 thriller/mystery/think piece/comedy/who-even-knows movie Parasite. “Its cities are crowded, its economic mobility limited, and its toilets prone to expressing their dissatisfaction with all the (admittedly unpleasant) ins and outs of daily toilet life by returning the contents it was meant to consign to oblivion right back into the homes of their cruel human masters.” “Well, Parasite,” you return, “you certainly describe a grim situation, but what does it mean? What can or should be done about it? What deeper point are you trying to get across? And how does BTS figure into all of this? (No, seriously, someone please explain what BTS is to me, I’m scared to look it up.)” Parasite’s reply is ambiguous, a half-shrug and a mysterious smile, and depending on what kind of movies you like, this may send you scrambling for articles, videos, and reviews dissecting the deep layers of thematic flesh in which Parasite is coated, or on a different kind of journey . . . the kind that leads back to the video aisle of your local Walmart with anger in your heart and a refund in your future. But whether you left the theater ready to declare the film a masterpiece or having thrown up into your popcorn at the sheer pretentiousness of it all (or just having been inspired to write an angry letter to . . . whoever runs capitalism, Mr. Monopoly I think), your reaction was probably not one of apathy. Now, the movie-going Magellans for which this program is named will submit for your listening pleasure their own reactions to the 2020 Best Picture winner, their, uh, let’s say endearingly enthusiastic attempts at thematic analysis, as well as their best efforts to recommend a movie that is in any way similar to one that, whatever else, resists easy classification. Let’s do it!
