The Oscars won by the South Korean film, Parasite, pay a welcome tribute to cinema's ability to shine the spotlight on the darker corners of social reality in Asia and elsewhere. Among other accolades, the biting social satire won Best Picture, making history as the first film not in the English language to win the movie industry's highest honour. Writer, director and producer Bong Joon-ho would feel vindicated in having lived up to a commentator's compliment that his films are sociology-in-motion, imbued with critical thought without being preachy. The artistry of his film-making, recognised in the awards showered on Parasite, makes propaganda unnecessary.
In some ways, Parasite acts as a necessary counterpoint to the gilded world portrayed in films such as Crazy Rich Asians. That film imbued Asia mythologically with the riches of a segment of its population, whose lifestyle would be the envy of ordinary people anywhere. Although its celebration of Asia's rise to prosperity after World War II, and its consequent eminence on the global stage, helped reinforce the economic resilience and vitality of Asians, the film provided but a selective glimpse of the overall nature of Asian societies. All societies are made up of winners and losers, and those struggling to rise through the interstices of existence. Parasite draws attention to the lives of the economically marginalised in what is one of Asia's undoubted success stories.
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