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Parasite | 2019 | R | – 5.6.7
Why is “Parasite” rated R? The MPAA rating has been assigned for “language, some violence and sexual content.” The Kids-In-Mind.com evaluation includes a sex scene with partial nudity, and a few kissing scenes; a couple of fighting scenes that end with bloody injuries and a couple of deaths; and over 20 F-words and other strong language. Read our parents’ guide below for details on sexual content, violence & strong language.”
A family (Kang-ho Song, Woo-sik Choi, Hye-jin Jang and So-dam Park) that’s down on its luck stumbles into a seemingly dream job for each one of them with a wealthy family — that is until secrets are revealed and circumstances spiral out of control. Also with Sun-kyun Lee, Yeo-jeong Jo and Ji-so Jung. Directed by Bong Joon Ho. Dialogue is spoken in Korean with English subtitles and a few lines are spoken in English. [Running Time: 2:12]
Parasite SEX/NUDITY 5
– Three people hide under a table in a house when a husband and a wife lie on the sofa nearby and the husband caresses the wife’s breasts under her pajama top (we see a partial breast and cleavage); she moans and reaches into her husband’s pants as he moans, and he rubs her crotch through the pajama bottoms and they both moan. A husband squeezes his wife’s clothed buttocks.
► A young man and a teen girl kiss passionately in her bedroom. A teen girl touches a young man’s wrist and they kiss. A teen girl asks a young man if he is interested in a young woman (she seems to be jealous). A young man asks another young man to protect a teen girl while he is away. A young man touches a teen girl’s wrist, she gasps, and her mother seems alarmed.
► A man finds a pair of women’s underwear in the back of his car and assumes that his driver had sex with someone in the car; he describes to his wife later what he thinks happened and refers to “car sex.” A young woman removes her underwear and leaves it in the back of a car (we see her partial bare thigh). A young man hides under a teen girl’s bed and a dog whimpers, nearly giving the young man away.
► A man is shown in a bathtub (we don’t see anything). A woman in a bathtub (we don’t see anything). A woman skirt is slit in the back and reveals her bare legs to the mid-thighs as she walks up stairs. A teen girl wears shorts that reveal her bare legs to the upper thighs.
Parasite VIOLENCE/GORE 6
– A man with a knife walks among people gathered at a party and stabs a young woman in the shoulder (we see her bloody wound) and a woman with an axe attacks the man and they fight until the woman stabs the man with a long skewer (with grilled sausages still on it), and another man stabs another man in the chest with a knife (we see a bloody wound as the man falls to the ground). A man wraps a cable around a young man’s neck and attaches it to a wall, the young man struggles to get away and the man picks up a large rock, hits the young man in the head (we hear a crunch) and slams it down on him on the floor (we see a pool of blood under the young man’s head).
► Two groups of people fight and shove each other, as they struggle to get a cellphone before a video is released to the public: a woman hits another woman and a man in the head with a bottle, a woman smears a peach on the face of a woman and we see one man gagged and hogtied with a cable. A woman kicks another woman down a flight of stairs and she slams her head against a wall (we see her lying motionless and later with blood on her head and complaining of a concussion). A man slams his head against a light switch repeatedly and we see a deep gash on his bloody forehead. A man buries a body in a yard (we see the body only from a distance).
► Three people fall down stairs and onto the floor where a woman is startled and records them talking to each other; she threatens them to post the video and turn them in to their employer. A woman rings a doorbell late at night and enters a house laughing maniacally; she is shown trying to open a passage, she makes her way down stairs and through hallways to an opening where we see a man lying on a bed (he has been there for some time) and she feeds him what looks like milk formula from a bottle. We hear that a woman is allergic to peaches and we see her in the hospital after peach fuzz is sprinkled near her and she has an attack (she’s coughing and wheezing). Three people sneak out from under a table as a man and a woman sleep on a nearby sofa; one man is nearly caught when the sleeping people are awakened.
► A woman coughs violently and throws a used tissue in the garbage (we see it covered with a red liquid later, after a man squeezes a red sauce on it, implying that it is blood). A man outside an apartment sprays a thick fumigation fog that enters the apartment and causes the people inside to cough. A man flicks a stinkbug off a dining table. A woman calls her husband a cockroach and he raises his fist to hit her; he breaks several bottles when he swings his arm back and they both laugh (he does not hit her). Two men in a street yell at each other and shove each other. A woman swings a rope with a ball at the end and releases it; it sails through the air and we hear glass break in the distance. A woman picks up suction cup arrows from the floor and the wall of a home where a young boy plays with them and he later shoots a couple of arrows into a room and his mother yells at him.
► A flashback shows a young boy alone in a kitchen at night and he sees a man sneaking up a flight of dark stairs; the boy thinks it’s a ghost and has a seizure (we hear about this and do not see the seizure). Three people hide under a table in a house when the homeowners return unexpectedly (please see the Sex/Nudity category for more details). A young man wakes up in a hospital bed after brain surgery and laughs uncontrollably as police question him.
► A woman cries and talks about an incident with her young son having seen a “ghost” in their home and that his fear caused a seizure of some sort. A man says that a woman has TB and another woman panics with the news. A woman says that she will be “Hanged and quartered” if her husband finds something out. A man talks about the way people smell and says that people that ride the subway smell a certain way. A young boy says that four people smell the same. A young boy lies on the floor in his room and has a suction cup arrow between his legs. People talk about homes having bunkers in case of an attack by North Korea. Two men wear Native American headdresses at a young boy’s birthday party. A woman talks about her son being an “Indian fanatic” and we see him playing with bows and arrows and sleeping in a teepee.
► A torrential downpour floods streets and sidewalks as three people make their way back to their apartment; they arrive and see that the sewers have backed up and sewerage is flooding the inside of their apartment; we see dirty water spurting out of drains and toilets. A man urinates against a wall in an alley outside an apartment window and a man inside rushes out and throws water from a bottle on him, another man dumps a bucket of water on him and the man urinating sprays the stream of urine toward both men. A man urinates in a street a few times and we see the stream. Someone says that something “Makes me want to puke.” A woman is shown with a bruised face, scabbed soars on her lip, and swollen eyes. A boy eats a cake using his hands and we see cake and icing smeared on his hands and face. A woman vomits into a toilet (we hear her gagging; we do not see goo). A truck cuts off a car on the road and the car driver swerves and honks.
Parasite LANGUAGE 7
– About 21 F-words, 4 sexual references, 5 scatological terms, 2 anatomical terms, 14 mild obscenities, name-calling (rejects, crazy, strange, sick, punk, loser, revolting frat boys, Indian fanatic, trauma recovery cake, Neanderthals, cretins, weird, loan sharks, monster, cockroach, silly, gullible, duck bill, shameful incident, scumbag, forbidden fruit, pervert, wicked, stinking guts, creeps), exclamations (shut-up), 1 religious profanity (GD), 8 religious exclamations (e.g. God, Jesus, My God, Oh My God, Thank God, a reference is made to a “Love Of God Church”). | profanity glossary |
Parasite SUBSTANCE USE
– A man and woman talk about suspecting someone of being a drug addict. Two young men drink shots of something unidentified, several people drink beverages from cans that could be beer, many bottles of wine and champagne are seen in a wine fridge, and four people drink whiskey and other liquor and appear inebriated. A young woman smokes in a café and is told that it is not allowed (she continues to smoke).
Parasite DISCUSSION TOPICS
– Family, poverty, desperation, wealth, fraud, deceit, making plans, eccentric, moderation, focus, regret, secrets, debt, class distinctions, forgery, trespassing.
Parasite MESSAGE
– Making no plans at all can never be disappointing because they will never fail.
CAVEATS
Be aware that while we do our best to avoid spoilers it is impossible to disguise all details and some may reveal crucial plot elements.
We've gone through several editorial changes since we started covering films in 1992 and older reviews are not as complete & accurate as recent ones; we plan to revisit and correct older reviews as resources and time permits.
Our ratings and reviews are based on the theatrically-released versions of films; on video there are often Unrated, Special, Director's Cut or Extended versions, (usually accurately labelled but sometimes mislabeled) released that contain additional content, which we did not review.
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Become a member of our premium site for just $2/month & access advance reviews, without any ads, not a single one, ever. And you will be helping support our website & our efforts.
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