Another Choice
Ever done a job interview?
Apparently we’re supposed to like No Other Choice, as the BBC and others would have it, “this year’s Parasite.” Did it get some jumps out of me, yes. Did I laugh, yes.
I laugh at all kinds of things. I can make myself laugh. I don’t need the help of a bleakly obvious, drawn out oh-i’m-meant-to-be-amused-by-that movie, an easy movie that’s all surface, even formally, a movie whose contribution is even easier…
I cringe at the Parasite comparison — these are the only two South Korean movies in existence, famously — but the unfortunate truth is there’s some merit to it. If anything, this is a movie that is trying to be Parasite without being Parasite, terrified that Parasite has said it already, what need is there for this? And yet this is a movie that understands nothing about what Parasite has to contribute, nor can it comprehend Parasite’s achievement in form.
What Parasite accomplishes in one line — “Respect!” — in one character — the housekeeper’s husband hiding from loan sharks underground for years, soon to switch out with Mr. Kim who should have all the makings of an ally — in one image — that bleeding head slamming the lights on in the bunker as Mr. Park enters the house above — what Parasite does so handily, almost offhandedly, No Other Choice takes the whole movie to do, and that’s exactly why it fails, why else…
Well, that and there’s no soul, no heart, no spirit, not like Parasite which is all of those things, and seriousness and brevity and grief and anger and possibility and death — that ending, the embodiment of the capacity of film to bend time for our catharsis, only to rip it from our hands, and the sound of that paper crinkling, inevitable and yet entirely unforeseen.
No Other Choice ends with the closest thing to a heart that it can muster — the sound of their daughter’s gorgeous music — and it’s the part of the film that is genuinely excellent, but also the part we can see from a thousand miles away, the part we know is coming the whole time.
Parasite trusts you to know somewhere deep within yourself exactly what it means. The credits roll on No Other Choice and it’s still force-feeding something to you — should we go? Wait, is it not finished? But you don’t have enough energy to really care if it’s the same spiel or something new. Believe it or not, “if only working people weren’t forced to tear each other apart!” was a thought I’d already had, but thank you for assuming we were all fucking stupid.
More to the point, Parasite is the more interesting film, the more soulful, the more brutal. The first half brings me joy like nothing else, but I can’t watch past when the doorbell rings, I just can’t, it’s torture. With No Other Choice I just can’t be bothered, and honestly maybe no one should. It’s a movie you’ve seen before if you’ve ever done a job interview. It does manage to be more fun than one of those, but that can’t really be enough can it?
Medina quadrascore: good, didn’t like (1, 0).