Renowned Korean director Bong Joon-ho’s Parasite received the Sydney Film Festival's main award, the $60,000 Sydney Film Prize at the festival's closing ceremony on Sunday night after winning the prestigious Palme D'Or at Cannes. He is the first Korean filmmaker to do so in that festival's history.
Parasite vividly contrasts the two families using humour, mystery and a creeping sense of tension. Bong once again skillfully fuses genre elements with social critique in a wildly entertaining, visually extraordinary and intoxicating manner.
Jury president John Maynard said "Parasite has an outrageous disregard for genre conventions — it is tender and brutal; beautiful and harsh; funny and tragic and a masterwork in its exploration of class."