‘Parasite’ Majorly Changed For Special Screenings: How Is Oscar-Nominated Movie Different?

Bong Joon Ho’s latest film “Parasite” has earned six Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Foreign Language Film. In case you missed it, don’t worry because the film is making a comeback here in the U.S. -- only with one major change: the film will be completely black and white.

According to Entertainment Weekly, this new “Parasite” screening will be hitting select theaters, starting with Lincoln Center’s Walter Reade Theater in New York on Jan. 30. In order to catch the black and white “Parasite,” you’ll have to attend a special screening in either Los Angeles or New York City.

“Although I became a filmmaker in the 2000s,” Joon Ho said about his reason for screening a black and white “Parasite.” “I idealize the beautiful black-and-white films by Renoir, Fellini, Kurosawa, John Ford, and the beautiful cinematography of Gregg Toland.”

Modern black and white films are nothing new and several of which have even taken home Oscars themselves, such as “The Artist,” “Schindler’s List,” “The White Ribbon,” and “Raging Bull.” The South Korean filmmaker calls black and white the “origin of cinema” and said that when he screened his own movie sans color that it felt more like a “story from old times.”

The story of Joon Ho’s “Parasite” follows the Kim family, an impoverished family living in a small basement apartment who con their way into success by working with the wealthy Park family. Variety reports that Joon Ho is working with “Succession” showrunner Adam McKay to also develop a “Parasite” TV series for HBO based on this story and these characters.

Joon Ho said about the future of the “Parasite” HBO series: “There will be many hidden stories that will be revealed about each of these characters.”