By capping off its banner night with a Best Picture win at the 2020 Academy Awards, Bong Joon Ho and the Parasite team made Oscars history. It is the first foreign-language film to win Best Picture, the first movie to win the top honor without receiving any Oscars in the acting category since Slumdog Millionaire, and it made director Bong the first filmmaker to win Best Original Screenplay, Best Picture, and Best Director for the first time since Alejandro Iñárritu managed the sweep with 2014’s Birdman. Parasite also became South Korea’s first winner in the newly rechristened Best International Film category.
The Best Picture win gave way to a standing ovation from seemingly everyone in the theater, and when the control room cut the stage lights before Parasite’s assembled team finished its remarks, the front row filled with superstars — e.g., Tom Hanks, Charlize Theron, Margot Robbie — waved their arms and chanted “Up!†so everyone could finish their speeches.
At least, for now, we can have a few nice things.