In the polite smiles of dinner parties and garden barbecues, two films expose the monstrous underbelly of social division.

Two modern masterpieces of unease, Jordan Peele’s Get Out (2017) and Bong Joon-ho’s Parasite (2019), masterfully dissect the anxieties that simmer beneath society’s surface. Both films masquerade as thrillers while wielding horror’s sharpest tools to probe race and class, turning everyday interactions into sources of dread. This comparison uncovers their shared DNA of social terror, revealing how they mirror our fractured world.

  • How Get Out weaponises racial microaggressions into a nightmare of body invasion, paralleling Parasite‘s class warfare through infiltration.
  • The films’ masterful use of sound design and visual symbolism to amplify interpersonal tension and societal rifts.
  • Their enduring legacy as blueprints for horror that confronts real-world inequalities without preaching.

Unmasking the Divide: Get Out and Parasite as Mirrors of Social Dread

The Veneer of Hospitality

In both Get Out and Parasite, the horror emerges not from overt monsters but from the fragility of human pretence. Chris Washington arrives at the Armitage family estate in Get Out, greeted by awkward compliments on his physique and golfing prowess, compliments laced with insidious undertones. Similarly, the Kim family in Parasite slips into the Park household under false pretences, their entry paved by fabricated credentials and feigned charm. These initial scenes establish a core tension: the terror of being othered in spaces of privilege. Peele and Bong exploit the viewer’s familiarity with such encounters, drawing from lived experiences of code-switching and polite endurance. The Armitages’ liberal posturing, epitomised by Dean’s claim of voting for Obama twice, echoes the Parks’ oblivious generosity, blind to the exploitation it enables. This shared motif transforms mundane social rituals into powder kegs, where every toast or job offer conceals a blade.

The genius lies in escalation. In Get Out, the garden party auction sequence crystallises the commodification of Black bodies, bidders raising paddles with glee as Chris sinks into the sunken place. Bong mirrors this with the Kims’ discovery of the Park family’s bunker, a revelation that flips sympathy into savagery. Both directors build dread through accumulation: small slights snowball into systemic violence. Cinematographer Toby Oliver in Get Out employs wide shots of the expansive estate to dwarf Chris, emphasising isolation amid crowds, while Hong Kyung-pyo’s work in Parasite contrasts the cramped, fetid Kim basement with the airy Park mansion, visually encoding class chasms. These choices underscore a universal anxiety: the fear that civility is but a thin mask over predation.

Racial Coercion and the Sunken Place

Get Out pioneers a visceral metaphor for racial trauma with the sunken place, a hypnotic void where Chris watches his life hijacked. Peele draws from real psychological studies on minority stress, where constant vigilance erodes autonomy. The tear-shaped void, achieved through practical effects and Daniel Kaluuya’s nuanced performance, symbolises internalised oppression. Missy’s teacup tapping induces trance, a mundane object weaponised, much like how everyday racism numbs victims. This sequence rivals the genre’s best body horror, evoking The Stepford Wives but rooted in contemporary America, post-Obama disillusionment.

Contrastingly, Parasite channels class resentment through parasitic dependency. The Kims’ odour becomes a motif, the Parks’ son detecting it as an invisible marker of inferiority. Bong amplifies this with the rainstorm scene: as the Parks luxuriate in dryness, the Kims wade home through floods, a stark visual of unequal burdens. Yet parallels persist; both films feature families plotting from basements, the Armitages breeding eugenic hybrids, the Kims scheming ascent. Social immobility manifests as horror: in Get Out, through neurological theft; in Parasite, through murderous desperation. Kaluuya’s wide-eyed paralysis finds echo in Choi Woo-shik’s Ki-woo’s calculated grins, both masking survival instincts honed by marginalisation.

Class Infiltration and Familial Facades

Parasite excels in portraying class as a parasite itself, the poor feeding on the rich until gorged. The Kims’ coordinated takeover—son as tutor, daughter as art therapist, father as driver—builds comedic tension before erupting into gore. Bong’s script, co-written with Han Jin-won, weaves economic precarity into every beat, from folding pizza boxes to scentless desperation. This mirrors Get Out‘s familial conspiracy, where Rose’s clan unites in ritualistic racism. Both narratives hinge on betrayal by intimacy: Chris trusts Rose, the Parks hire the Kims. Horror blooms when private spaces invade public pretences.

Family units amplify unease. The Armitages bicker over surgical details like any kin, while the Parks maintain sunny obliviousness until blood spills. Peele infuses Get Out with found-footage nods via Rod’s TSA camaraderie, grounding cosmic dread in bromance. Bong counters with the Kims’ tactile poverty—stealing Wi-Fi, mapping the mansion like thieves. These portraits indict capitalism’s cruelties, yet avoid didacticism through character depth. Song Kang-ho’s unemployed patriarch embodies quiet rage, paralleling Bradley Whitford’s affable surgeon whose lobotomised rants reveal bigotry.

Sonic Assaults and Visual Subtleties

Sound design elevates both to auditory nightmares. In Get Out, Michael Abels’ score blends hip-hop pulses with orchestral swells, the opening track “Sikiliza Kwa Wahenga” warning of ancestral unrest. Teacup clinks pierce silence, triggering hypnosis with Pavlovian dread. Bong employs Jung Jae-il’s minimalist cues in Parasite, rain pattering into deluge, underscoring floods as class metaphor. The scholar’s stone chime recurs, promising fortune but delivering doom. Shared is the use of diegetic noise: party chatter drowns pleas in both, silencing the oppressed.

Visually, staircases dominate as liminal horrors. Chris descends to the basement of lobotomised victims; the Kims infiltrate upstairs realms. Lighting shifts from warm interiors to cold revelations—flashlight beams in Parasite‘s bunker echo Get Out‘s strobe auction. Practical effects shine: Get Out‘s head-through-windshield impact via custom rigs, Parasite‘s rain machine drenching sets for authenticity. These crafts immerse viewers in anxiety’s grip, proving low-fi triumphs over CGI excess.

The Basement Revelations

Climactic basements serve as societal id. Get Out‘s reveals Andre Logan as a trapped soul, bodies stacked like trophies, eugenics laid bare. Peele consulted neurologists for the cohered lacrimal gland depiction, blending science fiction with slavery echoes. Parasite counters with the Parks’ shelter, housing a vengeful ex-housekeeper, symbolising buried resentments. Stabbings ensue, rain masking screams. Parallels extend to escapes: Chris’s deer kill recalls the prologue’s brutality, while Ki-taek’s sewer crawl evokes primal regression.

These scenes dissect entitlement. The Armitages collect Black excellence; the Parks hoard security. Violence cathartically shatters facades, yet endings linger ambiguously—Chris kills, spared by Rod; Ki-woo vows return, unlikely. Both critique upward mobility myths, positing integration as illusion.

Legacy of Unease

Post-release, both reshaped discourse. Get Out grossed $255 million on $4.5 million budget, earning Peele an Oscar for Original Screenplay, igniting race-horror renaissance. Parasite swept Oscars, first non-English Best Picture, globalising class critique. Influences ripple: Us and Nope extend Peele’s verse; Mika echoes Bong. Culturally, they fuel debates on allyship and meritocracy.

Their power endures in rewatchability, microaggressions hitting harder amid BLM and inequality spikes. As horror evolves, these films anchor social subgenre, proving scares need not fangs but familiarity.

Effects Mastery: From Hypnosis to Haemorrhage

Practical wizardry defines impacts. Get Out‘s sunken place used green-screen composites and Kaluuya’s contact lenses for verisimilitude, hypnosis via strobe and sound layering. Jeremy’s fight employed wirework and prosthetics for bloody realism. Parasite shunned digital blood for practical pumps, staircase rampage shot in long takes with rain rigs flooding stages. Bong’s team built the folding house set, allowing seamless vertical traverses. Such tactile effects ground abstract anxieties in body horror, evoking The Thing‘s paranoia but socially attuned.

Innovation persists: Get Out‘s flash photo snap exits trance, a nod to trauma triggers; Parasite‘s peach allergy gag foreshadows allergies to disparity. Effects serve themes, not spectacle, cementing status as craft exemplars.

Director in the Spotlight: Jordan Peele

Jordan Peele, born 8 February 1979 in New York City to a white mother and Black father, fused comedy and horror after Key & Peele (2012-2015) success. Raised in Los Angeles, he absorbed horror via Night of the Living Dead and stand-up roots honed racial satire. Get Out marked directorial debut, blending laughs with dread, inspired by The People Under the Stairs and personal profiling experiences. Career skyrocketed: produced Hunter Killer (2018), directed Us (2019) starring Lupita Nyong’o in dual roles exploring doppelgangers and privilege; Nope (2022), a UFO western with Kaluuya and Keke Palmer confronting spectacle; Nope earned acclaim for spectacle subversion. Influences include Spike Lee and Guillermo del Toro; Peele champions diverse genre voices via Monkeypaw Productions, backing Lovecraft Country (2020) and The Twilight Zone revival (2019). Awards abound: Oscar, Emmy, BAFTA. Upcoming: Untitled Fourth Film (2025). Peele’s oeuvre dissects American undercurrents, making horror introspective.

Comprehensive filmography: Get Out (2017, dir./writer/prod., social horror debut); Us (2019, dir./writer/prod., tethered twins terror); Nope (2022, dir./writer/prod., skyborne spectacle); Gremlins: Secrets of the Mogwai (2022-, exec. prod., animated prequel); Oh Hell No (prod., comedy). Writing credits: Key & Peele sketches; producing: Barbarian (2022), Violent Night (2022). Peele’s vision evolves horror into cultural scalpel.

Actor in the Spotlight: Daniel Kaluuya

Daniel Kaluuya, born 24 May 1989 in London to Ugandan parents, rose from stage to screens. North London council estate upbringing fuelled authentic grit; theatre debut in Sucker Punch (2008), then Black Mirror: Fifteen Million Merits (2011) showcased intensity. Breakthrough: Get Out (2017) as Chris, Oscar-nominated performance blending vulnerability and fury. Hollywood ascent: Black Panther (2018) as W’Kabi; Judas and the Black Messiah (2021) as Fred Hampton, Oscar-winning Best Supporting Actor. Versatility shines in No Activity (2015-) voice work, Queen & Slim (2019) romantic thriller. Theatre return: The Brother (2023). Awards: BAFTA, Golden Globe, Critics’ Choice. Advocates representation, produces via 55 Films.

Filmography: Skins (2007-09, TV, Posh Kenneth); Psychoville (2009, TV); Four Lions (2010, comic terrorist); Black Mirror: Fifteen Million Merits (2011, dystopian cyclist); The Fades (2011, TV); Welcome to the Punch (2013); Jobs (2013, Jony Ive); EastEnders: E20 (2011); Get Out (2017); Black Panther (2018); Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018, voice); Queen & Slim (2019); His House (2020); Judas and the Black Messiah (2021); The Harder They Fall (2021); Nope (2022); The Woman King (2022). Kaluuya embodies nuanced Black masculinity.

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Bibliography

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Greene, S. (2020) ‘The Sunken Place and Social Horror: Jordan Peele’s Get Out’, Film Quarterly, 73(2), pp. 45-52.

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