The Metropol Viewing Room presents: Thirst
by Lori Bowen
While a bit long, the pace never drags in this supremely directed, written, and performed vampire film from one of my favourite directors. I only watch Italian horror dubbed as I really don’t have a choice, but when it comes to every other foreign-to-me film that I watch, I always watch with subtitles. The voice actors rarely have the same emotion in their voices as the actor that’s on screen.
<i>Bakjwi</i> is slightly off-kilter and fantastical, as most of Chan-Wook’s films are, but also innocent and hopeful, a strange mix in a film about sex and morality, but it works. The vampires in this are fangless, but are otherwise reasonably traditional in that they can’t go out in the sunlight and can jump very high and very far instead of being able to fly. The religious aspect of the film is vital as it’s the basis for the questions of morality that it asks. It doesn’t point fingers, and deals with Sang-hyeon’s guilt appropriately, but it really asks the viewer to decide for themselves how guilty Sang-hyeon and Tae-Joo are in the face of their afflictions; one had no choice and no teacher and was guided by their own sense of morality and the other also had no choice, but had a guide and chose to forge her own path for good or for ill.
Cinematography-wise, it’s a beautiful film, stark and full of strong contrast, rich blacks and subdued colours at night except for the colour red. Absolutely beautiful work on display in this film.
The performances from Kang-Ho Song and Ok-Vin Kim are pitch perfect in tone and they were well directed by master Chan-Wook Park, who always asks interesting things of his audiences, making us question our places, our morals, our decisions and our prejudices, twisting our sympathies for his anti-heroes until they can’t be twisted any longer and then he twists at least once more, past our boundaries until the final release when judgement and punishment is meted out and it’s up to the viewer to decide if their fates were just or undeserved.
This is a great film deserving of a place in the pantheon of modern classic vampire films.
