Thirst (2009)

Review by Sean Patterson



"Happy birthday, Tae-Ju."

Having just seen Oldboy, I felt I must watch more of Chan-Wook Park's movies. I was going to start with the other two movies in his vengeance trilogy, but was more interested in seeing the latest movie written and directed by him, Thirst. Plus, it fits a little more neatly into the horror genre than those other bloody revenge movies.
A catholic priest in Korea, Sang-Hyun (played by Kang-ho Song, star of the excellent monster movie The Host), volunteers for a dangerous medical experiment in Africa. He survives where others do not, and comes home...changed. He gains a following as a miracle healer, which quickly becomes distracting.
The priest finds that he's very sensitive to the scent of blood. His vision is superhuman, and he has become very sensitive to sunlight. His hearing is also improved, making noise unbearable. Then he discovers that these symptoms can be mitigated by drinking blood.
That's right, he's a vampire, and a classic one at that. But as a priest, he's conflicted by his new obsession with blood. He compromises and mostly drinks from a coma patient at the hospital where he works. The catholic symbolism of the Eucharist and drinking blood is easy to pick up on and has been tackled before, but is done very well here and in a tactful manner.
The priest reacquaints himself with some friends from his childhood, and they begin playing mahjong on a weekly basis. He soon falls in love with the girl, Tae-Ju who is treated as a dog by her mother-in-law and is saddled with a sickly husband. This romance leads to more grief and self-loathing from the lapsed priest.
There are some definite bdsm undertones in the early sex scenes.
What follows is a journey of lies, murder, and Macbeth-type guilt, culminating in a tragic and beautiful ending. Forget Twilight and True Blood. This is the type of romance the chaos of vampirism would really spawn, and it's fantastic.
I can't praise Park's directing enough. During one particularly long sex scene filled with BDSM overtones, the sensual way Park uses the camera makes for an uncomfortable, yet erotic, experience.When the movie takes a turn for the surreal and disturbing, the camerawork shifts to a shaky handheld style. Also, his use of blood as a visual element is every bit as good as, and reminds me of, Let the Right One In.
So far Chan-Wook Park has shown me he can do revenge and romance. Both with a distinct style that is unmistakable as his own. I've committed myself to seeing everything he's written and directed now. While Oldboy's twist ending could be seen as a one-off Shyamalan-type fluke of genius, Park has proven with Thirst that he's a masterful director and writer. I know we're lousy with vampire movies right now, but this is not one to be missed.