Move over, Twilight. The world needs less sparkly vampires and more bloodthirsty humans from South Korea, like Park Chan-Wook’s Thirst, which opens tomorrow in limited theaters around the United States.
Park Chan-Wook, best known for directing Oldboy and Sympathy for Lady Vengeance, ventures into the world of horror with a story about a priest, played by The Host’s Song Kang-ho, who turns into a vampire after a medical experiment goes wrong. There’s also supposed to be lots of lust, gore and even full-frontal nudity–though the fact that Park’s work in Oldboy should be enough motivation for you to see this movie.
I’m not a big fan of vampires, which probably stems from my dislike of seeing blood of any kind, but I can’t wait to see Park’s take on a genre that has been dominated by Western or European story-telling. The trailer looks scary enough, and the film picked up the Jury prize at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival. A co-worker (who’s seen the movie twice) professed to me that Thirst exceeded all vampire movie standards, including Twilight–though that’s not saying much. Hopefully Song’s character has less dramatic head turning stares than Edward Cullen. Yes, I hate Twilight. (Bring it on, you crazy fans!)
So support Asian cinema if you’re near any of these theaters!
Check out G4’s interview with Park Chan-wook from last weekend’s Comic-Con ’09 after the jump.
