Thirst
In sum, “Thirst” is more of the usual, yet extremely powerful and fun to watch. All in all, it appears much less yet much more disgusting than what Park Chan-wook did before, and it definitely caters to all his fans when it comes to the visuals. It’s a dark tale with no happy end and has just as much stylish gore as literally all of his other works.
Aside from that, I can only say that “Thirst” perfectly met all my expectations and caught me a little bit by surprise with its ending. Without really showing all that much, the ending felt like a showcase of what Park Chan-wook’s films are to me: The way Tae-joo was hiding beneath the car was very humorous and even looked somewhat cute, and the music of the last scene coupled with the main characters’ cries made me want to cry myself. The same visual beauty and the inexplicable grippiness of the last scene can be found in about every one of his films, and I am glad that this one delivered it as well.
Curiously enough, this is probably the most evil female character Park Chan-wook has created so far. Or more like, she is more than just sick (like certain other characters); while it was always men who were responsible for the evil-doing so far, this film is much more concentrated on the femme fatale-ish erotocism of the woman – and boy how evil she is. I completely forgot about how unmotivatedly cruel film characters can be!
Without noticing, I have ended up seeing literally every one of Park Chan-wook’s major films, and I wouldn’t really recommend the film to anyone who is not already a fan of his. “Old Boy” is probably the most suitable gateway drug… except it’s quite an extreme one, I guess.
I found his Vengeance trilogy to improve with time – Sympathy for Mr Vengeance was good, Oldboy was very good and LAdy Vengeance was stunning. I’ve not seen I’m a Cyborg or this either, but thanks for reminding me that I’d promised myself I would.
What I love about his movies is not only the cinematography (which is beautiful, even when it’s brutal and violent) but the dark humour he employs. I can imagine how that black comedy could translate well into a vampire film…there are of course hundreds of good vampire movies made over the years, but if a director can tell three stories about revenge in succession and make each one special, I wouldn’t find that a problem at all.
I’ll reserve my final judgement for when I’ve seen this, but I noticed some moments of evil creeping into the female characters in the Vengeance movies too…Lady Vengeance is the obvious one, but it was all about her redemption and that conflict between retribution and the bond with her daughter.
I need to start watching movies regularly again…I might start with this one!
Oh! “Thirst” is the absolute perfect movie to get back into it. As I have mentioned, its sophisticated visual appeal should totally please any fan of Park Chan-wook, more so than “I’m a Cyborg but that’s OK”. The characters are also much more layered and controversial than they are in Cyborg. I’m looking forward to how you’ll like the film!