Thirst

Sang-hyun (Song Kang-ho), a tormented priest, volunteers as a human guinea pig at an African research facility, working on the vaccine for a virulent virus called EV (which only infects celibate or sexually inactive men). The virus kills him, but he is miraculously resurrected by blood transfusion. Unfortunately, the miracle comes with a serious side effect: he turns into a vampire. Only continuous supply of fresh human blood can reverse the symptoms of EV infection. While grappling with his disturbing new habit-and superpowers-Sang-hyun becomes attracted to Tae-ju (Kim Ok-vin, Dasepo Naughty Girls ), unhappily married to his childhood friend Kang-woo (Sin Ha-gyun, Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance), a bizarrely infantile hypochondriac living under the thumb of his manic dressmaker mother Ms. Ra (Kim Hae-sook, Open City).

Thirst Thirst, which, along with Bong Joon-ho's Mother, is 2009's most anticipated Korean film, opened to good if not spectacular box office performance (0.8 million tickets sold in the first weekend for the Seoul theaters). Unlike Park Chan-wook's "revenge" trilogy, however, the movie is generating extreme reactions from both viewers and critics. Some reviews have blasted it as a pretentious bore or a poorly conceived adaptation of Emile Zola's Therese Raquin (from which this film borrows certain plot points and a love triangle central to the plot): only a few critics have hailed it as a masterpiece. Among the viewers, the chasm is even wider: internet comments freely range from "a piece of trash" to "the best movie I have seen in 10 years."

Even for someone like me, a rabid-crazy Park Chan-wook fan, the initial reaction to Thirst was that of deep unease: I literally could not name what it was that I was feeling as the end credits rolled up. All I knew for sure was that I had to see it again immediately. Only after the second viewing did I understand that the unease came from my inertial inability to acknowledge that I'd just watched a bewildering but awesome work of art, well-nigh indescribable in its insane, alchemic melding of disparate genre elements.

Thematically, Thirst is as a straightforward and relentless exploration of Catholic guilt as any Euro-American film I have ever seen--as painful as Abel Ferrara's Bad Lieutenant, as scorching as Bunuel's Viridiana-- with its profoundly contradictory attitude toward the glamour and agony of desire. The protagonist Sang-hyun, like Graham Greene's Scobie in The Heart of the Matter, is tragically, sympathetically flawed. He has enough dedication to face certain death in the service of humanity yet cannot stop his pity toward a beautiful, unhappy young woman growing into passionate love. He is powerless to stop the faithful who regard his vampirism as a sign of being touched by God: having committed a mortal sin out of love, he figuratively and literally drowns in guilt.

Song Kang-ho gives yet another brilliant performance (I don't think he can just walk through a role even if his life depended on it), but it is not a flashy one: as was in Secret Sunshine, it's a catcher's turn that perfectly anchors the emotional content of a particular scene and at the same time generously puts the spotlight on other actors. I can only hope that Euro-American critics are not lazy (or foolish) enough to mistake the essential passivity of Sang-hyun's character for the lack of talent on Song's part.

A lot of media attention has been paid to the explicit sex scenes between Song and Kim Ok-vin, an interesting choice on Park's part. He seems to have had a young Isabelle Adjani (The Story of Adel H was allegedly one of the films Park recommended to Kim as a research material) in mind: fiery, heartbreaking, maybe a bit raw. Kim is stunningly sexy and gorgeous in both wilted-housewife and full-blown femme fatale modes, and throws all of herself into the role, but I cannot help but seeing Yeom Jeong-ah (who appeared as a fictional vampire in Park's "The Cut" from Three Extreme) or Lee Young-ae as Tae-ju. Kim strikes me as a bit too young and contemporary: she does not strike as someone who could have tolerated long years of indentured servitude in exchange for meager domestic comfort. She is blindingly beautiful, I must admit, in a blue hanbok dress.

The rest of the cast is equally superb: Oh Dal-soo, Sin Ha-gyun, Kim Hae-su, Kim Jee-woon regulars Park In-hwan (The Quiet Family), as a blind senior priest with a wry sense of humor, and Song Young-chang (the head-rocking section chief from Foul King), as a hard-nosed former cop. Their ensemble acting in the sequence where a character tries desperately to alert the presence of a vampire to other unsuspecting guests is a piece de resistance, superior to any similar scene in Sympathy for Lady Vengeance.

By now we expect not just high quality jobs but extraordinary aesthetic achievements from Park Chan-wook's regular staff, and Thirst certainly does not disappoint. Production designer Ryu Seong-hee is responsible for the uncommonly reined-in colors-bleached white and faded green-of the religious and medical institutions as well as ever-so-slightly off-kilter hues of Ms. Ra's domain-deranged blues and slick browns. Lenser Jeong Jeong-hoon weaves pure magic with shadows and light, culminating in the stunning vista of the ocean spreading in scarlet red, illuminated by the setting sun, as looked on by the eyes of the doomed protagonist.

Oh, is it a good vampire film, you ask? It sure as heck is- the tomato juice flows abundantly in horrendous, cringe-inducing scenes of violent exsanguinations, and there are many insanely creative twists on the familiar genre staples that will either stun you into silence or make you gape in disbelief. Have you wondered how a vampire can convince a blind person that he is one? Watch Thirst. Have you ever wondered whether becoming an immortal creature will heal calluses on the soles of your foot? Again, watch the movie. There are at least two sequences in this film that matches in sheer audacity and jaw-dropping hutzpah the notorious "long-take corridor action" set piece in Old Boy.

But Thirst is not an exhilarating showcase of directorial vision and filmmaking pizzazz that Old Boy was. Despite occasional insertions of absurdist deadpan humor, it is at its basis a tragic romance. And despite much bloodletting, the film is not interested in generating frisson of fear, but a deep sense of melancholy. In the end it returns, perhaps in a purer form than ever, to Park Chan-wook's starting point: the torturous reflection on the impossibility of salvation, the moral weight of sin and desire, and the agonizing scream of a man against God who may or may not exist, and may or may not love him. If Thirst were a book, it probably deserves a whole shelf of its own: regardless of one's likes or dislikes, it is a true work of art that calls out for the defense of its artistic honor by those who are taken with it, way beyond the question of one's taste in specific genres or stylistic choices.

English subtitle:soon
See online:HERE