Korean Horror Film to Satisfy "Thirst" for Vampires

Set to hit select theaters in the US July 31st, the latest film from director Chan-wook Park centers around a frustrated priest played Kang-ho Song, who you might recognize as the bumbling older brother of the little girl abducted by sea monsters in the Korean horror movie The Host.

But Song has come a long way from playing the comic relief, and here he takes on a much more serious and brooding role as a man of the cloth who is disillusioned with God because of the suffering people have to go through in this life to get to the next.

In this frame of mind, he volunteers himself to be a guinea pig for a vaccine to cure the deadly F.I.V. virus. But instead of curing the disease he contracts it and it leaves him with a hunger for human blood.

The trailer (especially the last part) left me with the same creeped out feeling I got from watching Takeshi Miike's Audition. There is a similair tension and a disgusted treatment of sex that I sense from both films that is sure to put some on the edge of their comfort zones.

Thirst is part of a greater trend of the Americanization of foreign horror as CJ Entertainment and Universal's Focus Features duke it out for the rights to a stateside remake. The idea for a US remake was prompted by the success of vampire films like Twilight and the HBO show TrueBlood, but as with most American versions of foreign horror films (The Grudge, The Ring) it will probably lack the edginess that has made the original such a success.

Thirst made it's debut at the Cannes film festival and here's what Maggie Lee of the Hollywood Reporter had to say about the screening:
"Park takes his famed eroticization of violence, pain and cruelty to new, feverish heights, and garnishes it with deliciously sadistic gallows humor. Those who thrive on gore, twisted sexuality and brutish handling of women can drink their fill from this film."





Further Reading:
Thirst Remake Coming?
Thirst… finally vampires who feed on blood and have sex!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Zombieland Trailer Censors Undead Boobs

Image
I was on MySpace when a Zombieland promo popped up with Woody Harrelson and that kid from Juno giving tips on how to survive a zombie apocalypse. This bit of fun seguewayed into the trailer and I was about to click off when I noticed the zombie stripper that chases the Asian businessman out of the nudie club (an image that has stuck with me since my first viewing of the redband trailer) was now wearing a digital bikini top! Check out the regular and restricted trailers at the Zombieland website to witness the hilarity.
Read more

And Now This: Pruitt Taylor Vince Creeps Me Out

Image
“His irises tremble violently as the camera fixes on his glassy gaze, and before you know it, you've once again been entranced by the character with whom you're unsure if you should fear or sympathize.”— Actor Bio on Blockbuster Onlin e I just got finished watching Captivity , one of the After Dark Horrorfest films starring Elisha Cuthbert as a kidnapped supermodel with Daniel Gillies and Pruitt Taylor Vince as her captors. Vince gives an unsettling performance as the psychotic Ben Dexter, who owns his own catering business to finance his and his brother's hobby of capturing young women and keeping them in the basement. Vince’s roles always leave me with a feeling of lingering creepiness, so I thought I’d do a brief review of the weirdos he’s played in the past. Monster (2003) Vince plays Gene the stuttering "John" in Monster, one of the many victims of Aileen Wuornos, a prostitute from Daytona Beach who became a serial killer. Identity (2003) Malcolm Rivers is ...
Read more

The Rise and Fall of the SAW Films

Image
With the sixth installment of the Saw franchise set to hit theaters this Halloween and news that Saw VII has already gotten the green light from Lionsgate, it seems only appropriate to take a long look back at the films that started it all. This five part series will look at each of the Saw films in detail and discuss what they’ve contributed to the evolution of the Saw phenomenon and twenty-first century horror. Saw feels very much like a short film, which is what it was originally intended to be. Director, James Wan and writer/actor Leigh Whannell met in film school. Whannell had always wanted to write and act while Wan was an aspiring director. Their combined talents met in the middle and Wan came up with the idea of Saw for a short film that the two would shoot on their own. The original concept was simple. Two guys are chained to opposite ends of a decrepit bathroom, and between them is the body of a dead man with a tape recorder in one hand and a gun in the other. Both captives h...
Read more