Thirst (2009)
“I have a terrible disease”
Of all the vampire movies out there, none is quite as moist as Thirst, Park Chan-wook’s 2009 take on the notorious genre. The Korean director, infamous for his 2003 film Oldboy, tells the story of Sang-hyun, a plague-infected priest who receives an unfortunate cure. Played by legendary actor Song Kang-Ho (Parasite, The Host, Memories of Murder), Sang-hyun evolves from a devoted, awkward priest into a bitter romantic when he meets the desperately bored housewife Tae-ju (played by Kim Ok-bin). Both live under intense restrictions, and both long for something more.
Both actors flex their skills by bringing their characters to life using very little dialogue. The final moments of the film will rip you apart with barely a word spoken between them. Ok-bin was an accomplished dancer long before she was cast in this film, and it's her brilliant physicality that makes her character’s transformation so terrifying. Kang-ho caused an uproar with his performance, as Thirst was the first mainstream Korean film to feature full-frontal male nudity. “All the journalists at the screening started sending [each other] messages,” Chan-wook told IGN back in 2010, “so when I actually started the press conference, every question was only focused on that one issue!”
Chan-wook always builds comedy and romance into his films (for better or worse), but I particularly love the “romance” in Thirst. Though these characters deeply desire each other, their scenes never look sexy. Sang-hyun and Tae-jun are clumsy and desperate, constantly reacting out of guilt and/or frustration. These vampires are not cool or seductive. As they lean into their desires, the colour palette of the film shifts from bland beiges and browns, to blinding neon whites and blues. Ultimately, Thirst is an exploration of restriction and desire, of the length these characters will go to satisfy a longing they don’t even comprehend.
