STOKER

On the 17th of February, I got the chance to attend the special preview of STOKER with an introduction by Park Chan-Wook himself, the acclaimed Korean director of Oldboy and Thirst.  When I arrived at the cinema, I was surprised to find queues of people outside the entrance and the interior all decorated. It turned out that the premiere was taking place at the same time. I missed out on meeting the actors (all 3 main characters attended) but at least I got to see the film. Here are my comments on  the film. Warning: Spoiler alert!

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“The story is about a young girl’s journey of self discovery and coming of age.

Now it’s a fact we all know that every young girl is special.
So of course this is the story about a special young girl.

Every story about a special young girl should be special like a fairytale or a dream.”

Park Chan-Wook

STOKER is Park Chan-Wook’s first English-language film. It was originally written by Prison Break star Wentworth Miller under a nom de plume, making his feature writing debut. In the words of the director, "It wasn't a film centered on dialogue and there were a lot of parts that were expressed without words". He enjoys expressing things visually and with sounds rather than words. Apart from describing Stoker as a thriller with aspects of horror and romance, Park calls it a "fairy tale". "I was interested in girls' coming-of-age stories - as with I'm A Cyborg But That's OK. I liked that the story had few characters so we could observe them more closely, not just superficially. I look for density in my films." STOKER is a mixture of a warped thriller, a gothic fable and some of Park Chan-Wook's trademarks. 

“India, is something wrong? Yes. My father is dead.”

He was taken away by a cruel twist of fate, reasons which are unknown. 
“People (just) disappear all the time (on you )”.

Led by a brilliant Mia Wasikowska (Alice in Wonderland, Restless, Lawless) as an introverted honor student/teenager whose personal and sexual awakening coincides with the unravelling of a macabre family mystery. When India Stoker loses her beloved father Richard (Delmot Mulroney) - he dies in an apparent freak car accident on her 18th birthday - , her globe-trotting Uncle Charles, portrayed by Matthew Goode (Match Point, Watchmen), whom she never knew existed, comes to live with her and her emotionally unstable mother Evelyn (Nicole Kidman).

Soon after his arrival, India comes to suspect that this mysterious, handsome, charming “Uncle Charlie” has ulterior motives apart from “to be friends.” “Uncle Charlie” swiftly cements himself in the household by seducing her mother. Shortly afterward, their housekeeper disappears without notice; same goes for India’s meddlesome aunt (a brief but sharp performance from Jacki Weaver), who appears to know troubling truths about the intruder, dismissed out of hand by Evelyn. The "is-he-or-isn’t-he the killer" question is answered sooner than Hitchcock would have planned it, as India’s darkest instincts about Charles are confirmed by the end of the first half of the film. However, instead of feeling outrage, horror and running to the police, this friendless girl becomes increasingly intrigued and infatuated with him. She can relate: “Secrets, lies, murder…it’s in her blood.”

However, there’s still plenty of Wentworth Miller’s warped family melodrama, as the respective and inevitably linked uncertainties about Richard’s death and Charlie’s long absence are kept aloft, while Charlie is slowly playing India and Evelyn against each other adding queasy sexual tension to an already distant, chilly mother-daughter relationship. In the words of Charles Stoker, “she is of age” to discover her true nature and thus “to become adult is to become free”. Her mother no longer recognizes her: “Who are you?” India, at first surprised, knows full well who she is: a photo of you when you are not aware of it, in an angle which you cannot see in the mirror, is part of who you are.

Visually and aurally, in terms of the filming and music, the movie is gorgeous.

India’s transition is beautifully portrayed through, for example, a series of different sizes of black or white saddle shoes and finally pointy high heels given to her as birthday gifts. “Just as a flower does not choose its colour, we are not responsible for what we have come to be” is illustrated by pure white flowers being splattered by blood. “Innocence ends” is shown by contrasts. There are two scenes that come to mind.The first shows a shower scene: the whiteness of the bathroom is ruined by the mud, dirtied clothes are left on the floor. She takes a shower to wash away the past events but the audience soon finds out that she is turned on by them. The second scene sees India eating ice cream next to a freezer which contains a dead body.

The audience is treated to parallels all through the film. For example, we get glimpses of spiders or a tv programme on birds of prey. We can quickly understand that India is much like her Uncle Charlie, she is a natural born killer/predator.

The plot is a bit predictable since one already suspects early on that the uncle is behind the inexplicable death of Richard but we don’t know what his motives are. The audience quickly realizes that India has a morbid side to her. She would go hunting with her father and preserve the kill as a child. She stabs a bully with her pencil, bites a classmate and later beats the guy up. Her anger subdues but the violence escalates. She shoots a man and then stabs an officer in cold blood and with a smile. However the way the relationship between India and Charlie ends will surprise.

Mia Wasikowska  is very good playing off Matthew Goode, who is well-cast as Uncle Charlie. The growing tension between the characters is very well executed. There is a powerful piano scene where both play together and we witness the evolving effect the uncle has on India at close proximity. There is something corrupt and compelling. about Goode’s good looks, something crazy just under the surface. It worked for him when he played Ozymandias in “Watchmen,” and he embodies his character here with a dedication that is impressive.

Kidman has some great lines but is less well-treated by the material and she seems somewhat stranded in the role of Evelyn. Even though the relationship between mother and daughter is cold and put to the test by Charlie, I didn’t know what to make of the Wasikowska and Kidman combination. There was something missing; maybe that was the point?

This beautifully designed and scored picture will shock as many viewers as it enchants. Park’s film stands to be treasured not just by his existing band of devotees, who should recognize enough of the “Oldboy” and “Thirst” director’s "loopy" eroticism and artistically distinctive mises-en-scene, but by horror aficionados and even a small group of teenagers who have outgrown Twilight. Fans who have followed the Korean director since 2003's Oldboy will not be disappointed; and a high creep-out factor and top-drawer cast should attract genre fans who have never heard of him as well.

“I hope you enjoy this dream as much as I enjoyed dreaming it up.”          

Park Chan-Wook