Ryan McNeilLast night was something of a protracted night at the bar for me, which might not have been the worst thing in the world. My busy social stretch is in full-swing, leaving me pretty darned tired at the end of each week. I’m surprised I have any energy leftover to watch a thing…let alone write about it.
However, my jaunt to pub night was well worth it for the stack of dvd’s my good friend Bob Turnbull loaned me to further my thriller sensibilities. Two titles in the stack intrigue me: SYMPATHY FOR LADY VENGEANCE and THIRST. Given the delightfully twisted nature of OLDBOY and SYMPATHY FOR MR VENGEANCE, I’m quite anxious to curl into a ball of nerves as these films play out on my TV.
Then tonight, I remembered that the director of these twisted tales is about to make the jump to North America and offer us something domestic. But of course, “domestic” doesn’t mean that the creep factor is getting lowered. Did you think that was going to be the case?
Silly rabbit…
Lady Vengeance is great, but you can’t go too far wrong with Chan-wook Park. I first saw Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance at the Asian Extreme film festival about a decade ago and loved it. Nothing prepared me for how amazing Oldboy was and that Mr Vengeance turned out to be the weakest of Chan-wook Park’s vengeance trilogy. Although billed as a horror Thirst, it is lighter and more comic the vengeance films but still really good.
THIRST is sitting next to my TV waiting to be watched – hopefully I can squeeze it in before the weekend is over!
I heard great things about Park a few years ago, so I went right out and rented Oldboy and Thirst. Sufficeth to say, I am not a fan of his works. I have yet to hear another blogger say anything but kind words. I’m beginning to think it’s just me.
It’s just you Colin! It’s just you!
Ain’t nothing wrong with going against the grain. All I’d suggest is that you try coming back to the man’s work down the line somewhere. Our tastes continue to change, right? So I wouldn’t want you to be locked in by a staunch opinion forever and ever…
Yeah. Park in full control of his picture and stacked with an amazing cast is exactly what I want from every one of his future productions, and this definitely looks to fit both of those criteria. No way am I not excited for this– it’s been too long since Thirst.
I’m really hoping he can make the jump to western films without too much resistance. It’s been a bit too long since an Asian director has made a splash on this side of the world. (Has anyone done it since Ang Lee?)
None that I can think of, though Kar-wai Wong almost did it with his arthouse films. (Not sure that really constitutes a “splash”, of course, so I’m not really counting him.) Which is interesting because Asian cinema has clearly influenced spheres of American cinema in the last decade, particularly horror films.
I’ll be thrilled if this makes Park a visible name in America. I feel the same way about Ji-woon Kim and The Last Stand. It’d be cool with me if great SK directors started making honest, excellent films over here.