Stoker (Park Chan-Wook)

[dreamdead]

Style keeps this one interesting as it meanders through the first half. The second half -- piano sex, the intercutting shower and forest scene, the coda -- add nice character beats and eccentricity to the affair to make it more interesting. I don't know if the whole thing hangs together well, but Park does an admirable job directing the hell out of this. I do wish it'd been better narratively.

[Henry Gale]

Am I the only one who thought [

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the big twist was going to reveal Charlie as a vampire and India a vampire as well? It seems like a lot of the images were foreshadowing this.

]

I still think there's some purposely unexplained supernatural traits between them, particularly their seemingly illustrated ability to see and hear each other from afar, and vague hints of some familial trait being passed onto India (beyond just how she may inevitably behave).

But I like how the viewer could still read it as having that twist embedded in it without the nature of it bothering with the need for blood to survive. The characters still exhibit the same impulses without a means to an end, just as an pubescent urge they can't fight.

[Peng]

Rewatching this really shows the ultimate in my preference of how over what when it comes to films. I don't find Miller's script as much a letdown as some others, but after the intriguing outset, his revelations would feel more of a collapse in other directorial hands. Park's filmmaking is so dazzling in its visual imagination though that it elevates the whole thing, and not just for its own sake (personally speaking, as I understand how it would feel too much if you don't find it serving the film that much), but his gorgeous flourishes are always in the service of illustrating a headspace, stressing a menacing atmosphere, and/or sharpening a narrative turn, which makes the whole film come off as intoxicatingly twisted coming-of-age tale. 8/10