FILM
14 www.guestlist.net
Issue 49 / 2013
Stoker
Perhaps the strangest thing about Stoker, the latest film from
Oldboy director Chanwook Park, is not the pseudo-incestuous
undertones that rage throughout, but the fact that Wentworth
Miller - yes he of Prison Break fame - is the man behind it���s icy
screenplay.
But it���s not just Miller who makes an
impressive debut ��� this is Park���s first US
picture, and fortunately the Korean auteur
has lost none of his trademark vigour.
Though more subdued than his infamous
Vengeance Trilogy (ultraviolent climax
notwithstanding), Stoker still makes
for an unsettling viewing experience.
Mia Wasikowska stars as India Stoker,
an 18-year-old outcast whose sullen
expression only intensifies upon the grisly
death of her father (Dermot Mulroney).
Despite viewing his brothers funeral from
a watchful distance, India���s estranged uncle
Charlie (Matthew Goode) soon makes
himself known, their encounters pulsating
with a hint of sexual menace. Matriarch
Evelyn (Nicole Kidman), meanwhile, is quick
to fall prey to the charms of her brotherin-law, although both are burdened with
a dark family secret. Twisted, disturbing
and packed with beautiful, suggestive
imagery, this is probably what Tim Burton
was aiming for with Dark Shadows. The
film carries a rather compelling brand
of coldness, reflected through its stilted
silences, Kidman���s glassy eyes and Chunghoon Chung���s cool cinematography. Things
do heat up when India and Charlie become
partners-in-crime, the crime in question
involving a smattering of bloody demises,
but Park keeps things tasteful, at least
until the final act. Kidman, Wasikowska
and Goode, meanwhile, all manage to
impress, adding class and conviction (and
in Wasikowska���s case, a barely-restrained
sense of burgeoning sexual prowess) to
what could have been a campy disaster of a
movie. On reflection, perhaps the strangest
thing about Stoker is in fact its unassailable
allure.
