Stoker

Stoker (2013) is Park Chan-wook's first English language film and he brought his grammar with him unchanged. India loses her father on her eighteenth birthday. At the funeral an uncle she never knew existed, Charlie, appears and moves in. Her mother likes him. India senses something in him, and what that something turns out to be is the film. The real subject is not suspense, it is a girl discovering her own nature. That is why some viewers find the film genuinely uncomfortable, and they are right to: the film stands with India. Park's visual language is in every frame. A cut that turns hair being brushed into a field of wheat, a piano duet, the way blood and colour are used. The transitions are the most discussed element. The screenplay is by Wentworth Miller, the actor from Prison Break. It was his first. It runs 99 minutes. Good for: psychological thrillers, visually ambitious filmmaking, and Park Chan-wook. Less good for: sex and violence are braided together and one scene in particular is hard. Anyone wanting the film to land somewhere morally clear will be disappointed.