Stoker (2013)

India Stoker: "He used to say, sometimes you need to do something bad to stop you from doing something worse."

By Chan-wook Park
With Mia Wasikowska, Nicole Kidman and Matthew Goode

I remember when I first heard of this film, from Tumor who also reviewed it (you can view his review here), I couldn't make head or tails of the title. What could "Stoker" possibly be? Finally, when the credits were up, it hit me that Bram Stoker wrote Dracula, one of the first vampire narratives to be popularized in Western culture. To me it seemed that the film was drawing parallels to the process of becoming a vampire and to becoming an adult, as it all begins on the protagonist's 18th birthday, the day she is orphaned as her father dies in a car crash, and the starting point of her forays into death, cannibalism, and all things sinister.

The film reveals early on her tumultuous relationship with her mother, which reaches its peak after her father's death and with the mysterious reappearance of a charming uncle whose existence she had never been aware of. At the same time, India, whose extraordinarily heightened senses have prompted her late father to teach her hunting, notices a brown spider scuttling up her leg. She makes no move to chase it away.

India's obsession with tracking and hunting grows to fill the narrative, and in a bizarre way, is encouraged by her uncle Charlie, for whom she begins to show a strong sexual awareness. Soon, people start to go missing...

The spider that India notices crawling up her leg makes a timely appearance by the end of the film, crawling out of her father-substitute uncle, making the viewer realize uncomfortably all the connotations of spiders, often representing women and death (as some species of spider kill their mate) and their role as hunters, may as well apply to India.

In all, this was an engrossing film that left enough unsaid to fuel a viewer's interest in it. The vampiric undertones of the film were subtle enough to not require an immediate suspension of belief, but were compelling enough to piece together a reliable explanation of India's 18th birthday and ascent into "adulthood" as her ascent into an eternal life -- she will no longer require new shoes every year as she will have stopped growing, and will remain eternally as she is. It also explores the psychosexual development of India, and the quintessential strained mother-daughter relationship, as well as the implications of the father-daughter bond.

I liked: The music, composed by Clint Mansell, was impeccable. The tense, innocently melodic piano tune that almost always functions as a harbinger of a lurking evil was used to perfection. All three of the lead actors played their roles convincingly, with especial kudos going to Mia whose portrayal of a troubled girl on the brink of adulthood so well done that it was almost uncomfortable to watch, the kind of painful blossoming, slick with blood (menstrual, virginal, and vampiric).

I disliked: Some may criticize this as a style-over-substance flick. I don't necessarily disagree with that estimation of this film, despite thoroughly enjoying every moment of it.

72/100
This film is an engaging coming-of-age tale of a young girl, India Stoker, and her battles with a rather feisty Electra complex, supplanted with a healthy dose of blood, cannibalism, and all the trappings of the Victorian era in a head on collision with the 21st century. A good film to watch if you are interested in psychological thrillers, vampires, or coming-of-age films.