Forgot password

PARK Chan-wook’s highly anticipated Hollywood debut Stoker was finally unveiled to a sold out audience this past Sunday at the Sundance Film Festival. Mere moments following the drawing of the curtain, critics took to the web and tweeted their initial impressions. Now the first reviews have appeared and while a handful are negative, the notices are for the most part overwhelmingly positive. The film’s polished aesthetics and gothic tone are getting particular attention and all agree that PARK has not compromised his style in his crossover to the West.

 

The first piece to appear online, from Twitch’s Ryland ALDRICH, stated that PARK fans would not be disappointed: “A highly stylized mystery, the film delivers what the South Korean auteur does best: moody mise-en-scene with intense moments of ultra-violence.” Jeremy KAY from The Guardian wrote that “PARK Chan-wook's long-awaited English-language debut is a gorgeously mounted family mystery dressed up as a gothic fairy tale.”

 

The film’s cast, which includes Mia WASIKOWKSA, Nicole KIDMAN and Matthew GOODE, is also drawing praise from many quarters. Screen Daily’s David D’ARCY says that “WASIKOWSKA has shown a new depth here, and is sure to be pursued for it,” while “GOODE hits a seductive tone of the urbane and the unctuous as a charmer with tales of world travel and a killer instinct.”

 

Meanwhile, Rodrigo PEREZ of The Playlist was one of the few critics not bowled over as he thought that it was a “brutally empty, deeply unfortunate movie, and PARK Chan-wook's jackhammer of a tool he calls a brush is, on this evidence, something that should be locked away.”

 

However, the overall response to Stoker has been strong. Guy LODGE from Variety found it to be “a splendidly demented gumbo of Hitchcock thriller, American Gothic fairy tale and a contemporary kink all PARK's own.” The Hollywood Reporter’s John DEFORE offered the feature especially high praise as he felt that with his latest “PARK offers one of the most artful chillers in ages.”

 

Stoker will next be seen at the International Film Festival Rotterdam and Glasgow Film Festival in February before bowing in Korea on February 28th and the US on March 1st. Fox Searchlight is handling distribution.