Thirst (Korean film): It's ok, and will appear to vampire fans
When I found out that there was a Korean supernatural film with a vampire theme in it starring my favorite Korean actor Song Kang-ho that if you like Korean films at all, you probably at least recognize his face seeing as how he is in a lot of the movies.
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I suppose that this film is a bit unique in the way that it isn't terribly evident that it is a vampire film at all right from the onset although I suppose the title of the movie would kind of be a dead giveaway. The way this one works is that Song Kang-ho plays the role of a Catholic priest who doesn't have any interest in being a vampire but accidentally ends up being one while he is working as a volunteer in hospitals in disease-ridden parts of Africa. They don't go into great detail about how this happens and it might have been for a number of reasons including that Song Kang-ho doesn't speak English very well and these scenes were all done in that language.
It's kind of funny when Koreans that don't speak English are in scenes where they have to pretend to understand what everyone else is saying around them and when they do respond to the people they have very short answers like "yes" or "no" and when they say anything longer it is normally done with the camera not on them at the time because it was almost certainly overdubbed later.
It takes him a while after getting this "disease" to figure out that he actually is a vampire and it is only through the tutelage of another priest that he learns what he has to do in order to survive. He doesn't like the idea of killing for blood just like Brad Pitt's character in Interview with a Vampire who I believe was named "Louis" and he finds alternate methods of finding blood such as getting blood from hospitals and via suicidal people that he encounters in the confession box. It is unusual for sure but not totally unique.
For reasons that are best left unsaid and instead experienced by watching, he develops an intense love for someone in a family that he had a lot to do with when he was a still a human priest and for reasons that I will not spoil, he ends up converting her to a vampire as well. Let's just say that it was not against her will.
In order to make the story more interesting than just two vampires raiding blood storage banks, let's just say that the much younger woman doesn't share his empathy for human life and doesn't go about obtaining her meals in the same ethical way. He feels the same "thirst" that she does, but she goes about it in a way that is very contrarian to his own methods.
This is where a majority of the conflict in the film comes from and it is quite interesting and at times humorous in a dark sort of way.
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One difference between this and other Korean films that I have seen throughout my life is that this one is quite sexually graphic and while this isn't banned in Korea, it is a lot more rare than in USA films. It was a bit of a surprise to see Song Kang-ho in such a role and I wonder if he was comfortable with it. I suppose he is one of the best actors in the world so I am sure he just rolled with it.
Mostly I watch Korean films because I really enjoy the crime thrillers as I think they are the best in the world at making them. This is one of the only Korean "horror" films that I have ever seen and even though they operate at miniscule budgets compared to their Hollywood counterparts they managed to turn a profit on their estimated $4 million overall budget.
Should I watch it?
Well the answer to that as best I can muster is "it depends." If you enjoy the style of Korean films and can deal with reading subtitles the entire way through then I think there are definitely worse vampire films out there than this one. That being said this wasn't as thrilling a ride as many other Korean films that are available out there. If you are one of those people that really likes vampire lore than this could be a great one to add to your arsenal. It isn't going to be for everyone, but overall I think it was pretty good and worth watching for most.
