Dorathen Better Late Then Never

Baseshment I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

Aneesa Wardle The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Allissa .Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

chengiz There are so many, so many things wrong with the film, I do not know where to begin. Why does the movie hint at suspense but reveal less than half way thru? Why are people helping (housekeeper) or not-outing (aunt) the madman? Why is it okay for people missing never to be reported or investigated? Why is this murder gene there and how does he know it is there in her? Why is the sheriff murdered? Why is Nicole Kidman playing another redheaded manic pixie milf? Why is the setting English with housekeepers and cooks and yet in the US? What are rich people doing going to govt schools on a school bus? Why are modern cars being driven but attire and bullies are from 30-40 years ago? Why are they hunting birds with rifles?

Elise Feklistova The dead man's daughter is the only one who notices the stranger. He is standing some distance away from the funeral, watching her. Later, at the reception, her mother is immediately charmed. 'India,' she beams, 'come and say hello to your uncle Charlie'. The stranger turns around, smiling.What follows is a dark and inventive subversion of the coming-of-age genre, as eighteen year old India realises that there is something menacing about this uncle that she never knew existed, and that it is precisely this suggestion of the dangerous which draws her to him. 'Have you ever seen a photograph of yourself,' she explains, 'taken from an angle you don't get to see when you look in the mirror. And you think, that's me! That's also me!' In her father's younger brother India finds echoes of herself, and what she comes to understand about the two of them both fascinates and disturbs her.This tension of being attracted to something that you know is wrong is masterfully expressed through a camera which keeps zooming in as it moves away, and zooming out as it draws closer. Like India, we linger when we should be leaving. We hesitate as we approach. And the images that we see on screen are very beautiful, showing us the world from an original, compelling point of view. The opening of an eye is matched to the opening of a piano lid. Long hair transforms into long grass waving in the wind.What you end up thinking of Stoker largely depends on whether or not you agree with something Oscar Wilde said (about books, but he was writing before film was invented). According to Wilde, 'there is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written or badly written. That is all.' To say that Stoker is a well shot film is an understatement, but the subject matter that it renders so beautifully is as perverse as can possibly be. Violence is not only aestheticised, but sexualised. And those compelled to hurt others are presented as unique, almost elite human beings. 'I wonder if you too' Charlie tells his niece, 'can hear what others cannot hear, see what they cannot see'. Blood drips off small white flowers.Worst of all, Stoker ultimately concludes that destructive urges run in your blood – for India's mother is an outcast who can never truly belong to the family that she married into – and that the mature thing to do is to give up individual agency and simply accept your own biological determinism: 'Just as a flower does not choose its colour, we are not responsible for what we have come to be,' India whispers in the opening monologue. 'Only once you realise this do you become free. And to become adult, is to become free'.Nevertheless, I think those who decry Stoker for glorifying violence are missing the point. Chan-wook Park's film is really about seduction, and it is us the viewers who are being seduced. Wilde was writing at a time when an 'immoral book' was simply one with a hint of sex. Today, sex is all over the screen, and the bar for immorality is lower. But seduction is at its most thrilling if it has an element of transgression. What can a film still show us nowadays that, to our dismay, makes us realise that we like what we see? I suggest you watch Stoker for yourself and find out. I for one enjoyed it immensely.

mistoppi Stoker has been on my watchlist for so long I don't even remember what made me interested in it in the first place. I'd say it's because of Park Chan-wook but I'm not so sure if that was the original reason for that. However, now that I haven't really written about movies for a while I thought I'd watch something and decided to go with Stoker.The story is astonishing, and so is the structure. The whole film is somewhat creepy from the beginning, but it's not so straight-forward with it. The film begins as "muted creepy". While the audience sees that something is clearly up with Charlie, the audience doesn't necessarily know what it is. He seems normal, but we've all seen movies, we know he isn't. It's just hard to realise before it's shoved into our faces and we know. Also that really disturbing atmosphere is enhanced by weirdly intense scenes. They don't necessarily need to be that intense, but they are, and that helps create the ambiance of the film. Also while parts of the "plot twist" were easy to predict, some of them came as a total surprise. They definitely were disturbing twists, just like in Oldboy, but still at least partly delightfully unpredictable. Somewhere during the film I forgot that it was Wentworth Miller who wrote this. Either the story is similar to what I'm used to from Park Chan-wook or his directing just made it look so clearly like his movie, but I kept forgetting who actually wrote Stoker. Visually this movie is just as enchanting as Oldboy or Sympathy for Lady Vengeance. It's marvellous. It's unconventional, yet every shot seems to be beautiful, even if they are extremely gruesome. Chung Chung-hoon is an excellent cinematographer. Stoker goes to same category with other Park Chan-wook movies I've seen. It is gruesome, disturbing yet extremely fascinating. If you like films like that, Stoker and Park Chan-wook's movies in general are the right films for you.

k-hosni Stoker is Park Chan-wook first English-language film, which I found to be more on the tamer side of his usual work. Stoker is a psychological thriller, and the best kind you can ask for. The limited amount of characters and slow pacing of the movie gives the audience time to reflect and peer into the minds of the Stoker family.The story revolves around an 18-year-old girl India Stoker (Mia Wasikowska), whose father dies in a bizarre car wreck. Her Uncle Charlie (Matthew Goode), who she never knew existed, comes to live with her and her unstable mother (Nicole Kidman). She begins to suspect this mysterious, charming man has concealed motives and becomes increasingly infatuated with him. The story isn't really that subtle or original but the film is stylishly made with Hitchcockian elements throughout the film. It was quite obvious 10 minutes into the film that the girl and her uncle are psychopaths. Thrillers usually build tension slowly throughout a plot until it gets to a point where everything unravels into a complete different direction. Instead of jump scares or whatever tricks that typical thrillers use, the film rather tests the anxiety of the audience and haunts the imagination. Mia Wasikowska really gives the film a beating heart, as she emerges from her innocence into her latent self. Matthew Goode had a quality about him that reminded me of Norman Bates in Psycho. I was quite surprised to find that the story was written by Wentworth Miller (Prison Break). This is he's first written and produced film on the big screen. I look forward to seeing more of his theatrical work including a prequel story to Stoker about the life of Uncle Charlie.