If I know one thing, it’s that you can’t ever really kill anyone in
Asia. They always come back as some sort of squeaky ghost with tongues
instead of eyeballs and hang out under the sink eating your fear.
Yaaawn. And if I know two things (I really do!), the first is
the thing I just said about Asian ghosts—surely you
remember—and the second is that vampirism is the SEXIEST DISEASE
EVER (except for super-duper-big-boob-itis, am I riiiiiight?). Like,
seriously, vampires, we get it. WE GET IT. You’re hornay. Hornay
hornay hornay. Cheeseburgers are not an option anymore because human
blood is your food now, and for some reason that means you just want to
grab a lady and PUT IT IN THERE at all times. All night. It has to be
at night. Because daytime lovin’ would cause you to be on fire,
which is another symptom of your condition (I have done my
research!).

But for realsies, between Twilight and HBO’s True
Blood (marry me, Lafayette) and Interview with the Kirsten
Dunst’s Snaggletooth and good old Dracula and goddamn
Count Duckula (that dude was a perv) and now Thirst, I’ve
had it about up to here (picture me holding my hand up really
high—like, incredibly high) with sexy, sexy,
vampire-on-human, bloody, lusty bloodlust. Mon. Dieu. Quit
braggin’.

Now, Thirst—directed by Park Chan-wook of 2003’s
Oldboy—is not bad. It’s actually kind of good. It’s
about an ultraprincipled, goody-two-shoes, wooden-flute-tootin’
priest named Sang-hyun (The Host‘s Song Kang-ho), who
volunteers to test a new vaccine, dies, accidentally gets a transfusion
of vampire blood, un-dies, becomes a gauze-wrapped, messianic folk
hero, and then has sex. A whole bunch of it. Because that’s what
vampires do (JESUS CHRIST, WE KNOW). Also there is a squeaky Asian
ghost (see?).

Thirst is a horror movie, albeit a silly one. Actual scares
are few to none—instead, Sang-hyun’s painfully earnest
consternation at trying to live as an ethical monster (losing
his priestly virginity, daintily sipping a comatose man’s blood
straight from the IV) make it a funny, cartoonish, and strangely sweet
fable about ethics versus instincts: “Is it a sin for a fox to eat a
chicken?” Unfortunately, Thirst drags on for a punishing
gazillion hours—ethical monster shacks up with manipulative harpy
and the complications pile up like bodies (because, you know, they
literally are bodies)—and you feel like you’ll never see
your home or your mom or the precious golden sun again. VAMPIRE-STYLE.
Hornay, hornay vampires. God, shut up. recommended

Comment on Concessions at
thestranger.com

Lindy West was born an unremarkable female baby in Seattle, Washington. The former Stranger writer covered movies, movie stars, exclamation points, lady stuff, large frightening fish, and much, much more....

6 replies on “Concessions”

  3. In truth, ma’am, I always thought sexuality and vampire legends went hand in hand at least since Bram Stoker. Or was it Bela Lugosi?

    Doesn’t mean we can’t get a new theme, though. I thought the whole sexy vampire thing should have been over after Keifer Sutherland.

    Really. That was, well, that time of youth for me. And just like the boys, the girls were trying out new phrases and concepts.

    So try it on. Keifer Sutherland or Corey Haim. Pick one. And then imagine yourself at twelve or thirteen years old and fill in the blank: “You know, _____ makes me so wet.”

    Yeah. The whole fucking sexy vampire thing should have died in 1987.

    Okay, I was fourteen. But still. I don’t think I ever, in my life, said, “You know, Minnie Driver gives me a boner.” Not even when I actually lusted the shy, awkward look in women.

    But, yeah. Anyway. Carry on. Keep up the good work, and all that. Thank you for seeing these films so I don’t have to.

  6. It’s at the Varsity in the U-District, low_sea. you must not have tried very hard.

    But vampires shmampires. Lindy, please PLEASE give us a review of the new Ashton Kutcher/Anne Heche film, SPREAD. With the tagline “It’s a business doing pleasure,” and this poster, I had a hunch it would be a gloriously shallow L.A. T&A fest and I was right! It’s the most wonderfully trashy thing I’ve seen on the big screen in years. I (and others, I’m sure) would love to hear your take on it.

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