Chan-Wook – who goes by the name Director Park on set – is one of the most celebrated and popular filmmakers in Korea, his work known for its very precise framing and violent subject matter. His earliest films were not a huge success, and he initially supplemented his income as a film critic. It was 2000’s Joint Security Area that would help him break through, and by 2004 he’d won the Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival for Oldboy. Director – and fan – Quentin Tarantino, as head judge, personally pushed for him to also be awarded the Palme d’Or.
Filmmaker Park Chan-Wook has created a singular body of work during his more than 20 years as a writer, director and producer of some of Korean cinema’s most innovative and original movies, crafting feverish scenarios that combine lyrical beauty with shattering acts of violence and operatic emotion. “Stoker” is a dark and disturbing thriller about a mysterious and isolated American family. Even the film’s title makes metaphorical allusion to evil, invoking the name of Dracula author Bram Stoker, whose groundbreaking novel is as much about an opportunist who preys on the innocent as it is the supernatural world of the vampire.
