Stoker

Stoker-posterStoker is an extended, misguided homage to one of Hitchcock’s, or anyone’s, finest films, Shadow of a Doubt. Both films are about how the approach of a distant Uncle Charlie affects a family. In Shadow, he’s a beloved family figure whose namesake niece absolutely adores him – until she begins to suspect that he’s a very, very bad man.

Stoker‘s Uncle Charlie is a completely mysterious figure. The niece in this picture, India (played superbly by Mia Wasikowska), has never heard of him; she doesn’t know she had an uncle until he arrives on the scene. He does this in spooky thriller fashion, appearing at the far end of a graveyard during India’s father’s funeral. He whispers something to India – something only she can hear, since she has some special powers: “My ears hear what others cannot hear. Small faraway things people cannot normally see are visible to me.”

Nowhere is this specifically dramatized, but it is a clue to unraveling this beautifully shot, bizarrely mannered and ultimately none-too-consequential thriller. Uncle Charlie shares India’s gift, but at first glance she hates him. He was off in other countries, never wrote, never called. And her mother (Nicole Kidman, walking a fine line between weird Tennesee Williams overheated gothic and Wicked Realmother, and somehow consistently finding the right notes to play throughout) is much too welcoming. She clearly wants to hop on Uncle Charlie within minutes of his arrival. She was deeply jealous of India’s closeness with her father, and almost seems to relish India’s mourning.

The first thirty minutes take place entirely within the Stoker manor, and when we finally see India at a modern high school, and that someone there has a cell phone, it’s almost shocking. She’s the class weirdo, openly harassed by bullies (who look like they came from the 80s). She dresses fifty years out of step, wears flat shoes, and tries her damnedest to look more like predator than prey. Her one apparent passion was shooting birds – her father would take her on hunting trips, and would stuff whatever she shot.

If all of this sounds ridiculous and mannered, it is. And some of it works. The material is heightened near-hysteria, and the actors and director wisely underplay the mood constantly. This is Oldboy director Chan Wook Park’s first English-language film. The performances are mostly fine (though Matthew Goode’s Uncle Charles is creepy from the get-go, which everyone in the movie except for India seems not to notice). Often in soft focus, the visuals are gorgeous, sometimes allowing the action to be subtle and detailed.

But the story is too self-conscious, too distant, and too strange to ever work. As an homage to Hitchcock, it falls flat. He was a master of dread, letting the audience know what was likely to happen, then stretching out the time until it did happen. Stoker is too busy being mysterious to be intriguing. Too much time is spent being obscure, and indirect. Indirection only works when it’s not obvious, not when the film is jumping up and down, saying, “I bet you’re wondering what weird stuff’s gonna happen!” It’s the difference between, “Oh God, what’s going to happen?” and “What the hell just happened?” Stoker is more of a “What the hell?” kind of film.

About Kent Conrad

To contact Kent Conrad, email kentc@explodedgoat.com