S. Korean vampire thriller grabs third-highest honor in Cannes

(ATTN: RECASTS headline, lead; ADDS details of Cannes results; RESTRUCTURES and
TRIMS throughout)
By Shin Hae-in
SEOUL, May 25 (Yonhap) -- South Korean director Park Chan-wook grabbed an
influential award at the Cannes film festival Monday (Korean time) for his
vampire thriller "Thirst (Bakjwi)," marking the second time for the talented
auteur to be honored at the world's largest competition.

"Thirst," featuring a priest-turned-vampire struggling with his physical desires,
shared the third-highest honor in the French contest with British director Andrea
Arnold's "Fish Tank," the event's organizers said.
The top prize Palme d'Or went to Austrian director Michael Haneke's "The White
Ribbon," featuring an eerie tale of brutality in a 20th-century German town.
"The joy of creating is my energy in making films. Filmmaking is a joy from the
beginning to the end," Park told the audience at the awards ceremony. "I'd like
to share this honor with actor Song Gang-ho, a great friend and colleague."
The award marks the eighth time that a local film has received one of the main
awards at the Cannes International Film Festival. Park had won the festival's
second-highest Grand Jury Prize in 2004 with his film "Oldboy."
South Korean director Lim Known-taek received the Cannes director's award for
"Stroke of Fire" in 2002 and actress Jeon Do-yeon took the best actress prize in
2007 for "Secret Sunshine."
"Thirst," praised by the jurors of Cannes as a "unique noir film," competed for
top honors at this year's Cannes with a platoon of big-named directors including
Quentin Tarantino, Pedro Almodovar, Xavier Giannoli, Jane Champion and Ang Lee.
With 20 films vying for the top honor, Cannes opened in the French resort-city on
May 13 hosting some 25,000 film professions and movie fans from around the world.
Cannes winners draw prestige from the awards and hope for a box-office boost.
Park, who had also won the Alfred Bauer Prize for his science fiction comedy "I'm
a Cyborg, But That's Ok" at the Berlin film festival, says it took a decade of
preparation to bring the vampire story, a genre rarely explored by South Korean
directors, to local screens.
Befitting Park's reputation for dealing head on with the most uncomfortable
subjects -- incest, revenge, insanity and brutality -- "Thirst" again covers
dark, brutal territory, drawing both criticism and praise from fans.
The film features a Catholic priest who begins to question moral and religious
boundaries when he is turned into a vampire after being given a strange blood
transfusion. Actor Song Gang-ho teamed up with Park for the third time after the
two pulled off a superb performance in "Joint Security Area" in 2000.
Although long held in high esteem and recognized internationally, Park's fame has
not always brought him automatic success.
"I'm a Cyborg, but That's Ok," his most recent release in 2006, was slammed by
critics as "too cute to be a creation of Park's" and was somewhat of an
embarrassment for the director, failing miserably in local box offices despite
its win in Berlin.
"I couldn't bring myself to make a film for a long time due to the recent
failures," Park admitted during his speech in Cannes Monday.
"Thirst," the first South Korean film to be co-produced and distributed by major
Hollywood studio Universal Pictures, has been sold to more than 10 countries,
including France, Greece and Brazil, for screening worldwide later this year.
Hitting the local screens on April 30, the film has drawn 2.1 million viewers at
home where 1 million is considered a yardstick for a box office success.
hayney@yna.co.kr
(END)