Many years ago, I was a regular contributor to the Mixed Media section of Racer X Illustrated, where I had free rein to write about films, books, and music. That section of the magazine eventually went away, and it’s the thing I always missed the most about that job. In 2023 I got the chance to do a short piece for excellent Cunning Folk magazine’s Vampire Issue, which I’m sharing here.

When a deeply moral Catholic priest miraculously returns from a grisly death, he becomes a figure of veneration across Korea. Problem is, this “bandaged saint” has returned with … a bit of a sunlight allergy. Director Park Chan-wook dispenses with most of the traditional western vampire mythos for 2009’s Thirst, treating vampirism less as a gothic aesthetic exercise and more as a medical condition—and a canvas for exploring the limits of morality, lust, and inescapable Catholic guilt.

Song Kang-ho stars as Sang-hyun, whose priestly instincts survive his transformation more or less intact; even with his superhuman strength and demonic carnal urges, he steadfastly refuses to kill. (Coma victims are essentially human Capri Sun pouches, and it turns out there’s an audience for a brooding Dr. Kevorkian type.) But when he meets Tae-ju (Kim Ok-vin), a childhood crush trapped by her seemingly abusive husband and her overbearing in-laws, the good father’s goodwill faces its most formidable test. As the lives of this unlikely power couple become more and more intertwined, the film turns claustrophobic, sexy, surreal—and at times shockingly funny.

An adaptation of 1867’s Thérèse Raquin, Thirst modernizes Zola’s novel for the Twilight generation while cranking up the sex, violence, and sweat. The edges begin to fray as Tae-ju starts channeling Isabelle Adjani in Possession, and we’re treated to a bloodsucking ouroboros, a surprisingly mobile drowned corpse, and a touching, poetic finale.

That issue of Cunning Folk is out of print but may still be available in the U.S. via the Peculiar Parish Bookshop—whose Fiddler’s Green zine is also a regular fixture on my nightstand!