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Charlie has an immediate, eerie interest in India. He stays at the house, and a lurid triangle forms between Charlie, India and her mother, Evelyn. Evelyn throws herself at Charlie, who all the while is eyeing India. Visitors like India's aunt (Jacki Weaver) quickly disappear, some on screen and some off. Park rarely metes out violence with guns, preferring more tactile gruesomeness with objects like scissors or a hammer. Here employed to bloody ends are a rock, a pencil and a belt. The movie has a dreamy, heightened air. The dialogue is arch and the whole affair is over-the-top; certain moments of sexual release are tacky and unforgettable. The melodrama doesn't rise to Pedro Almodovar levels of sublime, but to intoxicating macabre outlandishness. The Charlie and Evelyn characters veer too far into camp. Making the best of it are Goode and Kidman, who, with last year's "The Paperboy," has paired two of the most hothouse movies you'll ever see. Their characters aren't anything like real people, and it's such aspects of "Stoker" that make it seem like a mere provocation, one that only marvels at how splayed blood looks on crimson wallpaper. But Park keeps his cameras close to Wasikowska, whose breathless uncertainty
-- Is Charlie a spider to shoo or embrace? What kind of flower is she? -- propels the film, saving it from becoming suffocated in its masterly formalism. "Stoker" is an exquisitely made grotesque that crawls up your leg. "Stoker," a Fox Searchlight release, is rated R for disturbing violent and sexual content. Running time: 98 minutes. Two and a half stars out of four. ___ Motion Picture Association of America rating definition for R: Restricted. Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.
[Associated
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