The Fifth Thoracic Vertebra

The atmosphere of Vertebra lives in the liminal space between softly romantic and violent, as the creature develops along its lifecycle into something desperate to make sense of its complexities and the subtleties of the world around it.

Park's film is all about tone and sensation and while its loose story does thread several episodes together, it's merely a sounding board for the work's principal preoccupations - modern malaise and alienation.

It's less a creature feature than a meditation on the inexorable passage of time.

The Fifth Thoracic Vertebra is the most magnificent malevolent mutant mushroom mattress movie made yet. One small step by an old mattress is a giant leap forward for the horror kind.