Viy (1967)
I'd been looking forward to seeing this since i was given the Severin Blu-ray by a friend who for reasons unknown had ordered it both on Blu-ray and dvd. I thought by watching it first i wouldn't be jaded and raring to go with my month on new to me horror films.
Oh boy! This has one hell of a reputation but i was so disappointed by it. Is it 'good' because it's obscure and Russian? That's all i can think of. For three quarters of the 78 minutes run time my patience was severely tested due to some pretty wretched acting from star Leonid Kuravlyov who constantly seemed on the verge of either rabid hysteria or perhaps total inebriation.
The film never felt like a horror film at all, it lacked atmosphere and had nothing in the way of scares.
Then with ten minutes to go all hell breaks loose. Literally.
There are weird and wonderful creatures and demons oozing out of the walls of a chapel (Yes, oozing is the correct term) - ghostly skeletons, vampires, grasping ghostly hands and many other hideous monstrosities including the demon Viy. It's a full on assault of nightmarish visions and is utterly wonderful.
However that's just ten minutes of of 78. For a film that lives in it's own fairytale world of folk horror i really wasn't invested in it. As a reference point it sits somewhere alongside
The Singing Ringing Tree,
The Tinder Box and
Valerie and her Week of Wonders but ten minutes aside fails to live up to the brilliance of those films.
This was based on the story by Nikolai Gogol and was also filmed by Mario Bava as
Black Sunday in 1960.
/ 5