A few days ago I watched and enjoyed 1967's Viy. It had an authentic setting, some cool camera techniques, memorable characters and scenes. While some of it has dated, and is a bit tonally inconsistent, it's well worth the 7/10. Recommended for those interested in vintage horror films (must watch in original language, with subs).
Curious about the 3D modern remake, I had to check 2014's Viy out. Oh dear....
It is so clumsily made that it shouldn't have gotten released: poor dubbing (recalls those old Italian giallo productions), plot-mess, broken FX, amateur-editing. I've seen student films better edited and dubbed than this. The setting, costumes & makeup are inauthentic drama-school stuff. Script is just awful. Humour lame, thrills nay. The ending is total rubbish.
The actors try their best, but the rest of the film-making is so terrible that there's nothing more they can do. And what on Earth is Charles Dance doing on a mess like this? As it seems he appears in the sequel - which has an even lower IMDB score than this one, and unfathomably had an even bigger budget ($48m as opposed to $26m) - we can only guess what his motivations were...
Viy 2014 should've gone the 1967 route: just Russian/Ukranian cast, with perfectly-synchronised native dubbing, so we can at least get a feel for the characters.
A 1/10 candidate...except in 3D there's a few minutes of CGI creature fun: halfway through the film there's an imaginative fantasy-horror section, which actually looked quite neat in 3D. I guess they blew their CGI-budget on those few minutes, as we don't get anymore after that except right at the end with an impressive creature popout.
So gets two points for that bit of fun. Otherwise, this is one of the worst movies I've ever seen.
Curious about the 3D modern remake, I had to check 2014's Viy out. Oh dear....
It is so clumsily made that it shouldn't have gotten released: poor dubbing (recalls those old Italian giallo productions), plot-mess, broken FX, amateur-editing. I've seen student films better edited and dubbed than this. The setting, costumes & makeup are inauthentic drama-school stuff. Script is just awful. Humour lame, thrills nay. The ending is total rubbish.
The actors try their best, but the rest of the film-making is so terrible that there's nothing more they can do. And what on Earth is Charles Dance doing on a mess like this? As it seems he appears in the sequel - which has an even lower IMDB score than this one, and unfathomably had an even bigger budget ($48m as opposed to $26m) - we can only guess what his motivations were...
Viy 2014 should've gone the 1967 route: just Russian/Ukranian cast, with perfectly-synchronised native dubbing, so we can at least get a feel for the characters.
A 1/10 candidate...except in 3D there's a few minutes of CGI creature fun: halfway through the film there's an imaginative fantasy-horror section, which actually looked quite neat in 3D. I guess they blew their CGI-budget on those few minutes, as we don't get anymore after that except right at the end with an impressive creature popout.
So gets two points for that bit of fun. Otherwise, this is one of the worst movies I've ever seen.