31 Nights of Halloween Horror part 18 - Evil

Evil

89 mins

Dir. Oleg Fesenko

2006/Russia

Tonight, we are going to do something different.  I watched a movie that was a remake that I don’t want you to watch, instead I want you to go watch the original.  Like most remakes this pales in comparison to the original.  If you have not seen it before, it is one of the coolest films you’ve never heard of it.  It is called Viy or Vij.

Viy is a Russian film from 1967 and is based on a story from the 1800s by Nikolai Gogol.  The story revolves around Khoma who is studying to be a cleric or some kind of religious priest figure.  One night looking for a place to rest he comes across an old farm house owned by an old woman.  During the night, the woman tries to seduce him and as he refuses she gets on his back and rides him piggyback style and eventually flies him through the air. Khoma realizes she is a witch and once they return to the ground Khoma beats the old woman with a stick to near death.  As the woman cries in mercy Khoma sees that she has turned into a beautiful woman.  Horrified he runs off.

Back at his church school, his instructor tells informs him a rich guy in towns daughter is dying and has requested Khoma to pray for her soul for three nights.  The girl dies before he arrives and once there he finds out the young girl is the witch the old woman turned into.  So Khoma is like, fuck this, I am out of here.  But he is forced to stay and perform the prayers.  He is brought to the chapel where the girl’s body lies and is locked in for the night.

The rest of the movie revolves around Khoma locked in the chapel reciting prayers as the Witch returns from the dead and tries to attack Khoma, but Khoma draws a circle on the floor around himself for protection.  When the cock crows each morning everything returns to normal and Khoma is released from the chapel.  On the third night, the shit hits the fan and all sorts of evil creatures and demons descend upon the church, and the witch summons the demon Viy causing all the other creatures to tremble in fear.  This is where the movie really shines.  You have to remember, this is the 60s in Russia.  A place still not really known for its output of movies.  But the imagery, atmosphere and effects this movie generates is top notch for its time.  A classic story and visually one of the coolest movies you will ever see.  I believe it is classified as the first Russian horror film, but don’t quote me on that.  If you love old school witch movies and monsters, and dig movies like Haxan, Viy is definitely the witches tits and gets high ratings from me.

It has been remade several times over the years, including a South Korean version.  The version I watched tonight is a modern retelling loosely based on the Viy story.  The priest is a journalist who goes off to this town to write a piece on witchcraft or something, he encounters the old witch who turns into the young girl as in the original.  But as he escapes he comes across a dead priest and steals the priests garb and is eventually picked up by the police who have been searching for the priest not knowing he is dead and think the journalist is him.  They take him to the village to recite some prayers over the sheriff’s daughter who died. 

The biggest fail of the movie is the portrayal of what happens in the church at night between the witch and the priest.  Which is pretty much nothing.  The witch flies around and tries to grab at the priest, but the movie has no demons or night creatures coming from the shadows and definitely no Viy.  Sadly, this version ends with the fake priest going from a non-believer to becoming a god worshipper and more or less uses the power of christ to compel the witch.  A sappy bullshit pro-christian ending which is not at all like how the original story goes thankfully.

Another low point unfortunately which will probably turn off most people is the dubbing.  It is one of the worst dubs movies I have ever seen.  The voices sound ridiculous and do not synch up with the lip movement at all, to the point where someone’s mouth will be closed but you hear them talking.  For whatever reason, they made this movie with a western European and American audience in mind and set the location supposedly in a small American town, even though it was filmed in Russia. 

The inside of the church looks great and the witch is perfectly cast, but I honestly cannot recommend this movie to anyone unless you want to watch exactly everything I am watching this month or you love Viy so much you want to see other versions of it to compare.  But by all means make sure Viy is on your must watch list.  You won’t be disappointed, and if you are you should just stop watching movies all together because you have no taste, go read a book or play in traffic.