Le sanctuaire des sorcières

I was privileged enough to pick up a copy of this seminal piece of Russian horror (horrorpiece, to employ the official term)at Mike Knight's Open-All-Night VHS Dungeon on W 5th Street, LA in the early 90s. For anyone familiar with the area at this time, Mike's store was a great place for the distinguished VHS "aficionado" to relish in the more under-appreciated World rarities. Sadly, he who lives by the sword dies by the sword; I last heard Mike's Dungeon was closed down for video piracy by none other than LA's infamous video piracy vigilante, The Pirate JB. On to the film, and what a film! Marina Levtoza (who later went on to star in what was a bigger box office success, yet inferior critical success, 'President i yego zhenshchina' aka 'The President and his Women') delivers a strikingly convincing performance as the mentally unhinged love interest Belogurochka. It is delightful to see a horror film of this calibre (trash horror) trying its hand at some old fashioned Biblical symbolism, as Marina is enticed by the dark side, or Satan's path, as represented by the witches. This is pure Genesis parody, and the tremendous clout of the chromatic imagery is rival, if not commensurate, to that of Polanski's 'Rosemary's Baby' (1968). The witches, of course, inhabit a cave, symbolic of that small, hidden alcove in all our hearts where Satan lurks, "whispering" to us with his empty promises. NOTE: The witches communicate with each other by whispering! Class!

I came across this film on TV accidentally and being born in USSR it brought back some sentimental memories, mostly because it is based on Kir Bulichev's story - this author used to be published in almost every soviet youth magazine - so this made me feel like 12 again Don't get me wrong - it is quite bad, it was never a hit, and it looked pretty outdated already when it came out at the end of the soviet era. At the time, not only the audience but even the directors were totally mesmerized by the B and C level American trash films - mostly because were so different from everything we saw before that. So this film is clearly an attempt to emulate those foreign films: not even the original Star Wars, Predator or Conan but their cheap imitations. In less than a year my home country quit the USRR in the midst of wars and economic collapse and relations with Russians have been getting worse ever since. So this is a fantasy film (I would not dear to call it a science fiction) from the time and the country that now only remains in the memories and fiction and may be that is why I appreciate it more than it deserves as it gives my this sad memories of the world that doesn't exist anymore.

The actors playing the main parts (except Karachentsov who seems to be out of place here) were mostly the young generation that were not yet that popular in non-Russian republics (unlike the older generation that is still loved and admired) even though Zhigunov was star of the Russian knockoff of 3 musketeers ("Gardemarini" series) and Pevtsov (the villain in this movie) went on to become the major heartthrob of Russian cinema over the next decade, none of them are appealing enough to hold the entire film, and director's decision to cast own wife as a female lead did not help - if both hero and antagonist are trying hard to be Schwarzeneggers (Pevtsov comes close - with over the top ridiculous grimaces), the leading lady is obviously really poor man's take on every single "Tanya Roberts wearing fur bikini" character from American B movies. The special effects are really lame, not even the "American B movie" lame but rather a "Godzilla wanna-be" lame. And one can feel that it was too obviously aiming at young audience - it is felt in dialogs, and in many scenes, like in a sequence that has a promise and look of a vintage German porn the female lead takes shower in the waterfall, but alas, doesn't even take of her Stone Age bikini. The film is also gives an interesting alternative of the future where the an astronauts are wearing only soviet red flag - badges - I suppose communism was meant to survive into XXX century.

The funniest part for the Russian speaker comes when the a soviet astronaut of the future and a savage princess talk with an obvious Russian yuppie accents and seem to be almost embarrassed to be doing all this adolescent ninja staff.

On a positive note however, even with all of this criticism, the film has more heart and plot than most of its foreign sources of inspiration. It is pretty interesting, and pretty fun, even though in a masterpiece theater kind of way.

This is a sci-fi movie, it has nothing to do with the Bible and/or biblical symbolism. Nice and pure piece of fiction, story of what might become of us. Contact with an alien life, justification our of intervention into natural order, men and what they carry within them to the starts are the main problems aroused by the film. A.Tarkovskiy's "Solaris" (written by S.Lem) would be the closest in a genre. One might find deeper thoughts encapsulated within the story, but in reality it has no more that any other movie would have. Easy to watch, a bit naive. I'll give it 10 of 10 for the script, 8 for the play, 5 for decorations/special effects (don't expect much). Enjoy it, should you find decent translation or subtitles.

PS: By the way, Bulychyov's book has much more to appreciate.