La Comtesse

Very interesting plot. I love historical movies. I was really excited when I found out, that there is a movie about a Hungarian countess. As I am Hungarian i was really looking forward to watching it.Bit disappointing. At least if you make a movie try and be true to the country you are showing. Pronunciation of the names if terrible. The characters were not even similar to Hungarians. So basically if I didn't know she was Hungarian, I wouldn't even have recognised the place or country it related to. Apart from that, the story is unusual, the movie is an art. But if you watch it, do not think this is the real 17th century in Hungary:).

I really wanted to like this. Based on the true story of 17th century Countess Bathory, who grew obsessed with retaining her youth, and decided the best way to do this was by bathing in the blood of virgins. What could have been a disturbing descent into madness turns out to be a dull by the numbers bio-pic/period piece.

Julie Delpy does an alright job in the titular role, but the departure from her usual romantic roles doesn't really work, as Delpy just seems like she's on auto-pilot throughout most of the film. The script, written by Delpy, treats the Countess as some sort of feminist pioneer, and at other times, shows her to be a monster. The movie wants to have it both ways, but in the end it it just seems really confused and tiresome.

As much as I wanted to like this film, I was left feeling unsatisfied after watching it.

It felt as if the writers were unsure of what direction they were taking, most of the time. It wasn't a horror, a psychological thriller, or an accurate historical flick... though it did have elements of all the aforementioned.

I was also disappointed to find that (since it's such a dark movie) there was virtually no suspense or build-up. I caught myself growing bored at many points throughout the film, which is really surprising given the subject material. It doesn't help that the acting seems forced most of the time (as if the actors are reading their lines off of cue cards), or that Delpy and Bruhl have about 0 chemistry...

I did, however, love the costumes and the sets, as well as Anamaria Marinca's unique character.

All in all, I was just hoping for a bit more. A bit more horror, a bit more suspense, a bit more passion. This movie left little to no impression on me... and I was sorely disappointed.

Well, actually, in the Little Carpathians, apparently, which are not part of Transylvania, or so Wikipedia tells me.

I really enjoyed this film (at home on pay-per-view)though I think it is intended for a pretty narrow audience. As others have noted, the dialogue is amazingly stilted (very literary, rather like a French novel of the 17th or 18th century) and delivered in near-monotone. I kept feeling that the whole movie had been dubbed into English. On the other hand, I found the acting very fine, and I admired the insistence on presenting these characters as not at all like you, me, or the folks in the latest TV drama. The Countess in particular is a strange, unique portrait--her piety, her desire for amorous adventure, her pride, her intelligence. And that's before you get to the blood-of-virgins part.

The film proposes that what we are seeing before our eyes is not the truth about the Countess. We are watching a fantasy of a noblewoman enacting a tale "told by the victors"--by the men who were enriched by her downfall and relieved, too, to be rid of the very possibility of an intelligent woman. The tale is told, too, by the peasants and others whose sons are fighting in her army. Yet the man who questions the gory story is her lover, and he too may be deceived. There is no simple answer to the question, what really happened?--no resolution.

In short, it's an intellectual (and visual) treat, but it won't affect your blood sugar.

Julie Delpy gives her own vision (through an innocent young man's eyes who would have been one of her numerous -male and female-lovers)of a nefarious figure of history .her direction is icily impersonal but effective .Her hieratic cold look gives the jitters for her acting is restrained.Unlike Walerian Borowczyk's segment of "Les Heroines Du Mal"(1979) in which Paloma Picasso played an "erotic " countess with nudity galore,"the countess" has few bed scenes and few gore clichés -and with THAT subject,it is much to Delpy's credit.Her directing is not feminine at all (as Agnès Varda's or Jane Campion's are) and her character has the mind of a man :political power,women and men treated -with one exception- as sexual objects .She wouldn't sacrifice a virgin lad cause ,she says , God created man in his own image .She remained pious even in living in the most awful sin!

The atmosphere which is depicted does not square with reality,if you read one of her biographies:she lived in a lugubrious castle ,in a cold area,and she suffered from chronic migraines which almost never gave her any respite.