Strigoi

My husband and I loved this movie for:

1) it's quirky humor -- humor that we found intensely funny (laughing out loud in almost every scene).

One running joke is about Vlad's squeamishness. In spite of going to med school, Vlad failed to practice medicine, presumably b/c of this reputed squeamishness -- well-known to everyone in the small town. So, just about every character says something to Vlad about his squeamishness, as he is faced with increasingly challenging or gruesome tasks. The remark: "Everyone knows you're a pussy, Vlad" is repeated by several characters. The delivery is not teasing or mocking; it's deadpan and matter of fact way, which is much funnier.

2. the political and social context -- very interesting

3. the blood sucking/greedy eating as a metaphor for the communists' greedy thieving of people's land

Tips -- it's not scary -- not supposed to be, but it has a few gross out moments.

LOVED IT!

I've just recently seen Strigoi at the Toronto After Dark Film Festival and was absolutely surprised at how good the film was. The trailer I had seen for the film made it seem like a very low budget, campy, been there done that vampire film. What I was shown was a well produced, professional, good looking film with an interesting vampire story. As an added bonus, there are some funny moments and good jokes mixed in throughout the film so that it doesn't come off stale.

The only real problem I had with the film was the slow pacing and longer than necessary runtime. Had the film been cut down by 10-20 minutes, I think it would become 100 times more enjoyable.

I was surprised to find out that the film has technically been done since early in the year but had only now, played in front of an audience. I am lucky to say I was able to catch this little gem at it's world premiere.

I hope to see more from this talented writer/director in the future and wish Strigoi all the best. With no big name actors, it may be a hard sell which is a damn shame. Genre fans need to see this film. In a genre where the market is flooded with the taste du jour and the films often leave a bad taste in your mouth, Strigoi serves up a platter of delicious offerings genre fans are sure to eat up.

It is well written, well directed, and well acted.

This isn't a knee slapper. It isn't an in your face "Boo!" fest. It doesn't make your skin crawl like a Hannibal Lector. It isn't a Sherlock Holmes mystery.

But its wry and amusing. There are scenes so odd in light of the circumstances that they stand out as surreal and yet right for some reason. The whole movie revolves around getting to the bottom of why or what this Strigoi vampire nonsense is all about.

While set in Romania the language is English and well spoken. As a native English speaker it is easy to follow along while still getting the sense of being in a foreign world -- a place where the undead still have their wrongful place in the world.

When the villagers killed Constantin Tirescu, they thought it was justice. Vlad Cozma thinks it was murder. Now Constantin thinks pickles might go nice with blood.

Dennis Harvey at Variety called it "drolly funny if a tad long-winded". I think he is right on both points. Second one first -- coming in around 104 minutes, I think shaving ten minutes off would help the pacing and get more of an audience. Not saying it drags, but it could be faster.

First point second, it is quite funny, in an offbeat way. Romanians doing a conga line to "Spirit in the Sky", old men asking if Italy has nice pizza (it does, and ice cream, too). And weird comments like a character being "too ***** to stick his finger up my ***." The fast food nightmare scene was excellent, too, both funny and sickening at the same time.

Faye Jackson says, "Romanian is a language that uses a lot of word play and slang and my Romanian simply isn't good enough to write dialogue that sounds like Romanian as it's spoken. So I had to write it in English." She has been asked why it was not in Romanian since they filmed it there and it starred Romanians. Perhaps the right thing to do would be to get a new director, but since Jackson did so well, that seems unnecessary in hindsight.

The gore is commendable, very good and not too gross for a horror film, especially the scene with the police officer. I am not entirely clear why the cop has born without ribs, though. (I suppose he might have been born with ribs and had them removed later, but it is still weird.) I am waiting to see what Faye Jackson does next. The director's next project is "sort of Dirty Pretty Things meets the A Team, except nothing like that at all". Wow. Yep, wow.

I can't believe I sat through the entire movie without turning it off! This could have been a great movie. The concept and the history involving the location could have made this a great movie but somethings never happen like you hope they would. First why is this movie in English? Do they think everyone is so dimwitted that they just won't read subtitles? Secondly the phony accents do not match the nationality. I know Romanians and they sound NOTHING like the people in the movie. If you have watched everything available and it is a rainy Sunday and you don't mind watching a movie that has an ending that is even more confusing then any thing you have ever seen then watch Strigoi, but do not say you where not warned!