Svetlonoc

As with many foreign films, Nightsiren hadn't garnered much in the way of publicity throughout the international market. It did however make a major splash at the 2022 Sitges and Locarno Film Festivals, which is where I first heard of the movie. Gladly it received a physical release here in Germany last month.

The story unravels through chapters and remains interesting and engaging throughout, in fact, the (almost) two-hour runtime surprisingly just flies by. Natalia Germani (Sarlota) does a magnificent job in the lead role and the shared scenes with Eva Mores (Mira) are captivating. The cinematography is impressive with a handful of standout scenes and striking images.

As the story progresses, there is an underlying, uneasy feeling that gradually builds. Superstition, patriarchy, and misogyny all play a central role in the narrative and the finale is tense and well constructed. Not to say that there aren't minor quibbles, however, the movie is strong enough for the positives to carry over.

Overall, very impressive and I can give this one a strong recommendation to genre fans.

The dark mysterious atmosphere with a touch of folk horror, the cinematography and audiovisual direction are truly captivating. The acting performances are good and especially the main female duo is great, they carry the entire film.

However, Nightsiren also has several flaws. The writing is messy at times, character behaviour is weird sometimes and the biggest problem is that almost everything is one-dimensional, there's no nuance. For example, the villagers are portrayed as mean, superstitious, prejudicial assholes. And although I understand and support that the film attempts to point out/criticise many relevant problems, I must also acknowledge that the way in which it is done is itself problematic

In terms of (Czecho)Slovakian cinema, the Nightsiren is a bold, unique and high-quality work, so despite its flaws I give it a high rating.

After a shocking start, the script by Teresa Nvotová and Barbora Namerova slowly builds the story of a peasant community rooted in immovable agrarian values, according to basic concepts of duality (like a moon bath versus a sun bath, for example), which awakened my interest. The film also came labeled as "folk horror", a subgenre that is fashionable today, but that has existed since there has been cinema and has produced works about agrarian cults, human sacrifice and other aromas, with classics such as Murnau's «Tabu» to recent notable works such as the Estonian «November», the Portuguese «Alma viva», and the Chilean «Brujería», without forgetting cult films such as the Italian «Il demonio» and the British «The Wicker Man», nor the goats and inverted pentagons from Ari Aster's cinema.

However, this Slovak film is a mystery drama that places heavy emphasis on collective harassment, ignorance, sex and violence, telling us the story of a young woman who returns to her hometown, when she is called by the mayor to claim her inheritance. She ends up entangled in a patriarchal environment, full of family secrets. When the story takes the path of psychedelia, by "reconstructing" a summer holiday, I could not help but completely distance myself from the drama of the protagonist (which almost turns out to be a circus freak) to the point that the family tale lost its fascination and became a tearful melodrama. Awarded in Locarno and Sitges and renamed "Nightsiren" in the USA, proceed at your discretion.

No pun intended - it is always hard to be a woman with an opinion. Even more so if that is true in a village. Where whispers can become rumors and those than outcries and shouts for something that does not make much sense, if you think about it rationally. Also everyone knows (or things they do), what happens around them.

It is sometimes easier to blame something else than to face reality. When a woman comes back to the village she was born, she has to learn the hard way ... well about her past, about her mother, about gossip ... and about the people that live there ... how they conduct themselves and how they project ... or are unable to admit to their own wrongdoings.

If you believe in a religion, you should ask yourself how you interpret what you believe in ... if you are able to be that self reflective that is. But back to the movie at hand. This is really well made, great location, great story and really well acted. If you like thrillers/dramas with real life implication .. and society examining ... with a touch of otherworldly flair that is ... or more than that? You have to watch to see.

This film is truly a disaster The plot is really trivial in Meta Fil you understand everything even before, the film at certain times certainly offers us something good at then ruins everything with really trivial and stupid choices as the choice from a photo model perfectly clean and depilated, this character beyond everything serves only a thing that too is at the most crammed and banal, that is, to have sex this character is a puppet without any characterization only because the film can be a scene without a scene. Gender, we must always follow the flock of sheep, that is, a screenwriter must always do what everything do, without the Pecoraro model photo would have been a good movie with the photo model Pecoraro is just a movie like many others! Model photo which is then literally forgotten by the script !!