Piargy

Based on the story of the same name by Slovak writer Frantisek Svantner, Piargy follows a bishop investigating if there is truth in the antichrist being born in the village. The movie's best qualities are found in its mixture of family drama and folk horror draped in beautiful black & white aesthetics.

An invitation to explore the Slovak countryside where fantasy and reality are combined with an elegant and stylish cinematography that captures the light and shadows of the environment, from the reduced places in the farm to the open locations, as well as the lightness and the darkness of the characters in the story. Characters whose identities are unfolded as the movie goes on making their identities a puzzle that is being completed before our eyes. They pose different societal mores no longer normative, where the line between innocence and accomplice is many times unclear to see. This is an asset considering it helps the narrative to be more interesting, deeper, and the characters more profound and difficult to read. Piargy is a movie where it is difficult to be apathic because of the nature of the story and the unabashed freedom when it comes to the decision of leaving out or not some scenes that might be hard to watch for many people.

Its cinematography offers a slight resemblance to Sin City, not because of its black & white, unlike Sin City, the grays are more pronounced here, but due to the limited use of color. There is red, green, and orange as the only colors among the world of black and white. The minimalism of color use and their striking contrast with the absence of color in everything else is utilized to enhance certain elements of the story as well as to add layers of symbolism. Ivo Trajkov's Piargy is an entertaining and impactful movie, both by its visuals and also by the engaging narrative with drama and folk horror elements.