banem2 Unlike some comments, I think the effects in this movie are extraordinary, especially the church and dinner scenes, and I cannot remember when I saw such in any movie recently. And it keeps going throughout the whole movie (including complete scenery in whole movie!). The kid in you will watch it mouth open!Unfortunately, for some reason, someone has decided to dub the movie into English since it is originally in Russian and this was done quite poor. I was watching it on the movie channel and I was not sure what is wrong with the tone until I found out this is Russian movie which was dubbed (I am against dubbing)... And I am looking to watch the original version.If you like this type of movies (fantasy), you will have 2 quality hours of full enjoyment!

kosmasp Just in case you didn't know (like me), this is sort of a remake of a 1967 movie. Though as some have stated here and on other places, it's not really a remake or people shouldn't expect it to be one. Whatever the case, this has pretty good special effects in it. The acting on the other hand is hard to rate.Why is that? While watching (in English in this case), you might realize that something is off with some of the actors. I can only assume, but most of them either couldn't speak English or their English was so bad, they had to be synced. And that is very apparent in many scenes. Obviously Jason Flemyng does not have that issue. And if you are a fan of Fantasy Fiction, you will still sort of love this. But there are things that just don't work or are too convoluted ...

orvuus I have been eagerly anticipating seeing this film for a long time, ever since seeing previews. The first film made from Gogol's story, also titled Viy (1967), was humorous and yet had scary special effects, especially well done for the time (the Russians made some great films in this period). This is a different take on the story, NOT a remake of that 1967 film, which I can appreciate. As one reviewer noted, this is very like Burton's take on The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (possible spoiler?) in that the plot veers away from the original story. In fact this makes the film very interesting, and I think Jason Fleming does a good job in his role as the cartographer who blunders into a drama in a cossack village. The letdown comes in the overuse of CGI, to me, and in the decidedly humdrum actresses used for the female parts. Not being Ukranian, naturally, I don't share other reviewers anger at the portrayal of drunken cossacks, and in fact this is hypocritical in that the 1967 shows about the same thing. (The Don Cossacks historically were an important people in Russian history, and made up elite cavalry units). Comparing this movie to similar American ventures in period horror overusing CGI, I think this is actually better than, say, Brothers Grimm. Nonetheless overall weak actors (the witch should be at least as fascinating as the 1967 version, and there are plenty of beautiful Ukranian or Russian women that could have played this role), overuse of CGI, and an overly busy plot make this a less than stellar picture that is forgettable. Please note the film is available in a somewhat English-friendly DVD, but the subtitles are horrible -- making the plot even more incomprehensible. Some of the subtitles make no sense at all, and some apparently cannot translate Russian words and just put them on the screen in kind of direct transliteration. I think this subtitling was done with computer assistance, badly, because even the HTML for a title card is translated (a font number!).

Y.t. Whitemansson This movie didn't reach my countries cinemas, even though it's just a country away from the old SSSR. They don't tend to show Russian films in my homeland (although 'Stalingrad' was shown during some festival), so i had to pirate a bluray release to finally see the film. First of all, i must address, mostly negative comments that I've noticed, coming from Russia and the region. One aspect of that negativity came from the notion that this movie, doesn't follow or respect Nikolay Gogol's story or the eponymous 1967 film. There is truth in this (although some motifs are repeated, like 'all women are witches' stuff, and 'scientist-philosopher' babble), story is restructured and changed, almost entirely ignoring central theme of Gogol's tale, which is fear, deathly fear. That brings me to the second aspect of negative reactions, which claims that the movie isn't scary. Not scary as 1967 film. Well, what can I say except that that's also true. This film is not a horror, and trailer gives false impression that it is.One thing that is not true though is comparison of this film with Tim Burton's 'Sleepy Hollow'. Resemblance is only superficial, this film doesn't share Tim Burton's mixture of violent horror and morbid humor, although there's plenty of humor in this film, performance of some actors is almost entirely in comedic fashion.So, what this film actually is, is a funny horror fantasy. 12+, a family horror, something like this would never be approved for production in the Hollywoods. If they even decide to distribute it there, film is probably facing cutting, like the fate of unfortunate 'Snowpiercer'.Even the 1967 film was marked with comedic performances, so I don't see what the fuss is about, as for the plot, plot is not weak, it's chaotic, especially the ending, which only adds to the overall charming film. Film doesn't resemble Hollywood productions as some claim, most noticeable is respect that this films has for all characters, there's no cannon fodder characters which is a disgusting standard in Hollywood works.As for the special effects, they vary through the film. For instance, cgi dove is visibly fake in two scenes, while the scenes of breakfast with Cossacks if fantastic. There's cgi, prosthetic, even beautiful stop motion (update: no stop-mo, it's animatronics)This is only one of three movies that I really liked this year and I watch them plenty. Other two are 'The zero theorem' and 'The anchorman 2'. Seriously, this movie is special, the fact that Jonathan's dialogs look like they're from an 17-nth century adventure story, or the overall superstition and fear of everything, or the religious tones eastern style, film feels unique.Also, you should check 1967 'Viy'. It's super.