Sauna

Closer to a Nightmare than the Real Thing
Every once in a while I manage to find a dvd that is absolutely worth viewing-this is one among them. I have watched this dvd six times already, and each time the sense of the horror becomes more and more pronounced. The dvd is in the same meld as Bergman's Hour of the Wolf, or The Serpent's Egg, or The Seventh Seal, (the lead actor, Ville Virtanen, has resemblence to Max Von Sydow.) yet laying out the psychological horror far more explicitly and unrelentingly, finally at the end spilling it forth without restraint in the emotionally raw screams and yells that are totally nightmarish (one thinks of the final revelation in Heart of Darkness, when Kurtz utters his final words, " The horror. The horror!"). This dvd is a the telling of a story with the elements of horrific nightmares - it certainly does clinch the viewer, and by the end, you are left starring at the screen with these screams sinking into your mind. Excellent!!!

I won't spoil it for you; but, the period allegory...

Good creepy atmosphere, but slow
Interesting foreign language film (subtitles) based on a late 1500s storyline of a joint Finnish/Russian expedition working to define the border between their two countries. As they walk the actual disputed line, they commit a few unchoice acts that come back to haunt them, and also discover a village that is not on any map. Eerie things follow (trying to avoid giving a spoiler).

Overall, this was generally enjoyable. The mood maintains a dreary and eerie feeling throughout, but perhaps too much. It almost never lets up, as strange acts continue and the actors engage in several savage acts. This could be a negative; the story unendingly plods through dark territory with interspersed horror moments that more abruptly arise rather than be built up. Also, its kinda slow. The story unfolds somewhat discontinuously (which, at times, is very well done), but generally it moves from one slowly developed scene to another, all of which are more notable for the human-human...

great film!!
Saw this movie trailer on YouTube and it immediately captured my interest!! It took forever to come to stores to buy and I had to really look all over town to find it. Sauna is trully a sinister and gothic movie. Everything is so dark and gloomy as well as the character brothers Eerik and Knut. Even though Eerik looks harmless with his glasses and quiet demeanor, he is unpredictable and dangerous. The other parts that scared me a little were of the woman spirit that would haunt Knut in different parts of the movie. For anyone who enjoys foreign films and doesn't mind the subtitles, I would recommend this film. A.J Annila is like M. Night Shyamalan in the sense of how his films are a little intriguing but interesting and different.

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