I've heard about this Russian fantasy thriller for more than a year now. Made on a tiny budget ($3.2 million or so), but sporting impressive and imaginative effects, this movie has won raves from those who have seen it.
I don't know if I want to join the club of raving fans, but I found the movie deeply absorbing after a slow, expository beginning. There are some chilling moments and numerous creepy ones as the Manichean universe the story creates of Others among humans unfolds.
There is some gory violence, rough language, and brief nudity which one has to overlook to enjoy an otherwise curiously wrought work of Russian fiction, though.
The story is convoluted and would read like one of those fantasy video games if explained in detail. To put it as simply as I can, there are Others who have strange powers like shape shifting. Some are on the side of Light, others on the side of the Dark (who tend to be vampires among other things). An Other discovers himself to be more than human and must choose for himself which side he will be on. Hundreds of years before they fought a battle, called a Truce, and now police each other's activities to maintain the truce.
Fast forward to the present, and a man, Anton, goes to a witch to have his runaway wife charmed to return, and to have her pregnancy miscarried as the witch tells him it is another's and would make her return uncertain to stick. He approves and a harrowing scene ensues in which the wife, far away, suddenly doubles over. We see the witch's hands twist and rend as they become covered in blood. The spectre of abortion comes to mind at this time, and reminds us that innocent life deserves protection; that to deliberately rend it is unconscionable.
In fact, Anton's choice will come back twelve years later to haunt him. The unborn child, though, is saved by the Night Watch. Others of Light who police those doing illegal acts against the Truce. It turns out that Anton is an Other. He chooses to serve the Light.
Again, we go forward twelve years. He must use his power to track down a boy who has suddenly heard a "Call" and try to rescue him from vampires of the Dark. In the process he encounters a woman with a "vortex of damnation" above her head. This will have dire consequences later, also.
There are two sadly human, but immoral choices made in this story which have devastating effects on others. The movie takes good and evil seriously and seeks to illustrate where wrong doing can lead.
Anton, when asked why anyone would choose the Dark, explains, "Wise men say that it is easier for a man to destroy the Light inside him than to defeat the forces of Darkness all around him." There's a deal of truth in that.
When the nature of a curse is revealed toward the end, Anton says, "You shouldn't say things like that. 'Damned' isn't just a word."
Like all good movies, this one inhabits a moral universe where bad choices are fateful and one's soul is at stake. I recommend it for it's moral seriousness, but with reservations for its occasional graphic violence and gore.
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