Satan Reviews

Mental, mental..

I loved this film, first and foremost it was not what I had expected. as I only got the film cause of the title. The way the madness of the characters are displayed is absolutely genius. There is nothing more scary than being in a group of people and there's a complete loon (Vincent Cassel) amongst you. The way the suspense is a red thread weaving through out the film makes you wonder if this is reality or not. If you wont a film to unbalance you just a bit, watch this...

Fiendish French Horror

This tale of rural weirdness might put you off the idea of a weekend in the country as a bunch of boys and girls encounter League of Gentlemen style eccentrics in rural France.

Featuring stylish cinematography and more character development than you usually get from the horror genre. Unlike Hollywood productions this is a slow burning affair, building up an atmosphere of unease and impending horribleness. The copy I saw was in French, but the movie was entertaining enough to make reading subtitles worthwhile.

I like horror films but am usually disappointed. This was different enough to pass the time in and keep me entertained.

[Highly rated reviewer]

funny peculiar

I watched this film at the ICA, where the average age was 20-something. It was greeted by the audience with howls of laughter, more than you may expect for a horror movie. And it was reasonably funny. OK, I did feel a little out of place amongst my young companions, especially during the teenage sex scene.

The actor playing the groundsman clearly relished his part, haming it up something rotten. He really carries the film. I couldn't help but see a lot of the ideas in the film as derivative, but perhaps i'm just being an old fart.

So, overall as light-hearted and amusing as a film can be, considering all that blood, pain and sexual tension. Certainly worth renting.

You want some goats milk?

Insane French horror about a group of young lads befriending young (and very hot) bar lady, and jaunting off to her 'parents' country retreat. Enter Joseph the grounds keeper grinning like a mad man and putting us all (cast and audience) on edge. The plot thickens as we meet the locals, some very odd looking people - that all seem to be related? Add some creepy lighting, a few dolls and you're already behind the sofa.

Other reviews seem to have missed the point somewhat, in that the story isn't exactly spoon-fed. Here is a guy that went too far, and we're seeing the aftermath. If after you've watched it remember the clues Joseph drops throughout the film it will make sense.

The final scene is probably one of the most disturbing things you'll ever see, in the same league the Texas Chainsaw dinner party. Enjoy.

* * * This review contains spoilers * * *ShowHide

Satan Place

I wouldn't say this is a stone classic but director and scriptwriter Chapiron has turned out a highly funny, disturbing and entertaining film whilst having a ball with slasher/horror genre cliches and conventions. The cast are very good and work well together but Vincent Cassell is utterly outstanding as the gleefully psychopathic Joseph. What a killer smile!

The plot doesn't follow the usual trajectory associated with the kind of films it's title might suggest, this is more in the realm of the art movie and viewers expecting horror thrills 'n' spills may end up disappointed. Nonetheless, it's a movie that can be enjoyed on many levels and moves towards it's conclusion at a brisk enough pace to satisfy most film lovers. There are enough oddball, left turns to keep you in a state of unsurety as how it will all turn out.

It's not your usual 'teens in peril' type flick, in fact, I didn't realise that it plays as a sort of deconstruction of that kind of film until I was halfway through describing it to a friend and realised it sounded as if I was describing generic, Hollywood schlock. Satan is far from it.Surprisingly for a director seemingly grounded in youthfully knockabout, guerilla video shorts it looks pretty classy and calls to mind films such as Calvaire and The Last Great Widerness.

Not Very Good

I guess this is meant to be a cross between Deliverance and probably something by David Lynch but it's just terrible, grotesque piled on grotesque without any rhyme or reason, of all the characters not one seems to have any redeeming features and by the end you don't care for any of them, any fans of Vincent Cassel should probably steer clear unless you want to see him grimace for an hour an half, and to top it all off the film seems to have absolutely no meaning whatsoever, but not even in a good way. Not funny, puerile crap, a half joke you might laugh at while drunk, but probably not. People: Avoid This Film.

[Highly rated reviewer]

Not at all enjoyable

I am very partial to horror movies, and quite like Foreign movies. I am also quite an admirer of Vincent Cassel, who is usually very good. This movie follows the lives of a group of young people on a night out. From the start they seem to be totally stoned, and incoherent. They end up at one of the girl's country retreat where they meet the caretaker (Cassel), who is constantly grinning inanely - for whatever reason. Some other characters appear, but the plot doesn't really explain why they are there or are behaving very bizarely - until the very end when it is hinted at. The story is overly padded out by the male characters trying to get the girls into bed or groping sessions. So much so that the actual plot (which is weak at best) is swamped and lost. The caretaker is more creepy than scary. This is definitely a film I hope I never have to watch again.

Impending Gloom and the Loss of Soul

The opening disco scene feels random, the close-up of the DJ, indulgent. The characters seem served up like a series of courses; the main meal never quite arrives as there is very little personality identification. Even the weakest desaster movie makes you feel envolved with the lives of individuals in order to creat a sense of shock and loss as one after the other, they are annihilated.

We are left wondering where these young people come from,do they have parents? In the end, where did they go? Some relatively innocent individuals become a part of the sinister environment - how, why and when, one is left asking.

Certainly, the leading character, a rough dropout, steals the show, his delerious, maniacle, raging bacanalian countenance attemps to push you to the edge of reason, that point where a good time slips into lost control, where animalistic behaviour that perhaps lies beneath the surface of us all, is unleashed.

The sexurgent youth who in spite of conciderable personal injury, battles with his dubious mate (a smug smoothie appointed as God's gift to girls) hovers on the edge of 'making it' before his horrendous downfall.

So this is a story of deception, adolescent exitement, ambivellent sexuality, the juxtoposition of the modern disco cult with near medieval chaos, carnality, Max Earnst - like pagentry (good prop department), pending troialism (shame about the pending) and the adult grooming of vulnerable halfwhitts.

Doese this film put you on the edge of your seat? Sometimes it does.

Are we served with a diet of horror? Spasmodically we are.

Full marks would have to be awarded to whoever fashioned the spiralling knife, certainly you would find me running from it at warp speed!

Dreadful

I'm not quite sure what I expected from this film, but even if I had expected the very least entertainment, I would have been disappointed.

There didn't seem to be any point to it, just a group of french people being extremely weird in a village full of other weird french people. European cinema not particularly well represented, I'm sure.

In the end, I resorted to watching the dvd timer display counting away the seconds until the film ended.

What can i say?

This film is truly BIZARRE!-some (superbly)over the top acting from Cassell,genuinely creepy moments,a touch of gore,an absolutely MENTAL storyline!!!

Watchable as hell though!