ThiefHott Too much of everything
Protraph Lack of good storyline.
Humaira Grant It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.
Candida It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.
lanoraruiz I can't believe I sat through the entire movie without turning it off! This could have been a great movie. The concept and the history involving the location could have made this a great movie but somethings never happen like you hope they would. First why is this movie in English? Do they think everyone is so dimwitted that they just won't read subtitles? Secondly the phony accents do not match the nationality. I know Romanians and they sound NOTHING like the people in the movie. If you have watched everything available and it is a rainy Sunday and you don't mind watching a movie that has an ending that is even more confusing then any thing you have ever seen then watch Strigoi, but do not say you where not warned!
kps13 First off, it's not like van helsing, or blade, or underworld. Not that those are bad movies, but the plot here is more grounded in mythology and less about the characters, focusing on perspective instead of the intro, climax, and resolution. Seeing how the actors were Romanian, I wondered about the earlier comment on their accents, which seemed fine to me. The acting wasn't typical either, it was sort of routine and believable. The film was more indie style, and reminded me of wrist cutters a love story in the way the plot is delivered. I wouldn't say the movie was "scary," but rather creepy and slightly unsettling. The comedy is subtle and enjoyable, 'are you sucking my blood?! no, go back to sleep.' If you're a fan of indie movies and vampires, its definitely worth watching. Overall, I would suggest reading the wikipedia article on Strigoi before watching the movie, as it contains a few useful things to keep in mind.
gavin6942 When the villagers killed Constantin Tirescu, they thought it was justice. Vlad Cozma thinks it was murder. Now Constantin thinks pickles might go nice with blood.Dennis Harvey at Variety called it "drolly funny if a tad long-winded". I think he is right on both points. Second one first -- coming in around 104 minutes, I think shaving ten minutes off would help the pacing and get more of an audience. Not saying it drags, but it could be faster.First point second, it is quite funny, in an offbeat way. Romanians doing a conga line to "Spirit in the Sky", old men asking if Italy has nice pizza (it does, and ice cream, too). And weird comments like a character being "too ***** to stick his finger up my ***." The fast food nightmare scene was excellent, too, both funny and sickening at the same time.Faye Jackson says, "Romanian is a language that uses a lot of word play and slang and my Romanian simply isn't good enough to write dialogue that sounds like Romanian as it's spoken. So I had to write it in English." She has been asked why it was not in Romanian since they filmed it there and it starred Romanians. Perhaps the right thing to do would be to get a new director, but since Jackson did so well, that seems unnecessary in hindsight.The gore is commendable, very good and not too gross for a horror film, especially the scene with the police officer. I am not entirely clear why the cop has born without ribs, though. (I suppose he might have been born with ribs and had them removed later, but it is still weird.) I am waiting to see what Faye Jackson does next. The director's next project is "sort of Dirty Pretty Things meets the A Team, except nothing like that at all". Wow. Yep, wow.
Robert Harding I've just recently seen Strigoi at the Toronto After Dark Film Festival and was absolutely surprised at how good the film was. The trailer I had seen for the film made it seem like a very low budget, campy, been there done that vampire film. What I was shown was a well produced, professional, good looking film with an interesting vampire story. As an added bonus, there are some funny moments and good jokes mixed in throughout the film so that it doesn't come off stale.The only real problem I had with the film was the slow pacing and longer than necessary runtime. Had the film been cut down by 10-20 minutes, I think it would become 100 times more enjoyable.I was surprised to find out that the film has technically been done since early in the year but had only now, played in front of an audience. I am lucky to say I was able to catch this little gem at it's world premiere.I hope to see more from this talented writer/director in the future and wish Strigoi all the best. With no big name actors, it may be a hard sell which is a damn shame. Genre fans need to see this film. In a genre where the market is flooded with the taste du jour and the films often leave a bad taste in your mouth, Strigoi serves up a platter of delicious offerings genre fans are sure to eat up.
