Acensbart Excellent but underrated film

Lightdeossk Captivating movie !

Plustown A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

Kinley This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

qmtv Very Long and Boring. Good Costumes, Sets and Cinematography. Poor acting, dialogue and script.Too long, made for TV in series? This should have been cut down, too many unnecessary scenes. Monks with the technology and humor sucked. The actors were average at best. The dialogue and script sucked, most of the accents I couldn't understand what was happening.Fight scenes and gore was OK. The costumes, sets and cinematography was good. FX were good. Music was decent. Rating is a C, or 5 stars. They had a decent budget, they should have spent some of it on a decent screenwriter.

Paul Magne Haakonsen While I am familiar with the myth or legend of Countess Bathory, then I sat down to watch this 2008 movie for entertainment only, not really putting anything more into it. So whether how much or not this movie was true to the actual Countess and the events that took place in her life, I do not know, nor do I really care; a movie is a media for entertainment.The story in "Bathory" is centered around Erzsébet Báthory, notorious Countess, in the mid-1500's Hungary. Married to a formidable warlord and conqueror, Bathory is at the seat of power in Hungary, caught in the game of power and influence. But rumor and dark stories circulate about her bathing in the blood of virgins, having consorted with the devil and having a witch as her right-hand maiden.Right, well, entertainment-wise then "Bathory" was adequate, albeit nothing extraordinary. However, it was a long, long movie, running at two hours and twenty-one minutes. So keep that in mind, especially because the movie is not a non-stop action-filled ride. There are ups and downs throughout the movie, of course. I was adequately entertained, although at times I found the movie to just be too slow-paced and too long.The acting in the movie was quite good, as they had some nicely talented actors and actresses on the cast list. Anna Friel (playing Erzsébet Báthory) and Karel Roden (playing Thurzo) carried the movie quite nicely.One thing that didn't really sit well with me, was the two Catholic monks, or spies as they actually were. They were just too much of a comical relief, and were sticking out like a sore thumb from the rest of the movie. And their array of out of place gadgets were just too much.There are better movies that deal with the Erzsébet Báthory character and story. This 2008 movie at the hands of director Juraj Jakubisko scores a lukewarm, mediocre five out of ten stars from me only.

midnightsilvered-rose The great thing about this film is it's unique style, which has great flair, very like the best of Ken Russell. It doesn't try to be blandly mainstream, the director is too talented for that, he has too much vision to fit in with the prosaic , boring and anodyne rot usually filling our screens. This film entertains with gusto, flair, beauty and horror. One may quibble with any film and look for faults, but this film is fascinating and compelling, suitable for anyone interested in the drama of the life of Erzsebet Bathory. One soon comes to see through the eyes of the lead characters, their brutal and beautiful world lives and breathes again, shockingly, before our eyes.Erzsabet's story is told in a such a colourful, dynamic and thoroughly gripping way, that certainly had me looking forward to seeing more, like asking for a second helping of a surprisingly delicious pudding, I relished what I found to be so enjoyable after having heard such bad reviews. Erzsabet's life and times were brutal and this is shown graphically but not too eye wateringly. The performances are highly entertaining and extremely powerful especially the characters of Erzsabet, Caravaggio and Thurzo. Some have quibbled about the English accents of the actors but actually I thought Ezsabet's Hungarian accent rather convincing, the chill of steel to the edge of her voice. It is a very accessible story, so who would be so daft as to require the actors to speak Hungarian and so lose half the audience, who are either too dense or lazy to read subtitles. Frankly a ridiculous quibble, one does not notice anything but how fine the performances truly are.Visually stunning and beautiful, the script gives us a thumpingly good story and altogether it is a mesmerising piece of cinema. It is so powerful that twenty four hours after watching, it still haunts me and I look forward to seeing more from this director and creative team. I feel I've discovered, at last, a piece of English language cinema that isn't formulaic, that isn't dull and predictable, that isn't the same old same old, that isn't like every other pleasant enough but unimaginative 'product,' here is something unique and artistically brave and exciting. Altogether I think one would have to be in a very sour and unforgiving mood to find fault. If you want to be entertained and why else watch, everyone should enjoy this unfairly maligned but unusually fascinating film.

Ricardo Pinto This version about the famous countess Barthory is a big mistake in all aspects. Although the finest art direction, the film is fake in many ways and the rhythm is unstable.The storyline is confused with too many characters and the director didn't decide what to do with Barthory reputation (at the end are a ridiculous notice about the crimes of the countess)The introducing of the Italian painter, as well as the stupid spies and the English version misrepresent the historical facts. After 30 minutes the plot is boring and uninteresting. Frankly: the countess Barthory deserve something better. Let's wait for Julie Delpy's version 2009.