Cebalord Very best movie i ever watch

Fairaher The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

ActuallyGlimmer The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

Nayan Gough A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

Armand impressive images. inspired script.Ville Virtanen in a role who remembers many others of Max von Sydow. many influences from Tarkovsky universe. a horror who search to be more than a ghost story. maybe reflection about sin and life sense, about worlds as ambiguous circles, about links between people. a form of poetry, dark, foggy, cruel, slow, full of need to be more than another film about fear. a beautiful film. for noble intentions. for special atmosphere. for the its soul - mixture between profound questions. but, in few scenes, it seems be a thin ice. a puzzle who dispose by perfect pieces made in the time of game. but , in essence, an inspired exploration of history laws.

Richard Virga when you watch Sauna you have no sensation of watching a movie, rather the screen becomes a window and you are observing reality. this is an engine running on all strong cylinders: the score matches the mood, it accents and reinforces the dialog and action. the acting is superb, by everyone. there is no sense of acting. the older Spore is a dynamo of revealing restraint. the cinematography is flawless, there's not a weak shot from start to 'finnish'. every shot is lit like a work of art. the editing is sharp and crisp. the pacing is deliberate and inexorable, though slow, you cannot drift because of the quality of the work. now, obviously, all this could not have been done without one Hell of a director! i've watched it three times so that i can internalize the subtitles and concentrate on the rest of the movie. i could watch this thing at 1/2 speed and still love it!

swearm_x ...missing the target after all.Great in terms of stylish clear cinematography, look and details of costumes, effects, make-up, sets, the acting, lights, character-building and the main idea/plot.Not so great is several. On the one hand, horror arises only for thin-skinned people in my opinion, but this is OK. Though it may have been achieved by giving the certain scenes time to unfold and also more depth in that(=>longer film). On the other hand, despite the foreboding symbols and events and the over all somehow conclusive story are some "mysteries" not quite fitting into the puzzle, especially not the ending. May it be because of a need for a controversial, "thoughtful" end or because of lack of better ideas or lack of movie-time. Anyhow, it doesn't fit for me. In the end it is another missed chance, despite very good ideas, resources(sets, costumes, filming,...) and acting caused by either bad producing (pressure, constraining) or simply bad writing/directing in terms of bringing all together for the masterpiece. And if it has to be longer for that - be it! Don't be shy!

dschmeding If someone told me "hey, watch this movie about a haunted sauna, its a really scary horror movie!".. I guess I'd stay as far away from the movie as possible. Luckily I saw some pictures of this Finnish movie and they looked really great.Everyone looking for a horror movie should stay away from this. Its pretty laughable that so many people focus on the sauna and some ghosts in this movie as typical horror clichés while the director works so obviously on making every single piece and image in this movie a symbol for guilt."Sauna" or "Filth" (which is the far more fitting title referring to a statement by one of the Russian soldiers in this movie) is placed after the Russian/Swedish war around 1600 when a group of Russian and Swedish soldiers are setting for the new borders. The opening of the movie with the drawing of borders in blood and then the first shots of water turning red already indicate where this movie is going. Everything is carried by some great cinematography and the lead characters, 2 brothers of a very different kind. One is Knut, a mapmaker with high goals, the other is Erik, a soldier with a grim past who has his problems adjusting to the new peace.Erik constantly looking for trouble soon gets the group of soldiers into problems when messing with a family. The town the group soon finds in the middle of a swamp becomes a clear symbol of Erics previous atrocities with as many inhabitants as victims on Erics list, a strange girl reminding them of recent wrongdoings (also involving a sauna) and animals and people who clawed out their eyes. The whole issue of not being able to face your past is present throughout the movie that is more like a fable. There is plenty of interesting historical information as well as philosophical dialog including the story about the king and filth or the thoughts if hell is just a place that god turned his back on. The place is soon presented and the irony is that yet everyone is fighting for the land soon there is a place that no one wants to take but rather wants to give to his enemy."Sauna" is full of these abstract images and the finale is far from a clear resolution. After all the director clearly tries to make the viewer have his own thoughts. Actually I am still working on figuring the closing images out but however this is a damn interesting and different movie with great cinematography, acting and an interesting setting. There sure are some horror elements in this movie, but I'd rather consider this a mix of art-house movie and drama and its definitely worth giving a chance.