“The Vourdalak” (2023) is an adaptation of Aleksey Konstantinovich Tolstoy’s 1839 novella, “The Family of the Vourdalak.” The film follows the Marquis Jacques Saturnin du Antoine (Kacey Mottet Klein) just after his convoy was attacked. Alone in the forest at night, he finds a house, but the Hermit (Erwan Ribard), who answers the door refuses to let him in and directs him to get help at Gorcha’s house. The Marquis unwittingly comes at the worst turning point in this three-generation family’s history. Gorcha (first time writer and director Adrien Beau provides the voice) left a note that if he doesn’t return before 6 pm on the sixth day of his departure, his family should reject him, but they do not heed his order. Will the Marquis escape or get swept into the family’s tragedy?
Even without the supernatural, the Marquis would not be too good at surviving a stiff breeze. The protagonist of “The Vourdalak” feels more like a clueless Rosencrantz or Guildenstern figure dropped in the middle of an Eastern European tragedy. There is an open question whether like most horror movie strangers in a foreign land, he will rise to the occasion and rescue the locals from an undead tyrant. After all, he carries the rapier of his thirteenth century heroic ancestors so while he may look like a poodle, he may still have some wolf in his blood. Are the French renown to be great rescuers? He is a powdered fool without substance, but not an entirely harmless one; however, he prefers to assert his dominance over ladies. He has taken a liking to a mysterious woman who crosses his path on the way to Gorcha’s home and does not really care if she does not reciprocate his interest. It is not love at first sight, but lust and an assertion of status, and if he was a better at existing, she would be in danger.
This woman is Sdenka (Ariane Labed), Gorcha’s daughter, a dignified and serious figure who does not have time for the Marquis’ lovemaking. She is probably the smartest person out there—after the man who refused to open his door to a stranger at night, but as a single woman in the eighteenth century, she cannot persuade anyone to see reason. Beau seems to find inspiration for this Cassandra incarnation from Sir John Everett Millais’ painting “Ophelia” (1851-2) as Labed strikes dramatic poses in the woods and has the innate bearing of a noble, more than the Marquis, who moves tentatively through the world and hugs the edges of any room.
Sdenka’s sister-in-law, Anja (Claire Duburcq), is willing to spill the tea about Sdenka, but everyone is tight lipped when it comes to explaining the meaning of Vourdalak. A vampire is too simplified an explanation, and it is hard to glean. Based on the portrait hanging in Gorcha’s home, Gorcha always looked a bit cadaverous and green, but seeing him in the flesh, he is a man-sized puppet like an animated skeleton with only the suggestion of flesh drawn taught and thin like the batter head of a drum. Some models would kill for his cheekbones. As opposed to an average vampire, the one defining characteristic of a vourdalak is the repulsive, slurping noise that it makes, “like soggy chewing,” on a burial shroud. The women’s reaction to Gorcha indicates that something is wrong, but the men are divided. Piotr (Vassili Schneider), the cross-dressing younger son, suspects the truth, but is too cowed to resist. Jegor (Gregoire Colin), the eldest son, is blindly subservient to his father and in complete denial. Vlad (Gabriel Pavie), Jegor’s son, is oblivious to any danger.
A lot of critics have compared “The Vourdalak” to Hammer films. While the intersection between sexuality and danger is a theme in the film, do not expect any buxom bosoms, but you will get one bouncing butt. It is a film about the prison of normative masculinity, especially bad fathers, and politeness in following societal norms. The Marquis has enough common sense to know that he is in danger, but societal norms hinder him from taking effective action. Beau’s work is in the same vein as Roman Polanski’s “The Fearless Vampire Killers” (1967) where everyone knows what needs to be done, but evil is intricately intertwined with the hierarchy and demands deference through politeness, but doing so upholds that hierarchy and ensures the destruction of anyone complicit. The Marquis is particularly ill equipped to rise to the occasion since in the middle of nowhere, he is still caking on the makeup and applying fake moles when he should be hightailing it out of there.
There is no life-giving legacy in a male-dominated institution, even a biological family. The most basic concept in nature is to prioritize the survival of offspring so life will continue. Any creature who does not do so is monstrous, which is the fundamental message of Beau’s film. Jegor boasts to the Marquis, “Truth is, if this family is still alive, it’s thanks to us.” Noted. Even before “The Vourdalak” begins, Gorcha knowingly puts his family in danger for revenge. Then Jegor heeds his father’s health and commands over his wife’s concerns over their son’s well-being. Jegor is nothing but an ineffectual drunk playing dress up in his father’s clothes. Gorcha entrances Vlad. Only when Piotr embraces his feminine side without shame does the family stand a chance, but like Sdanka, the family prefers to uphold their standards and march towards death than stop the cycle and live. It puts the Marquis in a special position. A gender normative French man appears effeminate, and he is not the best at fighting so maybe he stands a chance. Everything must be sacrificed at the table of patriarchy, an institution that demands control over a natural life where children become autonomous adults to have full lives outside of the shadow of their fathers. Once the first life is taken without any substantial objection from anyone because Gorcha wills it, everyone’s fate is sealed. Gorcha’s last soliloquy is a poignant acknowledgment of the prison of power that he made for himself instead of the joy of being oneself and defying the expected image of a strong man.
Do not let all this intellectual theorizing turn you off a bloody good time. “The Vourdalak” is a visual feast. There are some terrific, blood-soaked oneiric scenes. Each time there is an attack, the victim finds themselves in a black void like a nightmare except it is real. The daytime scenes are like animated Raphaelite paintings. Beau proves that it is possible to have a seamless story and stunning visuals—Oz Perkins! Beau even finds a way to depict double penetration without being pornographic, and you will never see it coming. Not since “Alien” (1979) has a horror film found a way to make heterosexual men feel vulnerable. Having a puppet instead of a person play Gorcha, who resembles Nosferatu on a bad day, works, but it takes a playful moviegoer to suspend disbelief and just go along with it. The concept may lose some people but try to stick with it as part of the charm. It amplifies the pitch perfect performances of people trying to pretend everything is normal when it is anything but.
If you rush to the theater this weekend and head for “Longlegs” (2024), you may be disappointed, but “The Vourdalak” is a guaranteed good time with a bleak narrative, a colorful sheen and an economical ninety-minute run time. Beau proves that you can have it all without compromising on quality.
