An 18th century English cartographer, Jonathan Green, sets out on a journey to map the uncharted lands of Transylvania, only to discover the dark secrets and dangerous creatures hidden in a cursed, fantastical Romanian forest. With some anticipation rising regarding 'Viy 2' starring Jackie Chan and Arnold Schwarzenegger i wanted to see and review the original movie as well. Now despite some great special effects and make up as a whole this film wasn't that great neither on story wise or acting wise and it was basically just bad. (3/10)

Unlike some comments, I think the effects in this movie are extraordinary, especially the church and dinner scenes, and I cannot remember when I saw such in any movie recently. And it keeps going throughout the whole movie (including complete scenery in whole movie!). The kid in you will watch it mouth open!Unfortunately, for some reason, someone has decided to dub the movie into English since it is originally in Russian and this was done quite poor. I was watching it on the movie channel and I was not sure what is wrong with the tone until I found out this is Russian movie which was dubbed (I am against dubbing)... And I am looking to watch the original version.If you like this type of movies (fantasy), you will have 2 quality hours of full enjoyment!

In Viy also known as The Forbidden Kingdom, Jason Flemyng is Jonathan Green an ambitious cartographer forced to flee his prospective father in law in England and goes to create detailed maps of Transylvania and he stumbles upon a forgotten Ukranian kingdom with a roving beast.It is filled with villagers who fear witchcraft, monsters and legends with a cursed monastery high on the mountain that holds the body of Pannochka and is the source of all evil as she is some kind of spirit that controls the gateway to hell.Green as a rational man and a scientist does not believe in monsters and myths but the things he sees might just get him to believe in the irrational especially as Pannochka's father wants to give her a proper burial.The film is filled with wondrous special effects that would make Terry Gilliam or Tim Burton envious but the story is too muddled and the film veers from a twisted bizarre fairy tale to something more scary and bloodthirsty. The dubbing is very poor as well which is off putting but Flemyng provides goofiness and comic relief. The scenes with Charles Dance back in London have little reason to be in the final film.

This movie didn't reach my countries cinemas, even though it's just a country away from the old SSSR. They don't tend to show Russian films in my homeland (although 'Stalingrad' was shown during some festival), so i had to pirate a bluray release to finally see the film. First of all, i must address, mostly negative comments that I've noticed, coming from Russia and the region. One aspect of that negativity came from the notion that this movie, doesn't follow or respect Nikolay Gogol's story or the eponymous 1967 film. There is truth in this (although some motifs are repeated, like 'all women are witches' stuff, and 'scientist-philosopher' babble), story is restructured and changed, almost entirely ignoring central theme of Gogol's tale, which is fear, deathly fear. That brings me to the second aspect of negative reactions, which claims that the movie isn't scary. Not scary as 1967 film. Well, what can I say except that that's also true. This film is not a horror, and trailer gives false impression that it is.One thing that is not true though is comparison of this film with Tim Burton's 'Sleepy Hollow'. Resemblance is only superficial, this film doesn't share Tim Burton's mixture of violent horror and morbid humor, although there's plenty of humor in this film, performance of some actors is almost entirely in comedic fashion.So, what this film actually is, is a funny horror fantasy. 12+, a family horror, something like this would never be approved for production in the Hollywoods. If they even decide to distribute it there, film is probably facing cutting, like the fate of unfortunate 'Snowpiercer'.Even the 1967 film was marked with comedic performances, so I don't see what the fuss is about, as for the plot, plot is not weak, it's chaotic, especially the ending, which only adds to the overall charming film. Film doesn't resemble Hollywood productions as some claim, most noticeable is respect that this films has for all characters, there's no cannon fodder characters which is a disgusting standard in Hollywood works.As for the special effects, they vary through the film. For instance, cgi dove is visibly fake in two scenes, while the scenes of breakfast with Cossacks if fantastic. There's cgi, prosthetic, even beautiful stop motion (update: no stop-mo, it's animatronics)This is only one of three movies that I really liked this year and I watch them plenty. Other two are 'The zero theorem' and 'The anchorman 2'. Seriously, this movie is special, the fact that Jonathan's dialogs look like they're from an 17-nth century adventure story, or the overall superstition and fear of everything, or the religious tones eastern style, film feels unique.Also, you should check 1967 'Viy'. It's super.