A Norwegian master class in horror. Well no. A classic horror movie, well no again. Bringing something new to the world of horror, well no again. So how am I going to sell the 81% on this one. To be honest it is going to be a hard sell particularly if you haven’t seen it and then read the plot. Released in 2009 using a budget of less than $1m, it was believed to be $800,000 it went on to double that at the box-office with a $1.8m return. Starring Charlotte Frogner, Stig Frode Henriksen, Vegar Hoel, Jeppe Laursen, Evy Kasseth Røsten, Jenny Skavlan, and Lasse Valdal and I wouldn’t expect you to recognise anyone of those names. I don’t! This is the 9th movie in my subtitled list but apparently this one has been dubbed into English which for me will look a bit weird with the lips not moving in sync. No waking the scorer in the tri-critic sync challenge as I was the only on that liked this movie. IMDb gave it a poor rating of 6.3 from 10 and Rotten Tomatoes were not much better with a 69%. Well if that doesn’t put you off here’s the plot.
The movie is prefixed with a woman called Sara being chased by zombies in the snowy woods where they are all wearing Nazi Uniforms. We then join seven students going on an Easter vacation in a small cabin in the woods. (not seen that before). The cabin is owned by Vegard who is Sara’s boyfriend. He was planning on meeting her there which would make the group eight with four boys and girls. Having a fun time in the snowy mountains they retire to the cabin for the evening of drinking when a hiker arrives. He tells them of the dark history of the region they are in right at the moment. During World War II a force of Einsatzgruppe led by one Standartenführer Herzog occupied the region for three years. Nazi soldiers to you and me and they tortured the locals until near the end of the war with the knowledge that they were going to lose they looted the town. The villagers organised an uprising and ambushed and killed them. Those remaining including the leader Herzog where chased into the mountains where they were believed to have frozen to death. Well that part may not be strictly true. Vegard has a dream involving a secret compartment in the cabin but next morning decides to go look for Sara as she should be at the cabin already. The remaining 6 find the compartment with a treasure chest in it. This discovery would be enough to lure in the remaining German Zombie Soldiers and their leader Herzog back to collect their stolen gains. Simply killing everyone in their way what could be simpler? A bunch of student kids won’t be able to do much will they with the fact they are a killing machine of zombies that cannot be killed those foolish kids don’t stand a chance.
To be honest that is probably true as the zombies kill off the group steadily through the film with a couple of jump scares dotted about and not that many really. There is a very clever humour at play in this movie and it caught me at the perfect time because I fell in love with this movie and probably for all the wrong reasons. It is cheesy and predicable to a certain extend but still had me laughing out loud because when you put frozen Nazi zombies in a movie chasing a bunch of young students drinking and shagging in the woods in the middle of nowhere, it has to be good. Well no with that plot it has to be bad and dull and stupid. Well I give you stupid but it has the right level of tongue pressed against the cheek as it pokes fun at itself and other typical horror movies. It plays for laughs as well as a bit of gore and the odd jump scare here and there I liked this movie. I have no idea how good the dubbed version is but if you can live with the subtitles then go for it. Have a few beers and sit back and watch the madness as it gives you permission to laugh at it along with laughing with it. If you haven’t seen it then I don’t care if you do or not I enjoyed it and I’ll be happy to keep this little gem all to myself!
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