Customer Reviews

Sheitan

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Sheitan (Kim Chapiron, 2006)

Once again, we in America have managed to entirely miss a great French horror film. I ask once again why on earth we got a theatrical release of Haute Tension when this-- with a stronger cast (including Vincent Cassel, who seems to play very well on this side of the pond), a better story (with fewer plot holes), a cracking script, and a sense of outright weird that it shares with the similarly wonderful Calvaire, went straight to DVD in the States. It's a question I may never be able to answer. But I'm glad we at least got a DVD release; most Americans are still waiting to get their hands on, say, Jaime Balaguero's [REC] as I write this. In any case, Sheitan (and Calvaire, the film I will spend most of this review comparing with it) has a weirdness about it I'm not sure I've seen since Deliverance. And I highly recommend it for anyone who found Deliverance in any way enjoyable, and for much the same reasons.

The plot: three friends, Bart (Olivier Bartelemy), Thai (Nico le Phat Tan), and Ladj (Ladj Ly), are clubbing in Paris when they meet some lovely young women. Soon after, Bart gets into a fistfight and is unceremoniously thrown out. Eve (Roxane Mesquida), still looking to party, suggests they all head out to her parents' house in the country. (The parents are, of course, away.) On the way, they run into Eve's parents' caretaker, Joseph (Vincent Cassel), who seems to be not all there, but harmless. As the weekend progresses, the three friends, but especially Bart, realizes that all is not what it seems; while the other two have each glommed onto one of the girls, Bart finds himself the object of Joseph's affection. He feels less distressed about this, however, upon meeting Joseph's jaw-droppingly beautiful daughter Jeanne (Julie-Marie Parmentier), but he still mostly has eves for Eve, who leads him on while at the same time flirting with Thai.

Has the plot of a weird romantic comedy, doesn't it? Trust me, it's a horror film in the same way Audition is a horror film; it really is a weird romantic comedy, but everything eventually explodes. And while the final fifteen minutes of Sheitan doesn't have the same stomach-churning power as do the final fifteen of Miike's magnum opus, believe me, things take as many turns for the worse as they possibly can. This is Chapeion's first feature film, but his debut short also used Cassel and Bartelemy, and he knows how to use them to best effect; he certainly does here.

The more Vincent Cassel films I see, the more impressed I am with his acting. He breaks away from his usual tough-guy role here to play a happy-go-lucky, somewhat mentally vacant rube, and he does it wonderfully. In many ways, it brought to mind Leonardo DiCaprio's performance in What's Eating Gilbert Grape?. Cassel's resume is somewhat less wide-ranging than DiCaprio's was at the time, and so it seems even more a departure; he pulls it off with aplomb. Bartelemy doesn't have nearly as much work to do playing the clueless party animal, but he really makes his character's confusion and fumbled attempts to think quickly work. The rest of the cast are almost as good. The script is sharp and witty, never revealing too much of itself for the sake of a cheap thrill. I could go on pointing out things about this movie that make it worth watching, but by the time I was done, you'd have spent longer reading the review than you will watching the ninety-four-minute movie. As long as your idea of horror doesn't end with Hostel (or I Walked with a Zombie), Sheitan is a winner through and through. ****

[Do buy this film!
Its beautiful that vincent cassel agreed to make this film. It was creepy as hell!

its not at all like they just dubbed the texas chainsaw massacre.

absolutely worth your money & your time.]


Kim Chapiron's "SHEITAN" produced by and starring Vincent Cassel is by far one of the freakiest creep-fest's that I have seen in a while. Vincent Cassel is mind-blowingly scary as Joseph the abnormally strong bazerko housekeeper. Throughout the first half of the film your stricken with that unsettling(not quite right)feeling that something horrible is just around the corner. When you get to the halfway mark of the film horrible slowly starts to reveal itself in small but disturbing little doses. When you hit 3/4 the way through,any sense of normality you have left is swiftly pulled out from under your feet and you are then thrusted into a deliriously nightmarish rollercoaster of a climax that stands to be IMO one of the most skin-crawlingly frightning endings in horror film history. This is another unique & truly creative french kiss to the American backwoods horror film and also more proof that the real horror movies are being made by foreign independent film makers.

Mild Spoiler Alert.

I've learned that anytime Maxim magazine reviewer Pete Hammond or "Ain't It Cool News" gives anything a rave, you can bet it's gonna suck. That's the case here. There's nothing satisfying about this film; in fact, I was sorely disappointed that our hapless young'uns aren't slaughtered in outlandishly gruesome ways given that all three male protagonists are reprehensible twits. The only decent character, Yasmine, is last seen running after her friend's car--the driver doesn't bother to rescue his love interest and instead kicks another friend out of the vehicle and takes off to save his own cheatin' butt! (We're supposed to care about these characters?!) Illogical plot, howl-worthy dialogue, and a cross-dressing "wife" equal one-and-half hours of your life you'd be better off spending on...well...pretty much anything else.

While it's nice to see a new generation of French film makers embrace the horror genre, none of their recent attempts have been truly convincing. I had high hopes for "Sheitan". Regrettably, those hopes were dashed.

The main problem of films like "Sheitan" or "High Tension (Unrated Widescreen Edition)" is their fundamental lack of originality. They rehash themes that have already been developed exhaustively by American film makers. Sure, the French seem quite apt at pushing the limits of gore and violence (could it be because they don't have the MPAA breathing down their necks?) but ultimately I have to sum up "Sheitan" with the same words I used when I reviewed "Haute Tension": you've seen it all before but this time it's in French.
Furthermore, I have to wonder about the recurring portrayal of country people as degenerates. In that regard "Sheitan" is just like "Calvaire: The Ordeal". I first thought this was just a case of too much "Deliverance" but eventually I came to the conclusion that this might in fact be the most authentic aspect of the movie, something that is uniquely French and for once not borrowed from America. If you want to know what the Parisian elite truly thinks of the average provincial Frenchman, if you want to know in what low esteem French artists hold their fellow countrymen, then watch "Sheitan".

A group of spoiled, hedonistic young people flee a disco and repair to an isolated villa in the French countryside. They are introduced to a hulking, perpetually grinning farmhand named Joseph (a ferociously mugging Vincent Cassel), caretaker of the estate. Joseph gives the kids a tour of the crumbling manse, full of dolls and mannequins and other spooky bits of décor. A shadowy female figure glimpsed in an attic is explained away as his wife (she later looms large in the film's big shock conclusion). Little by little, the young people find their host to be casually racist, cheerfully calling an Algerian girl "a camel driver" -- and during a side trip to the local swimming hole, they find he has a lustful eye towards the young men in their party! There is an blood-caked showdown between the kids and Joseph on Christmas Eve, leading to Grand Guignol conclusion.

Until very recently, France's horror film output was rather negligible. Other than George Franju's Les Yeux Sans Visage (1960) and the films of Jean Rollin, few could note any notable Gaelic shockers until the arrival of Gaspar Noe. His I Stand Alone (1998) and Irreversible (2002) were daring, innovative shockers that remained true to their European art house roots with leisurely pacing, existential outlook and overall brooding atmosphere. These features were bolstered with some very notable "borderline" horror projects such as Fat Girl (2001) and The Piano Teacher (2001).

However -- Sheitan, along with Calvaire (aka The Ordeal, 2004) seems to be treading the tired, tried-and-true path forged by American horror films of the Seventies. Both are essentially remakes of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974). Sheitan, for all of its frenetic pacing and eagerness to entertain creaks under conventionality. A bit of Psychotronica for Eurotrash fans -- look for Monica Belluci (Irreversible, The Passion of the Christ) as a vampire on a movie quoted off a nearby TV screen!

A group of drunken friends are joined by their cute bartender, who invites them out to stay in her beautiful country home. Once they arrive, they are introduced to her deranged housekeeper, Joseph, and the rest of the town's strange inhabitants. As the night goes on, sex, drugs, and alcohol begin to steer the conversation, and Joseph tells them a tale of a poor farmer who sold his soul to the devil. From here, things quickly grow out of control as Joseph becomes their instrument of destruction in the name of Sheitan! SHEITAN is a twisted mind-bender that can't help but draw comparisons to 2004's CALVAIRE. Director Kim Chapiron spends the majority of the time developing his freakishly off-setting characters, which pays off in the end when all hell finally breaks loose. The weight of the film's success lies in the hands of Vincent Cassel as the demented Joseph, who leaves the viewer in a state of unease well before any of the true horror sets in. His commanding on-screen presence when he is pleasant and smiling is frightening enough, but when he shifts into serious mode, he is downright terrifying. Although they are all drunken, horny buffoons, the rest of the cast members put in solid efforts as well, even if it is unlikely that the audience will side with them in the end. Chapiron might have considered fleshing out more of the backstory behind Joseph and his depraved family, but as it stands, SHEITAN is a devilishly good time!

-Carl Manes
I Like Horror Movies

HELLO SO I AM FRENCH AND I LIKE MOVIES LIKE CALVAIRE HENRY TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE ETC AND WHEN I SAW SHEITAN I LIKED IT A LOT BUT YOU HAVE TO BE WARNED THIS A LITTLE BIT STRANGE AND NOT FOR CHILDREN SO FOR A FRENCH MOVIES IT IS VERY GOOD

Wow after 2 viewings,it's still hard to catch all the symbolism this movie brings to the table. And lets not forget the bravaura performance that Vincent Cassel brings to the table! The rest of the cast is excellant too but it is Cassel that turns it up to 11. Very scary,very funny, and above all, very very good. This makes my top 3 this year.

Neighborhood bonding time! Party on and get yourself a sheep!

Teens in peril? Or teens in trouble? Well, not quite. Putting aside the questionable and "probing" sexual (inbreeding, homosexuality)/religious (christianity, judaism, islamism)/racial (white vs asian vs black)/musical (hip-hop, rap) issues, this movie is quite good, from a low-budget production point of view (2,7M, $3,7M). Not wanting to pass an overrated hyped opinion, I think this one is a pure fun sex comedy horror flick, with some gruesome, unsettling moments, and also vile and gory visuals not unlike those at display on such classics as Cannibal Holocaust or Last House on the Left. And yet, those kids are just having some fun along with us, the spectators. Until your hosts make you eat the shocking truth and shove it down your throat. And why is that, you ask?
Well, I liked this better than Eli Roth's Hostel, considering the fact that nowadays graphic violence is not a necessity plot wise but rather a recurring tool for commercial benefit (gorehounds beware!), but in Sheitan it is more a justified exposition of the actions and settings in which the characters evolve, from rivalries between friends to gratuitous confrontational sex based aggression. Sonic!
As always, Vincent Cassel delivers his acting madness as a hilarious french "redneck" shepherd, with perverted sexual tendencies that make the ending quite understandable, for sanity's sake!

For more Vincent Cassel madness, try Dobermann, Hate (La Haine) or even The Brotherhood of the Wolf (Le Pact des Loups) for one iconic rogue character.

French independent cinema is getting better by the year!

If possible, go for the double disc R2 SE. If not, this edition (R1 Tartan Video) is your best option.

P.S.: Oh, and don't miss the Miss Monica Bellucci's cameo somewhere in there too!
Have fun! It's really worth it!

I found this movie to be very slow and also confusing...I'm not sure what the point is. It wasn't scary or disturbing...it was slow and confusing. A group of kids go to a disco (dance, drink, fight) then leave with a girl to her home in the country. They meet Joseph who is the girl's freaky handyman. Frolic about the girl's house. One guy there is making out with his girlfriend (yet he is on the phone making excuses to another girl), two guys vie for the other girl's attention, the group eats together and Joseph tells a story of a guy jumping his sister and over indulging. I guess that story is suppose to be some sort of foreshadowing or symbolic to the group of friends...I don't know...It was boring. The group goes to some hot spring and get into a fight with some locals and the local girl fondles a guy's dog. The end the group fights with Joseph and his wife (who looks like a guy) gives birth...also i'm not quite sure why they would want to give the baby a doll with human parts???