hillalbens

The Vigil has the merit of taking place on a road rarely trodden by horror films: Jewish folklore. And that's about the only original thing about the film, which follows scenes already seen hundreds of times, with a hero with heavy post-traumatic stress in the background.

Despite an original starting idea and an interesting horrific setting, The Vigil seriously struggles to excite the viewer. The usual jump scares and sudden appearances do not work. The soundtrack, all shrill saturated screams, seems more frightened than the viewer. The misadventures of the protagonist are underwhelming, and the feeling of déjà-vu that reigns makes the film banal.

Quite disappointing, as the first half of the moving was promising, and I was excited to watch a horror movie with a Jewish backdrop.

Beyond the sometimes inconsistent pacing and somewhat unclear chronology (which I'm sure was possibly intentional) I thought the film was a fantastic mix of horror and absurdity, with a definite touch of satire. The whole movie is like living in a windowless room not knowing where reality begins and fantasy ends. Then you add in crazy things like telepathy, time travel, drug use and demons that affect all of that. It was low budget B-fun, we don't get these kind of movies often.