Sweden’s answer to Evil Dead?  Well, its pretty close, and uses a lot of the elements, but was a lot more impressive than the recent remake of said movie ..

SPOILER ALERT…

The movie opens with an older guy calling his wife/daughters name (Lisa) to whom we find eating another person like she’s been infected/transformed into a flesh eating zombie! With very impressive makeup effects used, we can tell within the first few minutes that this is going to be a barn burner of a movie and not another Zombie doozie!!!  We quickly cut to him shooting her in the head to end her un-life ….

We move then to the main story a group of young spunky adults travelling to an old abandoned house for a weekend of debauchery and parties !!! The story opens up and unfolds extremely quick once they arrive to the house and find out that something isn’t right, almost immediately; 3 doors.  3 doors you say, to the entrance of a house?

A couple gets into an open window…well, one unlucky women goes into a open window with the plans of scaring the rest. Instead she begins searching around the dark house with an even darker secret. This is where the comparison to Evil dead comes into play, slightly. She gets possessed and soon enough weird things start to happen, her eyes start to bleed, she passes a lot of blood upon needing the toilet, spits blood, and then passes out in the bathroom. Now the fun starts!

So basically we have Sweden’s answer to Evil Dead … well, not exactly; ideas are similar, but the execution to the final product is a lot different.  The gore/effects are extremely well done, the soundtrack is perfect, the actors superbly cast, and the movie is well-acted. It’s not giving a remake to an already perfect classic, but it is superior to the aactual remake, so you could say it is more of a homage to the classic …

So the guests (if you can call them that) are all having dinner, and what we find out now is that the infected girl is rather peckish herself (for blood and flesh that is!), and the action plays out perfectly to some well set up gore and blood effects:  a actresses lip gets chewed off, violent blood and guts ensue, and they manage to tie her up to the door after she has attacked a few of them and gets treated to a good old fashion beat down.  Enter the old guy from the beginning (again he is known for killing his daughter,); he heard the commotion and dispatches her (so we think) … and tells everyone the story of the creatures/demons that possessed his wife and daughter, and that this is the same thing happening over again.  He knows that it is only the beginning; as soon as you lay eyes on the creature or one’s possessed, you will be overtaken with the anger and taste for flesh.  It wont be long until the whole cabin is overran with creatures.

The violence and gore starts, as the old man’s story becomes true, everyone starts to be overran with the lust of flesh and the taste of blood. There is a lot of gore and violence in the second half of the movie, but isn’t over the top or stupid, it is well produced and looks actually quite realistic. Though there isn’t a hell of a lot of story to the movie, it goes right into it quite quickly, it doesn’t make for a bad movie. There has been an abundance of foreign horror movies that have come out over the past 5 years that have been extremely well made and successful, this perfectly fits into the pile and Sweden has made some classics in recent years. They have definitely been putting themselves on the map with movies like this.

So back to the movie, so the violence carries on for the rest of the movie, heads cut off, throats chewed to pieces, heads blown up and faces cut to shreds, the only downfall for this movie is the ending is a little weak. The soundtrack, the acting, and the effects brings it down slightly but it is cliché as always with Zombie movies which makes it feel a little disappointed but this doesn’t detract from the overall outcome of the movie. It is impressive with all the above additions and effects, the outcome maybe could of been produced a hell of a lot better.

It falls into the class of the latter classics, Dead Snow, Let the Right one in, and Troll Hunter for the European creativity, but I imagine that it won’t be long till it is called up for a remake of a remake?  Because the Evil Dead remake fell so far from the point, it was a crying shame really…so with it being made for a tiny budget (35,000 euros), why couldn’t the remake been more of a hit (produced-wise, not box office-wise)?

So on the whole, Wither would make a perfect Saturday night movie for the gore lovers, horror monkeys, and blood trolls alike as its full of everything a Swedish smorgasbord could offer!  Snuggle up with a loved one, share a few with friends, and get relaxed with WITHER… its a fun movie !!!!