Lake Bodom

Some of these reviews are so harsh. I loved this film, and the people I recommended it to did as well. As someone that often picks the ending in the first 15 minutes I loved being totally thrown, and even said a "Oh my god" out loud a few times. Great acting, fabulous script. Overall one of the best horror film I've seen this year - And I watch a lot!

In 1960 two couples consisting of two 18 yr old boys and two 15 yr old girls, decided to take a camping trip to Lake Bodom, Finland. Only one of the boys survived grave injuries sustained during a horrific slaughtering that left his three friends dead at their lakeside campsite. No one has ever been identified and convicted of their murders. It is considered to be Finland's most horrific unsolved crime. In this film two boys and two girls take a trip to the exact location of the murders and have the intention to recreate the event based on a theory that one of the boys hold. Things don't work out the way they had planned and their night by the lake turns into a nightmare. I was impressed with this little slasher. This film did a great job holding my interest. It has a couple of twist that helped with that. The subtitles I had weren't that great. It was in a broken english but I followed it well enough to understand what was happening. I thought the camera work was decent and as far as I could tell, considering that I was interpreting a broken english dialogue, the acting was decent as well. I wished there had been a bit more blood and the kills had been a bit more creative. However, those things didn't take away from my enjoying the film. This is a decent film. It deserves a recommendation. I'll give it 7.5 stars.

Four teens go to a cabin in the woods, except there is no cabin. They camp out at the infamous Lake Bodom the site where four teens were murdered in 1960. They never caught the killer. Atte (Santeri Helinheimo Mäntylä) is on the nerdy side and has a theory about the killer he wants to test. His friend Elias (MikaelGabriel) likes girls, especially the damaged Ida Mary (Nelly Hirst-Gee) who had a terrible thing happen to her...details later. And her friend and lover (?) Nora (Mimosa Willamo) round out our foursome. Elias drives a Volvo station wagon, a chick magnet in Finland. Yes, people die. Ida is set up early as the final girl as her dad "treats her like a dog" because of that thing. The film takes a nice wicked twist, and then changes directions into the film you thought it was going to be all along. It was like they wanted to make 2 different films. Guide: F-word. Brief nudity. No sex.

"Bodom" is a Finnish horror film from 2016, so still a very recent release written and directed by Taneli Mustonen, his most known work at this point probably, and this is actually not the only film at all dealing with the Lake Bodom tragedy from several decades ago. It runs for slightly under 1.5 hours and takes us on a trip with 4 young people into a really scary area, namely the lake mentioned in the title. Early on, it is a bit of a film where they get murdered one by one you could say, but it's never repetitive at all as you can also guess who's gonna get it next. And maybe you will be as wrong as I was as my order was pretty messed up. But halfway into the film, when there's only two alive still, the film heads into a completely different direction and it was an interesting one as I found the second half clearly better than the first. As a hetero male audience member, I can also not deny that the two female protagonists were breathtakingly stunning and no matter what you are into, I truly believe that at least one of the duo will really get you juices flowing. The suggestive shots involving the blonde (looks like a mix of Chloe Moretz and the young Elizabeth Moss) clearly didn't hurt the film either. But is not defined by the sexual component by any means. It is a pretty scary and shocking film at times, especially towards the ending, even if I did not like the very final ending too much, especially the extreme change in time and atmosphere that gave off an impression as if they wanted it to be a much more significant and way deeper film than it was. No need for that. Lets just enjoy it from the pointless sexy fun perspective. Story-wise I must say that it was never a realistic film by any means, but that's not a problem either. I enjoyed seeing it nonetheless for what it is. And that comes from somebody who does not enjoy slasher films at all. Then again the actually bloody moments weren't that frequent as I think of when I hear the word "slasher". This is most certainly the reason why I liked it. So I give this one a thumbs-up and of course you will need subtitles if you aren't fluent in Finnish and want to check it out. Which you should. There is also lots of subtle comedy in here like when we hear the guy's voice at the end. A good watch with friends as well as your significant other unless she despises horror and violence (in) movies.