Critical Film Condition

“Dead Ringers” meets “The Reader”

Europe, early 17th century. Hungarian Countess Erzebet Bathory (Julie Delpy) is a virago, strong-willed and vain, the most powerful and also the most feared in her country. She is beautiful, intelligent and unwilling to accept that men make and break the rules as they please. She meets the much younger Istvan (Daniel Brühl) and they immediately fall for each other and start a passionate affair. But their bliss is short-lived. Istvan’s father Count Thurzo (deliciously cold: William Hurt) forces his son to marry another woman and initiates a scheme to bring down the commanding Countess. Erzebet however is convinced that Istvan left her because of her fading beauty. Slowly going mad, she starts to believe that the blood of virgins, extracted by an iron maiden (the torture device, not the aptly named band) will preserve her youthful visage. She embarks on a murderous undertaking, risking everything: her reputation, her wealth, her standing, her life.

Disturbingly, the movie is based on an actual person and actor/writer/director Delpy meshes legend and fact: The real Countess Barthory (1560-1614) is possibly the most prolific female serial killer in history, convicted on 80 counts, with one witness attributing more than 600 deaths to her and her myrmidons. In actuality she was never tried in court and the legendary bloodbaths were never verified. Yet she is remembered as the “Blood Countess” or “Countess Dracula”.

All of this being said, this is definitely not a splatter movie! It is disturbing, but not on a “slasher” level. There is structure and unruliness. Lesbians and S&M. Bloodthirst and romance. Vanity and power struggles. It’s a feast for the hobby shrink.

The movie starts off with a structured stab at a behavioral explanation. I think that Delpy tried to explore the main character in a very honest and exploratory fashion without excusing anything. Little Erzebet is conditioned to cruelty from childhood. Delpy employs two crucial childhood experiences and a merciless disposition to round out the character profile. Mix in unrequited love, madness and high social ranking and power and what do you get? Bloodbaths galore.

I have got to applaud writer/director Julie Delpy for a cunning psychogram of a very complex woman that was part victim and part perpetrator simultaneously. Like Stephen Daldry in “The Reader” she is trying to explore the facets of an inherently cruel, sangfroid and narcissistic character that falls for a much younger man. It is immensely difficult to chronicle the demise of a lover turning into a quenchless murderess, much less portray it. Although Delpy does a great job with the acting, the poetic license and the visual effects take away from the serious attempt at a character study. The combination of power and indefeasibility in this character is what makes it intriguing. The question arises how cruel anyone could become if they had the freedom to be. The Countess viewed herself as a devout Protestant and hardship and cruelty were a sign of the times then. But the quote “Time has no respect for beauty” is one that could be uttered by anyone in Hollywood today. Still – it is a long way to dead virgins lining the woods.

I like the psychology behind “The Countess” and that Delpy isn’t afraid to explore the wrath of a woman scorned in all its splendor. She isn’t afraid to portray herself as ugly or “old” (though I am sure 39 looked different in 1610). However, combining fact and fiction, the movie is crippled by the Cronenberg style of presentation. Which results in, sadly, the movie sometimes bordering on the comical.

A large portion of the movie was filmed in Germany and there are a number of German faces, spearheading is Daniel Brühl (who might be familiar as Jason Bourne’s girlfriend’s brother) and Anna Maria Mühe as Erzebet’s first victim, Sebastian Blomberg as her masochistic playmate Dominic Vizakna and a short appearance of Nikolai Kinski (son of the late Klaus Kinski).

I am a fan of Delpy’s work. I liked her directorial debut “2 days in Paris” and I think that “Before Sunset” is a nearly perfect sequel to the magical “Before Sunrise”. This movie has a distinct, dark style. And it is truly European: a French director shooting an English movie in Germany about a Hungarian tale. Still, it demands an acquired taste for the genre and human contradictions.

Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.

Release Date:

June 25th (Germany)

Popularity: 28%