The Vourdalak movie storyline. In 18th-century Eastern Europe, a courtier and envoy of the King of France, Marquis Jacques Antoine, knocks on a stranger’s door in the middle of the night, having lost his horse and companions through being robbed. The stranger does not let him inside, but advises him to go to the house of a man named Gorcha. En route through the forest the following morning, Jacques Antoine sees Gorcha’s daughter Sdenka singing, but she leaves at his approach. He then meets Gorcha’s youngest son, Piotr, who reluctantly takes him to the house.
Gorcha’s elder son, Jegor, arrives home, having spent the past month seeking revenge against the Turks who pillaged the village. He lives there with his wife Anja, his son Vlad, Piotr, and Sdenka. Gorcha, however, is missing. Piotr and Sdenka reveal that Gorcha left to fight the Turks, and had said that if he had not returned within six days it would be because he had died fighting; if he should return after those six days, he would have become a vourdalak and nobody should let him in. Jegor dismisses this as absurd, not believing in vourdalaks. He also knows where a horse for Jacques Antoine can be found, but it would have to wait until the next day.
It is later revealed that Sdenka fell in love with a traveller, and because everyone in the area knows, she now cannot get married. Jacques Antoine approaches Sdenka, who refuses to talk about vourdalaks. He aggressively tries to seduce her but she tricks him into almost falling off a cliff. She had arranged to meet the traveller at the cliff so they would flee together, but someone found out and killed him.
That evening, six days since Gorcha left, Anja spots him, looking like a corpse and lying at the edge of the forest. Piotr’s dog will not stop barking at him, and Jegor compels Piotr to shoot it. Gorcha reveals the severed head of the leader of the band of Turks, whom Jegor had failed to kill.
The Vourdalak (French: Le Vourdalak) is a 2023 French horror-drama film co-written and directed by Adrien Beau, at his feature film debut. It premiered at the 80th edition of the Venice Film Festival. The film is based on the 1839 Aleksey Konstantinovich Tolstoy’s novella The Family of the Vourdalak.
The Vourdalak (2024)
Directed by: Adrien Beau
Starring: Kacey Mottet Klein, Ariane Labed, Grégoire Colin, Vassili Schneider, Claire Duburcq, Gabriel Pavie, Erwan Ribard, Adrien Beau
Screenplay by: Hadrien Bouvier, Adrien Beau
Cinematography by: David Chizallet
Film Editing by: Alan Jobart
Costume Design by: Anne Blanchard
Set Decoration by: Thibault Pinto
Music by: Maïa Xifaras, Martin Le Nouvel
MPAA Rating: None.
Distributed by: Oscilloscope (United States)
Release Date: September 2, 2023 (Venice), Octoser 25, 2023 (France), June 28, 2024 (United States)
The Vourdalak Movie Poster (2024)
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