Frostbitten (2006)

Plot so thin, it passes unnoticed.

Brilliant and touching

Clever and entertaining enough to recommend even to members of the 1%

It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

A Swedish teen vampire comedy horror film isn't a huge genre, and it is always good to find something that tries something a little out of the ordinary.Sharing certain similarities with '30 Days of Night', the main thrust of this film reveals what happens when a group of teens mistake pills of what appears to be condensed vampire blood for narcotics. Instead of getting high, the teens develop vampiric tendencies.A film involving 'teens' usually scares me more than any monster, with relentless memories of the cat-walking petulant pouters often found being sliced by Freddie Krueger (or similar) over the years. But these Swedish juveniles are an appealing group, with little of the overbearing bravura of their Hollywood counterparts. The character of Sebastian, in particular, creates effective mayhem when visiting his girlfriend's parents after having taken a tablet, and is trying to make a good impression whilst fighting off the effects of his increasing vampirism (her father is a Priest, which doesn't help).In the end, the vampires appear to be running rings around the increasingly outnumbered police force, and remind them that here in Lappland, dawn is a whole month away, a reference to Sweden living in permanent darkness half the year round – perfect conditions for the undead.

Over here in Europe, and especially during the annual Horror & Fantasy Festivals all over the continent, "Frostbite" got endlessly praised and acclaimed as one of the most innovating and creative new vampire movies of the last few decades, but you honestly have to put all this eulogy into perspective a little. First of all because European horror critics understandably wish to promote our own stuff as opposed to that uninspired American "junk" and, secondly, because the guys behind the camera (director Anders Banke and producer Magnus Paulsson) used to be involved in the organization of the Swedish Fantasy Festival and thus the critics support each other. Don't get me wrong, I'm a big fan of the horror-festivals and I'm grateful that I can go and watch a truckload of new cult stuff there every year, but this circle of European Fantasy Festivals is undeniably some sort of elite club. That being said, I don't intend to state "Frostbite" is a bad film or anything … It just isn't as original and refreshing as it pretends to be. Given the North-Swedish setting, the tag line and the synopsis, I was anticipating a sort of predecessor to "30 Days of Night" but it's actually something completely different. The story revolves on an obsessive doctor trying to create the ultimate breed of vampires ever since he himself became one during World War II. He invented these red pills to fine-tune vampirism, but they accidentally end up at a local teenager's house party and all the guests gradually transform into bloodthirsty monsters. "Frostbite" features a lot of ideas and simultaneously attempts to parody the horror genre, but unfortunately it only became a very incoherent, not-so-funny and seemingly finished horror movie. The intro-flashback is overlong and, in general, not a whole lot is happening during the first hour. The last half hour compensates for a lot, though, since the film becomes extremely gory, absurd and tasteless. The actual ending comes abruptly and makes no sense at all, but the foregoing house-party massacre is quite cool to watch. The special and make-up effects are excellent (clearly, most of the budget went there) and the acting performances of the primarily young and inexperienced cast members are more than adequate. "Frostbite" is definitely an interesting and potentially terrific film, but the writers nearly didn't make enough use of the location's possibilities and the polar night concept.

During the last years of WW2 a small group of SS Nazi soldiers try to escape their demise by hiding in an apparent abandoned shed in Sweden. What they do not realize is they are not alone. Several are attacked and killed while a few others survive the ordeal. Flash forward to current time where a mother and daughter are heading to the town of Norbotten where the mother is seeking a career opportunity working with a genetic specialist.Shortly after their arrival things begin to get a bit odd. People begin dying and after a hospital attendant steals some red pills only to have them stole from him by a girl about to attend a party, the town comes under attack by a gang of vampires out to suck anybody or anythings blood they can sink their teeth into.Frostbiten tries to be a comedy horror movie, not a splatstick but a horror movie with dialog that is humorous, unfortunately most of it is not funny which leads to some rather ho-hums going on in-between the horror scenes of the movie. Don't get me wrong this movie has some decent parts but the shame here is for every good part there is another part that brings the film to a screeching halt.The thing I did like about this movie is the beginning and how it sets up the story as we find out the truth about some of the characters in the movie. Its just sad to say with the humor not being funny and the story not reaching its full potential as far as what they could have done here it leads to some uneven movie viewing. It is because if this that I can only slightly recommend this to vampire and horror fans.Fans of gore will only be slightly entertained as there is a few moments of the red stuff but nothing we haven't seen before. Jugulars being ripped apart, a few guys shot in the beginning and some animal cruelty (hehe) springs to mind but nothing extremely memorable. The main Vampire does turn into a vampiric creature toward the end but even that ends up only being mediocre at best. Throuw in some slight CGI work that ranges from so-so to noticeable and I think you get the idea.In the end this movie appears to try and emulate one too many of the classic horror comedies of the past only to come off as an amateurish take on the sub-genre. If the director/writer would have just stayed to the horror stuff and not tried to add the rather unfunny dialog this could have turned out better, alas I give Frostbiten a meager: 5/10: Average Decent Horror elements not so funny comedic dialog hamper the enjoyment factor of this movie. Fans of Horror/Comedies may slightly enjoy this one as well as those into Vampires but all others may find themselves reaching for the remote.

Awful. I give it a '1'. The lowest value I could find.The movie could have been great. After I've watched the first 10-15 minutes of it I gave the movie a fair chance. It caught me. A group of soldiers in a deep forest in Ukraina during WW2, looking for shelter during the night. (Man! This can be great, I thought).Anyway, so far the movie seems to be great. Great acting and filming. THEN, all of a sudden, the movie jumps into modern time. And a complete disaster is a fact (only after 10 minutes or something like that). After I've watched the first half of the movie, I was starting to feeling sick. The acting was bad, the story was awful, the whole thing and idea was a disaster. I hated it.Before I started to watch it, me and my friend I watched it with had a few movies we've promised ourselves to never watch again. A few of them were Dogma, ExistenZ and The Cube 2 (Hypercube?). These films, which I've hated for so long suddenly appeared as masterpieces. But I must give Frostbiten creds for their great effects! Sorry to tell you all that they have absolutely no use.Frostbiten made me wanna commit suicide. I can't sleep at night, I can't watch Swedish movies any more - It killed me from the inside, and not because of the story or effects, only because of it's "worthlessity".Do I recommend you to see it? Well, I'm sorry (or not), but I can't say 'yes' to that question.