Carmilla (2020)

Yes, yes, yes, YES! I adored this version of Carmilla. It’s right up my street. It’s slow, fancy and features a truly tender and sensual seduction down the path of darkness. Carmilla is the rare film I wish were longer. I did not want to leave the story and world this film created.

This version of Carmilla puts the teenage Lara’s experiences front and centre. At the beginning of the film, Lara is an isolated and deeply bored teenager. She lives with her father and governess, Miss Fontaine. Miss Fontaine is controlling, obsessed with the possibility of evil entering the house and maybe a little overly affectionate towards Lara. Lara deeply longs for a friend to visit her. However, all the nearby girls of similar status have mysteriously taken ill. Lara’s life changes when a carriage crashes and introduces a mysterious girl to the household. The girl asks Lara to name her and Lara chooses Carmilla. Quickly, Lara and Carmilla bond. But Carmilla’s presence leads to justified suspicion from Miss Fontaine and Lara’s father as she is definitely a vampire.

Someone deeply horny for cinematography made this version of Carmilla. So scant is the story that the film only really covers the first half of the 100 page novella. The film is much more interested in filming closeups of bugs and people’s hands in candlelight. I really love this. The 1970 Hammer horror version, The Vampire Lovers remains the closest adaption of the original text. But this version of Carmilla gets the tone of the novella right. And beyond that, it’s absolutely striking to look at. This is a beautiful film. It’s primed and ready to be turned into a series of gifs on Tumblr. As someone who still has Tumblr, that definitely appeals to me.

Admittedly, I did wish for more story. Enamoured as I was by this universe, I really mourned the film being a mere 94 minutes. There is definitely more content to be mined from the source material and even this adapted version of the story. Carmilla feels like it’s missing a chunk before the third act. Because Carmilla enters the film so late, she and Lara only smooch twice before they’re caught. The film does spend too much time on set up and not enough on pay off. But again, I liked what they set up so much that I can’t be too mad about this. What I want more than anything is for this to be a languid, three episode miniseries. The slow, sumptuous set should remain. But it would allow for more time spent on development and a less rushed third act.

While I overall love Carmilla as a movie, as specifically a horror movie, it’s not great. This film is not scary nor is that a priority. Lara has two surprisingly graphic , gorey dream sequences and the film ends on a down note. That’s as much horror as in on offer. There’s hypothetically horror to be found in the basic plot of a young girl seduced and fed on by a creature of evil. But I’ve never found vampires scary. Especially in this version, Carmilla’s seduction of Lara is so tender and Lara is clearly so willing that it definitely falls on the romance side of romantic horror. If anything, the real horror happens after the credits role. Lara was already considered potentially evil because she’s left handed. Her life after being willingly seduced by a vampire? Probably not going to be a good time.

Carmilla is so many things I adore in a movie. It’s slow yet beautiful and finds the proper balance between beauty, sensuality and horror. As a big fan of a horror romance, this really appealed to me. My main critique is the simple fact that I wanted more.

Overall rating: 7.6/10

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