I, myself, am a big fan of horror movies. I watch different movies, and I am used to the big directors like James Wan. Thus, many horror movies nowadays are poorly done despite the big budget they get.

This film proves the contrary. Despite it having a low budget, this film managed to give me some goose bumps. I am pretty confident that's because of me, as a romanian born and raised child, knew the story of The goat and her three children by Ion Creanga as being a children's story and now in this film the tragedy and the horrors of having your children massacred by a psychopath is portrayed very well.

Maia Morgenstern plays her roll impressively well, and Marius Bodochi is the perfect character fit for a psychopath which can really induce some fear.

The video quality can be better. The camera is sometimes too shaky. But having to consider the low budget, they had to work with what they can.

Sound quality, I cannot complain. There are some reviews which I cannot understand. The sound was almost a perfect fit, and it fitted every scene almost perfectly. There are some discrepancies, but you can easily overhear them.

You need to keep in mind that this film is not a Hollywood production film, nor has the budget of movies like ones by James Wan to meet the expectations of western productions.

Now, on the theme of dialogue. Yes, it's true that this film lacks dialogue and build up and, most important, it lacks the motive of having the children murdered.

In the fictional story, the three baby goats are being murdered because wolves eat goats. In this film is not clear enough why would the so-called "godfather", murder the babies of the goat.

Me personally, I think we should not think about this film as the three kids to actually portray the three baby goats, and the mother as being the goat. Instead, we should look upon it with the idea that a psychopath lusts towards the mother and wants to have a sexual relationship with her, and by being rejected by the mother on the first encounter, the "wolf" murders the two children as revenge for the mother not offering her body to his sexual needs. If you look at the film with this idea in mind, then you have your motive, and all of this makes sense. If you have the original's story motive in the head for the duration of the whole film, you will be disappointed.

Anyway, this was a great watch, definitely not a waste a time, and I would love to see more horror/thriller movies from romanian producers / directors.

Have fun watching!

The story by Creanga upon which this is based is essential reading in elementary school and a cautionary tale for children which has been adapted many times, perhaps most famously in the rock musical "Mama" (1976). This is a fond memory for many Romanians, so quite a few will be peeved to see it turned into a folk horror piece (like the infinitely worse Winnie the Pooh gore).

But I am from Transylvania and the story made sense in the past as there are many small farms scattered in the countryside which used to be targeted by thieves. Also, there are lots of stories about people turning crazy in our long winters, so this somber uptake is more on point than city dwellers may believe. We invented werewolves, after all (not vampires, they're from Serbia). The finish is how the story actually ends so it's more brutal than Little Red Riding Hood.

Maia Morgenstern is an icon of 1990s cinema, her best known film is probably "The Oak" (1992) by Lucian Pintilie but she hasn't done much in the past years, this is a great comeback for her.

Movie trigger warnings: bullying, sexism, (mild) domestic abuse, sexual assault.

Number of jumpscares: 0.5 (literally barely a jumpscare once)

Review: Honestly one of the best pieces of Romanian cinema I've seen until now, and just a really good horror/thriller movie. It captures really beautifully what it meant to live in the 19th century rural Romania, along with the accurate traditional house, cutlery and clothes.

The two main actors are absolute legends, and the kids do an amazing job.

The filming is pretty well done, with very desaturated colors pushing the difficult lifestyle of the poor family.

Editing is decent, a few fast cuts here and there, but nothing to be offended by.

Sound design is pretty good, the soundtrack being played on traditional instruments, only note would be that at times you can't hear the dialogue due to the music being quite loud.

All in all, a pretty dope watch, biases aside, a solid 8/10.