The Belarussian countryside, the turn to the 20th century: On his
search for old legends, scholar Count Bielarecki asks for abode in the
castle of the Janowskis, and finds this a place where old legends are kept
very much alive, starting with an exorcism of Countess Nadzieja on the eve
of her coming-of-age party. Thing is, the Countess believes her death is
imminent, since she has already seen the Little Man on the Marsh,
the Lady in Blue, and worst of all, the Savage Hunt of King
Stakh, all of which sure signs of death in her family ever since
about 300 years ago, her ancestor killed King Stakh, but not before the
king could curse him and his family ... Bielarecki soon takes an
interest into the legend of King Stakh, but whoever tries to help him in
his investigations ends up murdered, and each murder seems to be linked to
the legend in some way. Eventually, Bielarecki even sees the Savage
Hunt of King Stakh (a group of mysterious and creepy masked riders) in the distance ... Bielarecki refuses to believe
in the family curse though, and soon finds out the Little Man of the
Marsh is the midget brother of one of the murder victims whom he has
hidden in the castle, the Lady in Blue is the countess herself
sleepwalking, and the Savage Hunt of King Stakh is nothing but
scarecrows on horses, orchestrated by Count Dubotowk, a distant relative
of the Countess who tries to drive her to suicide because she turned him
down. Ultimately, Bielarecki leads a mob of angry villagers against the
Count's castle and sees to it that Dubotowk gets his just desserts - but
in the end, Bielarecki himself is arrested for inciting a rebellion ... Nice
Soviet gothic that might contain more than a few parallels to the Sherlock
Holmes story Hound
of the Baskervilles, but still comes across as a rather original
piece of work, told in very impressive images, making perfect use of the
Belarussian countryside. Only the ending, with all the mystery explained
away by a few silly ploys, is a bit of a letdown (and the sequence
featuring the midget borders the ridiculous), but that hardly hurts the
film.
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