Prikosnoveniye (1992) User Reviews

Life can be wonderful and amazing...

[niunoniotro · 7/10 · 13 September 2021]

Or rather the opposite. Well, that's what the director seems to be trying to convey to us and what if he succeeds. It is a movie where the depressing is visible almost in every frame. For this and despite a low budget, he knows how to play with the lenses, the camera cuts, the old and abandoned buildings so typical of the recently abandoned USSR. He delves into this idea of a sad world doomed to failure and the fact that we never see an evil that you can call a villain in order to position ourselves fuels that anguish.

Even good turns into bad and good actions into heinous events.

It is not made to entertain, it simply terrorizes us without makeup or sweeteners. Take it or leave it.

Masterpiece of Horror

[Smillas_sister · 10/10 · 26 August 2010]

Rated as the scariest Russian horror movie ever, Prikosnovenie (which is best translated into English as The Encounter, not Contact) is one of those films viewers don't watch twice -- at least that's what many of them admit online. A low-budget supernatural murder mystery filmed with a bare minimum of homemade special effects succeeds brilliantly in creating a truly inhuman, otherworldly atmosphere you won't want to experience again in a hurry.

A detective investigating a series of suspicious suicides realizes too late he might not be dealing with an organized crime group of hypnotists as he first believed...

The strength of the movie is in the fact that it's not filmed for entertainment, the way most horror flicks are. You're not expected to watch it, stretch and say "it was only a movie". It's filmed in dead (pardon the pun) seriousness, a fictionalized documentary rather than a scary bedtime story. Interestingly, director Albert Mkrtchyan -- who enjoyed the challenge of working on a supernatural story contrary to his superstitious friends' warning -- very nearly shared the main character's fate and never made another film until his death 15 years later.

The film is unique in that it actually makes us experience the other side beyond life, the notorious next world -- not as a filmmaker's concept but as raw unedited truth. How did the director do it? -- Well, that's talent for you. But just getting a glimpse of what might await you out there is enough reason to carry on living.

classic horror film ever

[andreygrachev · 31 October 2008]

Well, this unknown but genius horror film had a deep and real beyond story, including the mystery of the screenplay, very real feeling of dead world. I can compare this film with Lucio Fulci's last "The door to the silence" of the same year. A detective is working on a strange suicide story and meets strange people who tells about "forzi"- some beyond creatures taking away people beyond. The hero was prohibited to say the words "The life is wonderful and nice". Every time he said that accident happen. Bad ending . A lot of cemeteries, super sound-effects, true story and masterpiece music.

They are nearby

[Zhorzhik-Morzhik · 9/10 · 8 March 2020]

Contact" of Albert Mkrtchyan is the best Russian horror of the 90s. An atmospheric and frightening film about a policeman who, when investigating a double murder, encounters inexplicable mystical supernatural facts and otherworldly forces. The film literally drives crazy not only the heroes of the film, but also the viewer. Also, in a mystical way, the film turned out to be the last in the creative biography of the director of the film, who almost died immediately after this film.

Movie stays in 90-s

[ioninay · 4/10 · 22 April 2017]

When I have found this movie all comments were about how genius this movie is. The scariest and the first in this genre. In my opinion, people who find this movie scary and intimidating just remember the feelings when the watched it for the first time.

The poverty is everywhere. And it's not about 90-s. The thing is that the great movie could be placed only in 1 room. For example "12 angry men" - who will dare to say that it lacks effects? It's great just the way it is.

All scary moments are in loud sounds and the father's picture.

The plot is nothing. He wants they there just because it's a better place. Really? It's easier to say when you had lived until silver hair. It's been only a week of "happy life" and it's also seems strange and unreal. The only prohibition is to speak this phrase and because he didn't watched what he was saying - Father (the great and kind man) diceded to blast his relatives. Sounds like a great dad.