Viy (1967) review

Young seminarians are dismissed from school to go on a break except three of them, philosopher Khoma (Leonid Kuravlyov) and his pals Khalyava (Vadim Zakharchenko) the theologian and Gorobets (Vladimir Salnikov) the orator get lost in the woods, encounter a creepy old "woman" (Nikolai Kutuzov) and then Khoma winds up in a village where he's asked to keep vigil for three nights over the corpse of Pannochka (Natalya Varley), who is possessed by evil spirits.  It's adapted from a novella by Nikolai Gogol and tries to be a "dark fantasy," but it's basically Soviet kitsch, and waits until the very end to truly unleash all the funky demons (which could have come out of Häxan) to accompany Pannochka's coffin floating around in circles.  The "main monster," called Viy, appears only briefly, and he looks like the Pokémon character Muk with green headlights for eyes.  Russian scholars are better equipped to explain the "deeper meaning" - if there is any - to it ... although I'm willing to guess that being scared to death by the supernatural is about as terrifying as getting injected with polonium-210.