All Rise...

Judge David Johnson once accidentally summoned a Succubus during a game of Scrabble.

The Charge

Sometimes it's so hard to let go of the dead and carry on living…sometimes it's so hard for the dead to let go of living and stay dead.

The Case

This Nordic import tells the depressing tale of a guy named Henri (Markus Salo) and his inconsolable despair over the death of his wife. Seriously, this guy is just wrecked wandering around, zombified out, alienating his friends and jeopardizing his career. No matter how hard the people in his life try to lift his spirits, Henri just isn't having any of it. Part of that may be because the primary colors of his surroundings are blue and gray. Or maybe that's just Finland?

Life becomes so unbearable for the guy and his longing for his beloved is so overpowering, he eventually resorts to the occult for even a shred of hope of reconnecting with her. He strikes out with a few psychics, until he stumbles upon a demonic book that contains pages and pages of fun-filled incantations. And after drawing a pentagram on his floor and murdering a cat, he taps into some super-dark @#$% and awakens the Succubus Demon, a scantily clad, pasty-skinned woman with sharp teeth and a bad temper, who sits on a mountain of CGI skulls with CGI lightning and clouds in the background. Blah blah blah and it's demon orgy time!

Some creepy moments and a f—-ed up final ten minutes aren't enough to keep Succubus the Demon from, well, "succing." OK, that was a cheap shot. Succubus doesn't suck, so much as it underwhelms. The concept has promise for an effective little shocker, but the followthrough is painfully tedious. Our boy Henri spends the first half hour just moping. That's it, moping. He has a few heart-to-hearts with his peers and they all tell him pretty much the same thing to get over it and move on, but, nope, all he wants to do is lament. Aside from some mild jump scare hallucinations with his deceased wife, the first two-thirds are relatively event-free. Once Henri starts farting around with the black arts is when things get more interesting. You may not care that much by then but say this for director Sami Haavisto: he tries his darndest to re-engage you.

The introduction of the Succubus on her goofy throne is jarring, not because the effects are good, but up until that point is what just Henri being despondent. Once Lady Suc breaks into the picture and Henri starts having his nightmares, the film finds its footing. There is blood and demon makeup and stabbing and eye-gouging and the grand finale, a prolonged orgy featuring Finnish women covered in what appears to be Nickelodeon green slime, performing fellatio on each other. So, there's that.

The disc: a soft 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer and 2.0 stereo track (Finnish with English subtitles) gives way to featurettes on the director, the blood effects, the orgy setup, and the cinematography, a still gallery and trailers.

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