Trollhunter

This is probably my favourite time of the year. The Sydney Film Festival. Each year I choose 10 films to see from the hundreds on offer. There is always great difficulty in narrowing down to my final 10 but that is part of the fun.

The first film I'm seeing at this year's festival is 'Trollhunter'. A Norwegian film about three college students who venture into the forest to film a movie about a legendary bear hunter. However they uncover a much bigger story, literally and figuratively.

This film comes falls into a recent genre of the 'found footage documentary'. The set up is very similar to the classic of this genre 'The Blair Witch Project' but goes in a different direction and is much better. The one thing it proves though is that European film makers can take a genre that Hollywood has driven into the ground and inject it with new blood. Writer/director Andre Ovredal has crafted an excellent story that takes a fairy tale legend and gives it a horror twist and plants it into the real world. Andre brilliantly creates a scary mood with the way it is filmed. It is incredibly spooky and creepy. But its greatest achievement is how funny it is. There is lots of black humour as well as many funny lines and situations. While the characters are played as being in a serious situation, they are not above knowing how absurd what they are doing is. Andre is also willing to give you the money shot early in the film but still manage to keep you on the edge of your seat as far as what will happen.

The Trollhunter is brilliantly played by Norwegian comedian Otto Jespersen. He is a mysterious character who has been doing a thankless job for many years but is just now had enough and wants to spill the beans about what he does. Over the coarse of the film we get to know this man and come to respect him. Otto plays him so well that we become sympathetic to his plight. His team of film makers are a good group of young actors. Glenn Erland Tosterud, Johanna Morck and Tomas Alf Larson do not have all that much to do except look frightened and surprised by all the wonders they see but are still very effective at being our eyes into this strange situation.

This film may not come to the cinemas in Australia but if you find it at your local video store then you should check it out. A new and clever twist on a genre that has been exploited a bit too much recently.