Baba Yaga
Baba Yaga : Terror of the Dark Forest has an absolutely gorgeous cover and put out by shout shout factory, so I’m holding on some real hope for this thing. The recap an explanation of what the Baba Yaga is is very well done… Chilling and matches the cover art, so I’m really digging it.
We kept to a child walking in the middle of the street on a foggy night, beautifully lit and just dark enough to be unsettling. A woman comes out of the fog… No, a girl. A dream. And in modern times, a boy wakes from a nightmare.
The whole private school and development community vibe I get here reminds me a lot of the fright night we met. Identical houses and plastic people, with the occasional bullies. Oh, and the girl next-door that our boy is falling in love with.
Did I mention that dude’s infant sister has a new and wholly creepy nanny?
Of course, because there’s a new nanny, dad has decided to put the cameras up… Right? Except… Some of the things we see on the security cameras can’t be seen in real life… Like that person sitting in the chair by the crib… Or the gnarled black hand that reaches up… We get a good and proper jump scare less than 20 minutes in, just saw the movie and let us know it’s not playing around.
The vibes totally change for me once the boy and the girl get chased in the woods by bullies… What are the strange red cords that the boys trip over? They surround small house in point Grille find… It’s old… Dirty, ramshackle and dangerous. The inside is dim blue lighting, like the torture room in hellraiser. It’s got mysterious shapes and mechanism in it, and 
seems bigger on the inside than on the outside. Voice whispers to the boy… Even as his mother nets with red yarn in the babies room, And drops into the strangest dreams.
OK, now you’re into nightmare on elm street vibes. Seriously, this thing manages to evoke the feeling sensation of all sorts of different horror films, will never directly on margin or copying any of them. There’s a certain brilliance to that… And I’m saying that while still fully immersed in the first act. They are still well over an hour to go here!
The most settling thing here is that inside the ancient hut… That’s odd enough, but things actually get weirder once kiddo arrives home…. And now, the mother and father have forgotten never had a baby… Much less noticed that that baby is missing.
And why is the old babysitter his crushes piano teacher???
But it’s not just the teacher, all of the parents have gone insane… Even the crush has turned into an Alice demonic… Until our boy shakes the evil out of her and brings her back to reality.
Oh crap. Do you know what’s worse the bullies? Possessed bullies. Now we’ve stumbled into it territory.
They want to burn down the shack… Which seems to me to be a good idea… But it also may be kiddos only way of getting his sister back. Also, they’re bullies, so he’s reluctant to exceed to their demands. Inside, there’s photos of all of them, and a Maps… And a watcher in the woods keeping track of them all.
Turns out, the wanderer in the woods is much like a hero… He lost something… A child perhaps, but he couldn’t quite remember it. That’s how he knew Eve had to come to the city. He’s kind of playing the role of doomsayer for us here, that and folklorist.
Even as he’s being murdered by a shadow, they make their way back to the hut to embark on an arcane journey. Our hero runs into the furnace, parts of the wires or vines, and then find himself sucked into a whole different world… Girlfriend and bully her right behind him, even as they are pursued by whatever evil stalks them.
It’s one of those mirror universe deals… Where everything is lit different, and nothing feels quite right… because right about now, this film is prepared to completely mess with your sense of reality, lunging us towards an ending that feels very green light… Very light the silent hill film.
It gets weird from here on out. I mean weird same time, marvelous. This isn’t just a good film, this is a shockingly good film. This thing was not a blockbuster theatrical release just saddens me to my core. If you still see this on the shelves at Dollar Tree… Grab it immediately. It is great innovative unbalanced horror that makes you think, makes you care, and makes you scared. It’s brilliant stuff, and gets my highest recommendation.
Argo City Comics 