El Conde (2023)
September 20, 2023 10:13 PM - Subscribe
Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet is actually a vampire who, after faking his own death, decides that he is ready to die.
Unfortunately for him, those around him aren't ready until they get what they want from him.
His human adult children want their inheritance and his human wife wants to be a vampire. With his vampire butler by his side, the 250 year old Count attempts to deal with all of this when a young accountant arrives to help the family figure out the estate.
His human adult children want their inheritance and his human wife wants to be a vampire. With his vampire butler by his side, the 250 year old Count attempts to deal with all of this when a young accountant arrives to help the family figure out the estate.
I'm waiting until Bake Show comes back to re-up but this is the thing I've been most excited for from Netflix in a long while.
posted by thecaddy at 7:14 AM on September 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by thecaddy at 7:14 AM on September 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
I think my favorite part was the Count using the walker, particularly in the scene where he slooooowly makes his way to his conquest's room and then dramatically throws the walker to the side promptly falling on his ass.
posted by miss-lapin at 10:33 AM on September 21, 2023
posted by miss-lapin at 10:33 AM on September 21, 2023
(Chilean here, relatives were tortured by the dictatorship, but I like Larraín's work and the co-screenwriter is a childhood friend, so I am a land of contrasts.)
We watched it the day it came out. We were fairly meh on it. It seems to over-aestheticize Pinochet, and making him and Thatcher vampires adds a certain glamour to their inhumanity. In Krasnoff's case it's worse because he's stil alive and Kast, who almost won the last presidential election, is buddies with him.
I didn't really get the nun-vampire hunter character, she overacts a lot during the interviews with the children, and the beautiful sequence of her floating in the air then coming back to kiss Pinochet seems like it's from another movie and does not really work within this narrative. I also did not understand the climax, why does she fail to kill Pinochet? Why is she so easily captured by Krasnoff?
I don't think it accomplishes what it set out to do, and in the end is just sort of an extended joke that wears out its welcome after the first half hour.
posted by signal at 5:12 PM on September 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
We watched it the day it came out. We were fairly meh on it. It seems to over-aestheticize Pinochet, and making him and Thatcher vampires adds a certain glamour to their inhumanity. In Krasnoff's case it's worse because he's stil alive and Kast, who almost won the last presidential election, is buddies with him.
I didn't really get the nun-vampire hunter character, she overacts a lot during the interviews with the children, and the beautiful sequence of her floating in the air then coming back to kiss Pinochet seems like it's from another movie and does not really work within this narrative. I also did not understand the climax, why does she fail to kill Pinochet? Why is she so easily captured by Krasnoff?
I don't think it accomplishes what it set out to do, and in the end is just sort of an extended joke that wears out its welcome after the first half hour.
posted by signal at 5:12 PM on September 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
In terms of the nun-vampire slayer, I thought her presence was not just about the failure of catholicism to actually do anything to stop these atrocities but how susceptible the Church is to corruption. Larrain's film the Club also focuses on that as well.
But the film is also full of tropes from all kinds of sources including a super old one "The butler did it."
posted by miss-lapin at 12:20 AM on September 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
But the film is also full of tropes from all kinds of sources including a super old one "The butler did it."
posted by miss-lapin at 12:20 AM on September 22, 2023 [1 favorite]
Finally watched this last week and was astounded by how angry this was. Far from finding the vampires to be glamorous, I felt the disdain dripping off every frame: these bloodsuckers, these demons, these fascists, they are out here dressing in the disguises of our leaders and literally sucking us dry. They steal and they kill and they vaguely convince themselves that they are acting with a purpose but we see that they are lying; they have no principles beyond selfishness and greed and survival. The nun is corrupted, sure, but at least she has the ability to delight in the powers that vampirism gives her: that her flight, awkward and gangly and joyful, seems to be from a different movie just shows how anhedonic the rest of the vampires and family are.
The children are useless, but it doesn’t matter because these movements and cretins are reborn with every generation. It’s not passed on from parent to child (though, yes, of course Thatcher is the literal mother of Pinochet’s dictatorship), but from eating the hearts of the next generation and letting the hate continue on.
I mean, Jesus, this was bleak. I loved it.
posted by thecaddy at 7:38 PM on October 9, 2023 [2 favorites]
The children are useless, but it doesn’t matter because these movements and cretins are reborn with every generation. It’s not passed on from parent to child (though, yes, of course Thatcher is the literal mother of Pinochet’s dictatorship), but from eating the hearts of the next generation and letting the hate continue on.
I mean, Jesus, this was bleak. I loved it.
posted by thecaddy at 7:38 PM on October 9, 2023 [2 favorites]
I liked this. I'm sure I don't know enough about Chile to appreciate (or not appreciate) it fully. I'm glad it didn't get super into the vampires fighting each other, though also, after tooling up, the kids are still totally worthless.
The Thatcher entrance/reveal is great.
posted by fleacircus at 12:23 AM on March 29
The Thatcher entrance/reveal is great.
posted by fleacircus at 12:23 AM on March 29
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posted by atrazine at 2:56 AM on September 21, 2023 [3 favorites]