An oddity this film, feels like it was made in the 1870's and not the 1970's and a really strange viewing experience. Suitable though, as the story of
the film probably takes place in the 19th century.... or the 18th .... or the 20th. Well, in a timeless Balkan rural village anyway.

Made for Jugoslavian television in 1973 and only shown twice, in 1973 and once in the 1980's (says Internet info) and never released on DVD or
Blu-ray before, until now. The film is based on a novel and on ancient Balkan folklore about the vampire-werewolf creature The Vulkodlak and is
supposedly the first Serbian horror movie. Is it good then ? Maybe not, the film is grainy and .... eeh, strange for being a "vampire" movie, BUT
what the film has to it is an intense rural atmosphere, a beautiful vampiress and an inspired ending. A fairy tale from the Serbian countryside

Mirjana Nikolic as Radojka and Petar Bozovic as Strahinja

In the village of Zaroshje the villagers have a problem, their millars are killed off by a vampire and who will then grind their wheat ?
Who's stupid enough to be the new millar when 4 millars have been killed in a year? The answer to that is young Strahinja, who wants to marry
the beautiful daughter of Zivan, blonde sheperdess Radojka. Zivan is a rich farmer (well, he's the only one in the poor village who owns a horse
anyway, and he won't give his daughter away to some slacker without a job, so the new millar Strahinja becomes.

The Vampire Werewolf

The villagers blames the killings on the mythical Sava Savanovic, a vampire who ravaged the area some century ago and they search for his
grave to dig him up and stick a pole through his heart. But the vampire killer is someone else which can be seen in the pic above.

The film is very grainy at the beginning but luckily gets better after a while and you ask yourself if it has been restored or not.
It's a primitive horror and it feels a bit clunky, but Leptirica for sure has a rural fairytale feeling to it and the unusual depiction of the vampire-
werewolf creature at the end was surreal, and the make-up of the pole wound in the belly looked great too.

The Blu-ray disc is presented in a 4:3 fullscreen 1.33:1 ratio and in the extras has a widescreen version also. The audio is serbo-croatian with
english subtitles DTS-HD MA 1.0 mono. Extras: a widescreen version, an audio commentary in german without english subtitles by a Lars
Dreyer-Winkelmann, a trailer and a bilder galerie. 65 minutes and region B
The DVD version plays for 63 minutes, region 2, and has a DD 1.0 mono audio with english subtitles