The Blood Countess review – Isabelle Huppert reigns supreme in a surreal vampire fantasia

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Vienna turns into a playground of camp, cruelty and aristocratic disdain in a blackly comic take on the Báthory legend – with Huppert gloriously suited to the title role From the dark heart of central Europe comes a midnight-movie romp through the moonlit urban glades of Euro-goth and camp from German director Ulrike Ottinger. As for the star … well, it’s the part she was born to play. Isabelle Huppert is Countess Elizabeth Báthory, 16th-century Hungarian noblewoman and serial killer, legendary for having the blood of hundreds of young girls on her hands and indeed her body, in an attempt to attain eternal youth. The “blood countess” has been variously played in the past by Ingrid Pitt, Delphine Seyrig, Paloma Picasso, Julie Delpy and many more, but surely none were as qualified as Huppert who importantly does not modify her habitual hauteur one iota for the role. Her natural aristocratic mien and cool hint of elegant contempt were never so well matched with a part. She gives us the ...
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Film: Wendy Ide’s 10 best of 2023

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From a struggling mother to a monstrous maestro, the year was notable for superb performances by veterans and newcomers

1. Tár
Released in the UK in January
It’s been a banner year for fans of films about mercurial conductors/composers, with Maestro, Bradley Cooper’s mosaic portrait of Leonard Bernstein, a 2023 highlight. But Todd Field’s creation of the magnificent, monstrous fictional conductor Lydia Tár, inhabited down to the last shred of cruelty and ambition by the remarkable Cate Blanchett, is exceptional: a savage, slippery account of rampant narcissism brought down to earth.

2. How to Have Sex
November
A wealth of outstanding British first features has included Rye Lane (directed by Raine Allen-Miller), Scrapper (Charlotte Regan) and Earth Mama (Savanah Leaf) – and there are more to come in 2024. But Molly Manning Walker’s phenomenal How to Have Sex is the standout, for its visual flair, superb performances and for the crucial conversations about consent that it has prompted.

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