Critics reviews

An eerie and atmospheric fairytale horror... Loosely based upon an old Nordic folk tale, The White Reindeer mines ancient Finnish lore and Sámi shamanism, imbuing the film with a rich folk element.

If there is a certain naïveté to The White Reindeer, that is an intrinsic part of its style, evocative precisely for its plain, archetypal nature. The traces left in the snow by Pirita may be easy to follow but, abstract and enigmatic, they are not, after all, so easy to understand.

Often described as one of Finland's earliest horror films, The White Reindeer isn't really scary but it is haunting. The lonely landscape, wrapped in snow, really makes its presence felt... In night-time scenes all the empty space seems to press in around flickering sources of light. The effect of it is not freeing but bizarrely claustrophobic.

Haunting rather than horrific, Blomberg's folktale-inspired chiller may be set among stunning snow-covered Lapland vistas but Kuosmanen's channelling of the sensuality of Jennifer Jones in Duel in the Sun and the gothic-horror poise of scream queen Barbara Steele keeps the story compelling and bubbling with suppressed passion.