Black Death (2010)
This was pretty intense. Also brutal and strange.
Sean Bean leads a team of witch hunters into the pagan boondocks. There's a "one does not simply walk into..." joke there somewhere. The conflict is part sword-and-sorcery and part crisis of faith. I wanted to be impressed by how the filmmakers refuse to label heroes and villains, but I'm not sure how well they succeeded. Too many characters exhibit the moustache-twirling cruelty and unlikely turns of phrase one would find in a Chick Tract.
The tone wavers between the vistas of an epic journey, the cast depletion of a slasher flick, the askance camerawork of a creepy town story, and the got-him-too progression of a zombie movie. Each scene deserves credit for serving up some pungent and knotty gristle, even if it doesn't digest fully. MVP goes to the makeup and costume folks for making these actors into the most pikey, marginal dregs one could be proud to have descended from.