Reviews & Ratings for
Krabat: The Sorcerer's Apprentice More at IMDbPro »Carodejuv ucen (original title)

22 out of 22 people found the following review useful:
An orphan becomes a sorceror's apprentice in this masterpiece, 15 February 2003

Author: lisam9 from North Hollywood

KRABAT is one of the great undiscovered classics of world animation. Told in a stunning style that resembles classic woodcuts (but moving!), the story centers on a young man who is forced into apprenticeship to an unspeakably evil sorceror. Not only is the film absolutely stunning visually, but it's also by turns genuinely frightening, wonderfully melancholy and finally redemptive. As talented a filmmaker as Karel Zeman was, this film stands apart from his other work. When will this gem be made available to western viewers?!

16 out of 16 people found the following review useful:
Great work of animation, 28 July 2003

Author: favreauna

I saw this movie two years ago at a Zeman retrospective in Montreal and I was amazed. Not only was the story excellent, but who could have imagined that such an old movie from Czechoslovakia could be so well animated ? This is not Pixar, but there is a true master of animation at work here. I saw a couple of other movies from Zeman, but this was the best. Cross your fingers and hope your local art house shows this movie someday.

15 out of 15 people found the following review useful:
still feeling creeps all over me...., 18 June 2008

Author: marpac from Ireland

Unbelievable story, excellent animation, treasure of cinematography.. What more to say?

I am actually happy I didn't have a chance to see this movie when I was a kid, because I would not be able to sleep for very very long time.. Sooo scary and dark, so much of fear, and I don't remember when last time I felt so helpless while watching a movie..

it is not another naive fairy-tale where the Good beats the Bad somehow automatically and you are just witnessing that with smile on your face 'couse you expected that.. Easily beats most of late horror movies just by atmosphere, no special tricks needed.. recommend to everyone, you wont be disappointed.. amazing, 10 of 10, no questions asked..

11 out of 11 people found the following review useful:
Truly an animation masterpiece, 18 September 2006

Author: Arno Luyendijk (sendanor) from Netherlands

I saw this movie on a children's program on Dutch TV when I was on basic school, I cannot remember if it was before or after 1980. What I do remember is the impact it made on me : an atmosphere that could be called "Gothic" in the Romantic sense of the word, I still cannot believe this was broadcast on TV for youths when I especially recall the hand-shaking ceremony of the master wizard, by this magically taking the new apprentice of the mill as his magical disciple. I did not know much about the Satan's pact of the popular witchcraft stories, but GOSH, that moment was creepy to the bone!!!! The exclamation of the master wizard when the young apprentice is taken into the magical brotherhood of the other young disciples "Now the mill grinds again!!" is forever engraved in my mind!! If anyone knows where this masterpiece is distributed, send me word...

7 out of 8 people found the following review useful:
English Title-Krabat-The Sorcerer's Apprentice, 28 November 2006

Author: chlitton from Canada

I saw this movie twice in my youth. It played (both times) on Canada's French CBC channel-Radio Canada in the early 1980's. The film was shown on the (now defunct) Saturday matinée series Ciné-Famille . The film itself had been dubbed in French. To this day I can remember the film as being hauntingly beautiful, captivating, mesmerizing. Everything from the transfiguration of the Miller's disciples into Ravens, to the Master Disciple(s) having to build their own coffins before their final confrontation with the Miller. This film is a masterpiece thru and thru. Sure wish I could find a French or English copy of it. I saw it today on E-Bay, but it was the German version, no subtitles ($30 + US after shipping). I should still put a bid on it. Even a version in a foreign (to me) language is worth getting.

5 out of 5 people found the following review useful:
My first glimpse at animation from Czechoslovakia, 20 June 2009

Author: Julia Arsenault (ja_kitty_71) from Canada

At first, when I watch this film online (subtitled), I had confuse the title for the poem version by German poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe that inspired French composer Paul Dukas for his famous musical piece with the same title. But really, the film is based on a book called The Satanic Mill by a Otfried Preußler and the Sorbian folk tale upon which the book is based. I thought the cutout animation is really good, it's like the illustrations of some ancient book come to life. Why, The National Film Board of Canada used that technique for their 1991 animated short, inspired by the legends of the Native Americans of the Pacific Northwest - Lord of the Sky.

Well anyway, the film is about Krabat, a beggar boy in early 18th century Lusatia, is lured to become an apprentice to an evil, one-eyed sorcerer. Together with a number of other boys, he works at the sorcerer's mill under slave-like conditions while learning black magic, such as guising himself as a raven and other animals. Every Christmas one of the boys has to face the master in a magical duel of life and death, where the boy never stands a chance because the master is the only person who is allowed to use his secret grimoire: The Koraktor, or the Force of Hell.

One Easter while performing an annual ritual near a small village, Krabat meets a girl (whom he dubbed the "Kantorka" or "The girl who sings") and falls in love, but has to keep the romance secret in order to protect her. After witnessing his friends one after one being helplessly slaughtered by the master every Christmas, Krabat starts to sneak up at night to study the forbidden book. On the last page of the book, Krabat finds a phrase saying: "Love is stronger than any spell."

That's all I could tell you folks, you will have to see the film for yourself how it ends, and overall; I enjoy this dark-fantasy film. And one thing I should tell, is that watching this film is my first glimpse at animation from Czechoslovakia.

2 out of 2 people found the following review useful:
I hope there are more animated tales like that, 5 June 2010

Author: alexfromhorn from Germany

At first I was incredibly skeptical about this, but it turned out to be something really special.

I read the the book at school - quite a lot of years ago. And as I remembered it, it was quite good. But what almost made me not watch it was the style of animation. It reminded me of South Park but just more old school and stiffer in the way it's animated. I thought this is not going do be interesting but it was the opposite. Especially the style of animation made its atmosphere and deepness. It creeped me out some times.

The story is good. But what makes it is the way it's told. You see the main character become a grown-up in some ways and it's darkness and violent moments. One of the main feelings is despair in this movie.

Its really hard to explain but this is really something unique as far as I know. The combination of animation, the story, the character development and music is just unique.

Everybody should see this.

A Tale of Orphans, Black Magic and the Power of Love, 20 April 2010

Author: Eumenides_0 from Portugal

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

I must have watched Karel Zeman's The Fabulous Baron Munchausen a year ago. I loved this movie for its sense of wonder and use of colors together with silhouettes. But I didn't get to watch another Zeman movie until now.

Krabat reinforces my belief that Karel Zeman is one of cinema's lost visionaries. In the two movies I saw he showed a mind capable of inventing situations full excitement, humor and magic. His world belonged to the old fairy tales, early science fiction writers like Cyrano de Bergerac (a character in Munchausen), Jules Verne and writers of tall-tales like the Baron himself. I think it's this love for the past that makes his word so timeless; like a bedtime fairytale that one never tires of hearing.

In Krabat we meet an orphan boy traveling by his own, enjoying his freedom and opportunity to find adventures. But with the coming of Winter he needs shelter. One night, sleeping in a barn he's summoned by a raven to a mill. There he meets a man who offers him a job as apprentice there. Of course this man is actually a sorcerer who also wants to teach his black magic. Krabat soon discovers he's just one of the many boys at the mill.

Many times Krabat tries to run away, but the sorcerer always foils his plans. Furthermore, Krabat is anxious that the day will come when the sorcerer will challenge him to a duel. Every winter a boy fights the sorcerer, and Krabat is weary of seeing his friends die. Plus he has discovered love in a peasant girl in a nearby village.

This is a clear and simple good vs. evil story, fueled by the power of love. Imagination and suspense carry on the narrative. One is always on edge when the sorcerer and another boy fight, or when Krabat breaks into his chamber to read from his magic book. And we're always waiting for the sorcerer's new transformation: he appears under many guises - snake, crow, wild boar, cat - and is nearly omnipresent.

as well as the style of animation. How to explain it? It looks like woodcuts, it doesn't have the fluidity of hand-drawn animation. And yet this strangeness makes it alluring, different from anything else we know today of animation.

Although I love Pixar, I regret that its style has come to dominate the public's conception of animation, much like Disney did before Pixar. It's when watching a movie like Krabat that one remembers what a rich world animation is, how many styles it can have and it's virtually limitless. Krabat is not just a good animated movie, but it also serves to show that animation can follow other ways.

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