Experiments on ^4He films reveal an attractive Casimir-like force at the bulk λ-point, and in the superfluid regime. Previous work has explained the magnitude of this force at the λ transition and deep in the superfluid region but not the substantial attractive force immediately below the λ-point. Utilizing a simple mean-field calculation renormalized by critical fluctuations we obtain an effective Casimir force that is qualitatively consistent with the scaling function ϑ obtained by collapse of experimental data.