A disappointment at the local box office and after seeing it I’m not surprised. It’s not a bad movie, not by a long shot, but it doesn’t quite work. I was watching it trying to figure out why. It looks amazing, being beautifully shot with wonderful production design, the basic idea is clever, there’s some funny satire, an excellent cast – but it just doesn’t come alive (if one pardons the pun). Good vampire films have a tremendous emotional pull but it’s lacking here, even though it deals with the survival of the human race. This is a personal opinion of course, others might love it, but it’s how I felt.
Maybe the main problem was Ethan Hawke’s lead character – who really cares about an uncle Tom vampire scientist who is sympathetic to humans? I found Isobel Lucas’ character far more interesting – a human who refused to turn despite entreaties from her father (Sam Neill), even if it meant her death. But there’s too little of her. Claudia Karvan’s character might have been interesting too if she’d been given something to play but she isn’t – her relationship with Hawke is fatally under-developed. Come to think of it, the existence of Willem Defoe’s former vampire character negates a lot of the reason for Hawke’s character to exist. It’s as though the film should have been about Isabel Lucas, falling for Willem Defoe, with Ethan Hawke as a macguffin. Also, vampirism is cured awfully easily here. Wouldn’t someone have figured out this method by now?
Hawke's performance is dull, as his acting tends to be; the Aussies are better (especially Michael Dorman as a vampire soldier), and Defoe is good. It looks wonderful.
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