They're Coming!
Because of the earth's tilt, the small town of Barrow, Alaska occasionally experiences thirty days without seeing the sun. I will not make a joke about how Sarah Palin is always in the dark. Oh, I just did? Oops. A group of vampires come to town to take advantage of this quirk of the earth and embrace their inner gluttons! And as you know, when you're dealing with a live dinner, sometimes the meat is hard to catch. Well, these shivering townspeeps certainly don't make it easy on the razor-toothed interlopers.
I shrugged this movie off when it was first released because...well, I'm not really sure why. But, I finally decided to check out this movie because I had two free rentals that I wanted to take advantage of and this was a movie I always said I'd watch if I could watch it for free. I'm glad I did!
For me, this movie was less like Dracula or Salem's Lot and more like 28 Days Later or 2004's Dawn of the Dead. The focus wasn't so much on the vampires but the small town Alaskan folk who have been unwillingly invited to an all you can suck blood buffet. The main characters, sheriff Eben Oleson (awesome name) and his estranged wife Stella wrangle up the last few survivors and move from shelter to shelter while waiting out the month. Eban and Stella are the most fleshed out characters. The others are pretty forgettable and there to add to the body count. The vampires are an even bigger mystery. These guys seem to have a "wolf pack" mentality, with a pretty intense looking leader who commands the rest of the bunch. And this isn't your friendly neighborhood Twilighters, either. These guys are animalistic, vicious and ugly. In fact, some of the characters looked as if their faces had been tweaked by CGI or prosthetics. Or maybe they just found unique looking actors but there wasn't something not quite right about them, sending off a suitably creepy vibe. As with any apocalyptic monster movie, the vampires are mostly background noise to the shenanigans the humans find themselves in. Oh, and lets not forget the character(s) who get(s) bitten and doesn't tell anyone until they eventually turn, put the rest of the group in danger, and then has to be shot by the hero who has a good cry over having to snub his best friend/brother/favorite uncle that lasts for approximately a second and a half until everyone moves on to the final showdown!
Acting was good. Cinematography was gorgeous. Gore was great. There's one decapitation scene that is so graphic in its realism that I had to rewind it several times with my mouth agape in awe. That was worth a rental alone. The last block did pull me out of the film just a bit. The direction went from horror to almost a comic book feel with the decision of the main character. I suppose it sort of made sense and maybe it was pulled off better in the graphic novel but it just didn't sit right with me in the movie. Fortunately, the final frames made up for it with some bittersweet gruesomeness. I honestly can't remember the last vampire film I've scene (not counting New Moon) so this was a nice reintroduction to the vamp genre.
4 out of 5.
Acting was good. Cinematography was gorgeous. Gore was great. There's one decapitation scene that is so graphic in its realism that I had to rewind it several times with my mouth agape in awe. That was worth a rental alone. The last block did pull me out of the film just a bit. The direction went from horror to almost a comic book feel with the decision of the main character. I suppose it sort of made sense and maybe it was pulled off better in the graphic novel but it just didn't sit right with me in the movie. Fortunately, the final frames made up for it with some bittersweet gruesomeness. I honestly can't remember the last vampire film I've scene (not counting New Moon) so this was a nice reintroduction to the vamp genre.
4 out of 5.
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