Underworld

Day 286 - 10/13/09 - Movie #285

BEFORE: Another vampire film (almost done...), this one also has werewolves thrown into the mix. Werewolf? THERE wolf... If I like this one, I suppose I'll have to add its two sequels to my want list. Damn...

THE PLOT: Selene, a beautiful vampire warrior, is entrenched in a war between the vampire and werewolf races. Although she is aligned with the vampires, she falls in love with Michael, a werewolf who longs for the war to end.

AFTER: This is like one of those old schoolyard questions, like "Who would win in a fight, Batman or Superman?" Or one I once overheard in the comic shop - "Who would win in a fight, Big Bird or Barney?" It seemed quite ridiculous, but it stuck in my brain, which eventually determined that Big Bird would be the winner - he's got the reach, the beak, and even though he only has the use of one arm (think about it...) he was raised on the "Street". Barney's a big wuss.
In this case, it's a gang war between the immortals, vampires vs. werewolves.

The main problem I had with this movie was the acting, which was most horrific. Outside of Kate Beckinsale and Bill Nighy, no one seemed capable of delivering a believable line of dialogue, due to a combination of over-emoting and funny accents. I've seen porn actors with better acting skills - not many, but a few.

Another problem is a lack of exposition - characters interrupt each other just as they're about to say something that could give the audience some relevant info about the situation. "This human is important." - but WHY? "This will break the covenant..." WHAT covenant? Please, explain! Is that too much to ask? The ruling stands - if I have to go to the internet to discover what the plot was of the movie I JUST WATCHED, then it failed to deliver, and it can't score on the upper part of my scale.

That said, the dusty cobwebbed classic horror monsters were in need of an update - these are not your father's vampires + werewolves. They use guns (ones that shoot dozens of bullets and almost never seem to need reloading) and modern blood-work and genetic science, along with some cool CSI-style graphics illustrating the physical changes of lycanthropy.

But, if you're trying to unite the two species, wouldn't the old-fashioned way work better? They all have human(ish) bodies, right? Speaking of which, there are obvious references to "Romeo & Juliet" here, but those 2 Shakespeare characters were firmly ingrained in two feuding families - the conflict here might have been greater if the werewolf who was crushing on a female vampire had been a werewolf for more than 10 minutes. They try to cheat by saying that a new werewolf gets all the memories of the one who bit him, but I don't remember that as a solid part of werewolf lore...

No crosses, no stakes, no holy water, no garlic, no wolfsbane here - just a lot of silver bullets.

And the ruling is - I'll watch the sequels next October if it's convenient for me, but I don't think I'll be going out of my way to track them down.

RATING: 5 out of 10 syringes

SPOOK-O-METER: 3 out of 10 (a few action-oriented killings, and creepy werewolf attacks)