Director: John Carpenter
Starring: James Woods, Daniel Baldwin, Thomas Ian Griffith, Sheryl Lee
Tagline: "From the master of terror comes a new breed of evil."
Random Trivia: Dolph Lundgren was attached to the film at one point. Frank Darabount makes a cameo. I actually saw this during its theatrical run, and it was damn fun.
John Carpenter - the guy made it long ago, so I'm not sure if this can properly be called a B-movie. James Woods is a pretty big star to boot, although anyone in their teens/early 20s probably knows him best from Family Guy.
That said, the movie has a Baldwin, a kickin' country rock soundtrack, and vampires in the desert. It also has an awesome performance by Thomas Ian Griffith, who has been criminally underused in recent years.
The casting of Woods is puzzling - I don't really think of him as an action guy - but he does add a little something.
The opening raid is fucking brutally awesome. Jack Crow (Woods), with a name that would rock more than any other til Jack Sparrow came along, leads his crew of vampire hunters to an abandoned farmhouse in one dusty looking burg. Inside the house they spear vamps, pulling them out under the angry red sun of New Mexico with a truck winch, under the watchful eye of second in command Anthony Montoya (Daniel Baldwin). Vamps burst into flames as the team's padre performs the last rites.
Awesome. Fucking. Sequence.
You want back story? You don't fucking need it! If you really want to know, Crowe's team is funded by the Vatican. They know vampires are real, and they know they need someone - even as foul as Jack Crow - the do the dirty work, hunting them to the ends of the earth.
You could make an entertaining movie out of just following the crew slaughtering vampires, but of course, there needs to be some drama, so at a whore-filled after party (the best kind!), Jack's team is ambushed by vampire master Valek (Griffith). Only Jack and Montoya survive, leaving Jack looking for revenge. Valek, meanwhile, is looking for an ancient relic which will complete his transformation into the ultimate killing machine - a vampire able to withstand the power of the sun.
Simple. To the point. Fun to watch mashed.
Sheryl Lee adds the female interest for Montoya which is doomed to fail, as a recently bitten whore soon to turn vamp herself.
With their crew dead, and a green padre at their side, Crow and Montoya move to hunt down Valek - "the first and most powerful" vampire, according to the Vatican.
My only gripe is that the movie never really tops the coolness of the opening raid, and Woods fails to ever shake his own persona - it's James Woods, killing vampires. But at the same time, it's James Woods, killing vampires. Depending on your mood, this is a pass, or the coolest fucking vampire movie around.
Someone actually needs to update the vampire western sub-genre sometime soon, but until then - go back and check this out.
I may actually up my review pace right now, as there's a shitload of B-movies to come!
Overall Rating: Half-Baked (3 out of 5)
No comments:
Post a Comment