Talk us through itBy 2019 Vampires have become the most dominant life form on the planet, they asked the remaining humans to assimilate, the humans decided this wasn't going to happen, so the blood suckers decided to farm the last remnant of humanity for their blood. This would be all good except the supply of humans is running out and with it the literal life blood of vampire society. Edward is a vampire who is employed by a major supplier of human blood to find a synthetic replacement for the organic stuff. Like most vamps who share the same name Edward doesn't drink human blood, he makes do with pig's blood, and he is all about the preservation of the human species. His employer, the thoroughly evil Charles Bromley is happy to go along with this to a point. Enter the last human resistance fighters in the form of Audrey and Elvis, who want Edward to research a cure they have found for vampirism. Elvis is a former vampire who as luck would have it stumbled on a reversal process to blood sucking. Can Edward formulate the cure in time to avoid the extinction of the human race?
Review"Living in a world where vampires are the dominant species is about as safe as bare backing a 5 dollar whore." - ElvisI've been sweating on the release of the Spierig Bro's follow up to the zombie flick Undead since I saw the first very stylish trailer, we're almost talking noir there. Daybreakers promised a return to the sort of vampire flick we haven't seen since 30 Days of Night (2007) and the resurgence of the blood sucker as one evil bastard rather than a gutted sparkling emo that Blade would clean up in about 10 seconds. Was I one ramped fanboy? - betcha arse I was, so how did the Bros do? To be honest the Bros lined up the goal posts, gave it a punt, and just shaved the uprights. Daybreakers is so close to being a great vampire movie that I was initially disappointed when walking out of my packed screening. While formulating my thoughts for this review I suddenly realized that while not likely to be in anyone's top ten vampire flicks of all time Daybreakers remains a bloody, no pun intended, good film that kept me entertained throughout it's running time and that served up a couple of plot twists that I didn't see coming. I'm going to go grab another screening next Saturday with a couple of the boys who haven't seen it yet. It's not often that I respect a horror movie enough to call it again in the morning. The Spierigs have their blood sucker on and don't feel the need to mess around with the mythology. Vampires in the Daybreakers world have no reflections in mirrors, tend to burst into flames if exposed to daylight, go up in a sort of Blade (1998) fashion when staked, and have a hunger for human blood that would put Dracula to shame. The religious element wasn't introduced as the vampire plague occurred through a single bat bite, in a clear reference to Last Man On Earth (1964), rather than via supernatural means. About the only new element to the whole thing are vampires turning into "subsiders" if deprived of human blood for long enough. A sort of more primitive bat like vampire that will happily feed on whatever comes it's way, human or vampire. And before anyone screams Blade 2 (2002), no totally different head, Subsiders have zero vestiges of their human ancestry. I should also mention in passing that the Spierig Bros answer a couple of questions that have plagued vampire fans since forever. Besides the obvious "what happens when the blood runs out" debate, there's the whole non-reflection of clothes worn by vampires in mirrors. It might just be me but that second issue has always been problematic, do traditional vampires have like a Star Trek force field thing going down that renders their clothes invisible in mirrors as well? Nice touch by the Spierigs showing an eye for the detail that many Directors simply wouldn't have bothered about. From a writing point of view, and this blood delivery moves at a rate of speed that doesn't allow lagging, there's the subtle hint of a political message being delivered. The Spierigs don't overcook that message, a fault in a lot of movies, they allow the audience to either get on the groove train with it or not bother about themes and sub plots. That's total respect for an audience right there, without the Writers feeling the need to talk down to anyone in a didactic fashion. For those surviving 5% of my readers who are still with me at this stage, I took a whole non-renewable resource, exploitation, and victimization of the down trodden vibe from the movie. There's also the whole rape of the natural environment in a sort of ironic twist for humanity kind of a thing. Of course I could be talking total bollocks and the movie might have had nothing to do with political themes. Enjoyment of Daybreakers is not going to be reduced either way. For once a pair of film makers show what they can do with a large budget, $20 million is huge for an Aussie horror flick kids. We get a slickly shot professional looking movie that won me over with the constant use of blue colours themes, the excellent lighting efforts, the stylized camera use, and some of the best jump out of your seat moments that you are ever likely to see. I almost lost my choc top, rocky road flavor for those interested, when one "cat out of the cupboard" shock went down. I should mention the claret goes down fairly readily in Daybreakers. In what I took to be a wink at Day of the Dead there's a scene of absolute carnage toward the end of the movie that while drenching the screen in blood still has a wry grin on its face. Lots of wholesome bites, no trouble getting people eating their food here, severed heads, and blood sprays. It's not overwhelming but be warned the Spierigs aren't making a supernatural romance here. On the blunt side of the fang I got a real feeling someone went buck naked wild in the post editing stage of production. Considering this movie completed shooting in 2007 and was then worked on till the release date in 2010 that's quite likely to have happen. There's no feeling of gritty reality here, and I kept thinking some scenes had been sliced down a tad to make a more acceptable mainstream movie. Maybe we'll get a Director's cut when the DVD comes out; hell yeah I'm buying that sucker, no pun intended, like a wild night out in the Cross. There's a feeling we get from "A" to "B" a tad quick with some of the ideas, and not enough time was spent reinforcing why certain characters decided to take certain courses of action. Don't get me started on the ending, reminds me of JC's Vampires (1998), with both movies looking towards television land. And finally that whole bat motif was starting to piss me off by the end credits, over used came to mind. The Spierigs spent well putting together a solid cast to get Daybreakers happening. Ethan Hawke (Edward Dalton) while not particularly noted as a dark genre actor kicked a couple of goals for mine. Maybe slightly too moody, but once again this could be due to his character being cut a bit during editing. Willem Dafoe (Lionel 'Elvis' Cormac) was a hoot and owned his screen time. Dafoe is grossly underrated for mine. Sam Neill (Charles Bromley) delivered another professional performance and simply keeps getting better as he gets older. Claudia Karvan (Audrey Bennett) was well past solid in a strong female role that Ms Karvan took risks with. If they want to cast the next Ripley look no further. And finally Isabel Lucas (Alison Bromley) got limited screen time, scored when she did, and showed a clean pair of heels to the eye candy stuff she normally gets in the likes of Transformers 2. Hopefully a few people will take some notice, this gal can act, get her agent on the phone. Sorry I was pushing people out of the way as I got on the Spierig groove train and totally failed to take note of the score. Christopher Gordon is listed as composer for anyone interested.
Want a second opinion, additional detailsJason Nahrung found a lot of problems with the movie, check out Jason's valid issues while Kyla Ward was liking what she saw, click through. The official site can be found right about here.
Summary ExecutionIn the wash up Daybreakers is a solid vampire flick that offered me whatever I wanted to take from it. I grooved along throughout the running time, was slightly disappointed after getting hyped by the trailers as the end credits rolled, but allowed the film time to grow on me afterwards. I got full value for money and want to go see it again next week. Vampires should not be defanged; the Spierigs are in there polishing up the blood sucker dental work.Daybreakers isn't setting the box office on fire but it is hitting all those targets we would expect a horror movie to hit. In North America the movie is into the $30 million bracket, about half what the overblown and over priced disaster Australia did in total, and is one of the few local dark genre movies to make a mark over in horror central. Down Under the opening weekend exceeded $1 million, again solid action for a horror flick, though it must be admitted the Distributor is keeping very quiet on the Country of origin. Daybreakers is receiving mixed reviews ranging from absolutely terrible to glowing. This may indicate the movie isn't for everyone hence I'm not going to say it's a must see. If you are a twilight fan, don't like horror flicks, or hate anything with "made in Australia" on it then chances are you won't enjoy Daybreakers. If on the other hand you dig vampire movies, don't mind giving the local product a go (yes I know that's not fashionable currently Down Under), or simple enjoy a good yarn that doesn't take itself seriously then dive on it. Let some sunshine into your life and avoid the underground, Daybreakers doesn't aim to be art, it aims to simply be entertaining. ScaryMinds Rates this movie as ... Good solid vampire flick that delivers what it promises.
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