Good morning everyone.
As I said yesterday, I went to see the opening of the movie ” 30 Days of Night ” yesterday along with my daughter and her boyfriend.
When we came out of the theater, my daughter proceeded to tell me that I was a ” Bad Man “, and that she would take me to ” The Worst Movie that she could think of taking me to “, as ” a matter of fact, the movie doesn’t even exist yet, but when it does, I’m taking you dad. ” quote, unquote, period. That being said, you might gather that my daughter does not appreciate a good horror flick, and I can tell you, that is what I saw last night.
30 days of Night is based on the graphic novel, and comic book series from IDW publishing, the company responsible for one of my favorite titles ” Fallen Angel “, and stars Josh Hartnett in the role of Eben Olson, the sheriff of a small town called ” Barrow ” ( I keep thinking for some reason that the name Barrow is also associated with the novel and movie ” Salem’s Lot ) in the northern most area of Alaska, where for thirty days every winter the town experiences “30 days of night “.
Hartnett is joined by Melissa George in the role of Olson’s estranged wife Stella, who gets stranded in the town after missing a connecting flight back to Anchorage and Danny Huston who plays the leader of the Vampires, Marlow, who by the way is not named in the movie.
I have not read any of the 30 Days of Night series, so I am just looking at this movie for what it is, which is just plain terror on a pretty large scale.
The opening of the movie sets up the main characters of Hartnett and George as the estranged husband and wife, and gives you an idea of what it might be like to live in an isolated town like Barrow, dependent on backup generators and the like in cases of severe weather conditions.
And on the outskirts of town, a stranger watches as a ship approaches Barrow thru a frozen sea. A ship that unbeknowst to all in Barrow harbors a terror just waiting for the sun to set…
and as the sun sets, real terror invades Barrow in the form of Vampires.
But these are not your average, everyday, pretty looking Vampires, no….
These are distorted, nightmarish visions of the vampire. Brutal, Vicious, and Thirsty for Blood.
Make no mistake, there is no romanticizing these vampires as they feed, there is a brutality to their feeding, and there is lots of blood on the screen, and no I don’t think that it’s too gratuitous.
The blood and gore all belong, and add an air of desperation, as the towns people are brutalized by these vampiric horrors, and their population dwindles down to just a handful of people trying to survive the thirty days.
I will just tell you two of my favorite scenes ( there are actually three, but I won’t spoil the movie by giving away one of the scenes ) of this movie…
a) If you’ve seen the movie trailers,then you know the part where a lone woman is walking thru the town, crying in terror, being used by the Vampires as bait, and she crouches down and cries in front of the main Vampire Marlow, and cries ” Oh God “, and he replies
” No God “, well in the movie, there is a bit more to the scene…as the woman cries ” Oh God “, Marlow looks up to the sky, as if searching for a sign or maybe just a vision of God, and looks back at her and finally replies ” No God “, and then this woman is viciously attacked by the Vampires
b) Hartnett’s character Eben uses himself as bait to give the group a little time to move somewhere, lures the Vampires to his home, and uses a Sunlamp to burn one of the Vampires, a plan the group of survivors was not sure would work. It was just great to see Hartnett’s sheriff, actually be able to fight off the Vampires, and the one he burned was a female and I think a companion the the Vampire leader Marlow, which made burning her face, and Marlow’s having to show her mercy by killing her, all the more poetic.
Let me just end my review by saying that Hartnett turns in one of his best performances ever, and makes his character believable, and in the end desperate to do what he ” needs to do ” to save the group of survivors that are left of his town, and that the movie works all levels. The setting, the terror factor, and that these are not your ordinary Vampires.
30 Days of Night puts the terror back into the Vampire genre with a vengeance, and is certainly worth the price of admission!
And in case you want it bit more of 30 Days of Night,just click here to go to the official movie site.
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