Rating of
3.5/4
Great action movie with less blood than expected
The M.O.W. - wrote on 08/02/08
"Blade" (Wesley Snipes), the part-vampire determined to rid this world of the threat of the blood-suckers, is back. This time, he must deal with not only vampires, but "Familiars," humans promised immortality by a vampire in exchange for a service of some kind, and "Drake" (Dominic Purcell), whom the world knows as the allegedly fictional character "Dracula".
However, this time, he has backup that includes former vampire "Hannibal King" (Ryan Reynolds) and "Abigail Whistler" (Jessica Beil), the daughter of "Blade's" mentor and vampire hunting partner "Whistler" (Kris Kristofferson). They are joined by "Abigail" and "King's" sleeper cell of a team of vampire hunters calling itself "The Nightstalkers."
The first thing that stands out of this film are the fight scenes. They are fast and nicely choreographed. They are also nicely shot with many quick edits to keep up with the movement.
This movie also uses shadows quite a lot, especially when "Drake" appears in his true form. The shadowing is mostly used when the villains are in their headquarters, or when "Drake" is in his true form.
One problem with this movie is that the "Blade" universe isn't as well known to non-comic book fans, much like "Daredevil" was. Some knowledge may be needed to understand some of the background on characters which appear in the comic book to make them appear more developed. However, knowledge on the comic book isn't really needed to enjoy this movie since much of the story background is described by characters and "King" talks in voice-over at the start of the film to set up the movie.
The performances are nice, however many of the minor characters are poorly written. In my opinion, Snipes, Reynolds and Beil have good chemistry on-screen. Each make their characters interesting. Snipes also has made it quite hard to picture anybody else in the role, which is probably one of the reasons "Blade: The Series" did not last long.
Of course, due to the subject, there is blood in this movie. The blood is kept to a minimum since we see at least one vampire attack on a human. Most of the violence is during the fight scenes.
There are a lot of special effects in this film. One of the best ones are when the vampires are destroyed, they turn into burning ashes. The only special effects that are wasted are the makeup effects for "Drake's" true form due to the use of shadow in those scenes. One that doesn't work is when the vampires and "Blade" jump around at great distances. You can tell when they are replaced by CGI characters or have a harness on them, and are being lifted and moved by wires.
Some of the makeup of the vampires are not that great. Many look heavily powdered with obvious contact lens in their eyes. The makeup is intended to make them look pale, but it just doesn't work in my opinion.
This movie is worth looking at just for the fight scenes and the performances of the three main performers (Beil, Reynolds and especially Snipes). The problems with this film are pretty minor. In my opinion, this could be a very good addition to your DVD library and a good first choice the next time you go to your local rental shop.
