Vampires. Samurai. Ninjas. Do I have your attention? How about vampire samurai vs. vampire ninjas? And I'm not asking about your creepy Japanese schoolgirl in a sailor costume thing, but what if one of those vampire samurai was a Japanese schoolgirl in a sailor costume? That's right - BLOOD: THE LAST VAMPIRE is a movie about a vampiric samurai schoolgirl. She fights other vampires, some of whom happen to be ninjas. She has one of those awesome mountain senseis with a wispy white beard. Oh, and you just know there's a magic sword and the fate of mankind hangs in the balance and so on.
Ah, but here's the thing: I've just seen two legitimately great films: MUNYURANGABO and BALLAST. How can I possibly evaluate a genre picture like BTLV after that? It comes down to this: how lustily is the genre picture a genre picture? Does it embrace its premise? If we accept that a vampire hunter movie isn't trying to compete with the aforementioned films, then all we have to do is discern whether it's a good vampire hunter movie.
My answer is yes, BTLV is as good a vampire hunter movie as one could want. Gianna Jun (a Korean, but that's not important right now) isn't much of a martial artist, but she's shot, edited, and CGIed well enough to keep the suspension of disbelief rolling along. The movie does a decent job of recreating late-60s Tokyo, the monster effects look good, the action sequences pop, and the climax is exceptionally well handled. So some of the performances, especially the American ones, are a bit creaky - that's par for the course.
Put simply, BTLV delivers on its premise and delivers an hour and a half of good, vampire-hunting fun. What more could you ask for in a movie about a vampiric samurai schoolgirl?
No comments:
Post a Comment