Film review: Daybreakers (2009), directed by Michael Spierig and Peter Spierig
Daybreakers is set in a world where humans have become the minority race and vampires rule the roost. Proper vampires, mind! The kind that burn to a cinder in the sunlight instead of sparkling like disco balls. Humans are rare – being caught and harvested for blood in great big farms/laboratories.
One of these farms/labs being owned by my favouritest vampire boss ever, and yes, the only reason I say that is because he’s played by Sam Neill. One of his employees is Ethan Hawke, who is some kind of blood scientist or something like that, working to try and find a blood substitute, and getting more and more disillusioned with vampires.
Then one day, he finds a group of rebels. And even an ex-vampire (Willem Dafoe) … and what do you do when you come up with the ultimate solution to the dwindling stock of human blood? Every ultimate solution has a price.
Nice to see a proper vampire movie for a change. One where vampires catch fire in the sun, have pointy teeth and all that. It’s a bit gruesome and gory – but let’s be honest, vampire flicks should be a bit bloody; vampires suck blood, after all. Blood is inevitable.
I think it’s an interesting concept. Vampires rule the world, humans are near extinction because of it, and they’re after a solution for when the human race dies out. Kinda sounds a little bit like the real world and oil, doesn’t it? The gore aside, I thought it was a really good film. Makes you think. Sam Neill was a great villain (when was he not?) and Ethan Hawke looked just about as broody as he did in Dead Poets Society (which, for reference, is one of my absolute favourite films ever).
Wow, this was a bit of a “bleagh” review … must be because my head is full of how to optimise Google AdWords. Go courses!
4 out of 5 shades.
Really? It’s worth a shot? Ok, i’d kinda gone off vampire movies for a while since watching twilight when i had the flu. I’ll try it for Willem Dafoe
Oh, definitely. It was quite refreshing, especially compared with other recent vampire attempts! While I enjoyed films like The Vampire’s Assistant, it’s not really a proper vampire film. I wouldn’t even class the Twilight Saga as vampire movies, because whatever those things are, they sure ain’t vampires. (Dracula is a vampire. Sparkles and friends are … an abomination?) 30 Days of Night, now THAT’S more like it! Gory as hell and really not to my taste in general, but at least it has credible vampires. Or even Buffy, for that matter! (Which is how I spent most of Saturday. Yay!)