Vampire Week: Bloodrayne: The Third Reich

What could have blades, fangs, Nazi oppression and utter lack of proper camera technique?  Am I referring to some sort of Fellini film?  No it must be the German disaster Uwe Boll. Gather up the villagers and prepare to kill the monsters.  This is BloodRayne: The Third Reich.

Guttin' goose steppers!

Spoilers are Eternal!!

Yes just went you thought it was safe to go to video game movie adaptations, director Uwe Boll (BloodRayne, BloodRayne 2: Deliverance, House of the Dead, In the Name of the King, Far Cry and Alone in the Dark) rears his head like the mythological Hydra and gives us more narrative, fast paced zooming in shots and more shaky cam than The Evil Dead Trilogy.  I have stressed this in all his films and I shall say it again.  If you have photophobia or are prone to seizures PLEASE AVOID THIS MOVIE!   That being said, the rest of us will suffer through.

So you think I need bridgework?

We recap this film with of course flashbacks to previous footage from the first two and followed with the usual unnecessary voice over.  With all the reel footage of World War II, I almost expected to hear Ron Perlman’s Fallout narrative instead.  Rayne (Natassia Malthe of Lake Placid, D.O.A.: Dead or Alive, Elektra, Bloodsuckers, and BloodRayne 2: Deliverance) returns to battle the blight known as the Nazi Party.  Boll believes in adhering to Hitchcock’s notion of reaprising familiar actors into all of his work so if you are confused why you see Brendan Fletcher and Michael Pare`of BloodRayne 2: Deliverance well these are different characters and their previous characters are in fact not immortal. 

After a lengthy battle on at an undisclosed train station and Nazis are being shot by resistance fighters or gutted by Rayne, she encounters the Commandant Brand (Michael Pare` of Komodo Vs Cobra, Eddie and the Cruisers II: Eddie Lives, Moon 44, Sunset Heat, BloodRayne and BloodRayne 2: Deliverance) and as she preps to spear him with a chunk of rebar she is shot by a soldier splattering Brand’s face and mouth with her blood.   Rayne impales Brand to the floor board and drains him.

Banter with the Resistance not withstanding she senses one of her own creation and rather that find it and eradicate it she goes to a bordello for a massage.  One of the soldiers gets rough with a girl and Rayne beats him well.  Again sensing her creation she nobly seeks…the company of a girl.  Yup, no needs for carrying out that pesky exterminate all vampires mission; bring on with the prostitutes.  Yes guys reading this you get some more BloodRayne soft core skin flick action in true tradition of the original. Brand with the aid of Josef Mangler hatches a scheme to use Rayne’s blood to strengthen the Fruhrer.  

Don't laugh...it bought me a condo.

Will Rayne get off her butt and stop Brand?  Will there be more unnecessary modern swearing mixed in the dialogue?  What of little Timmy trapped down the well?    Like BloodRayne 2, her paranormal abilities of the game and the first film are stunted and apparently too expensive for FX.  Nazis, vampires and eroticism really are a crappy blend.

Blood Wars: A High School Production

Blood Wars

SPOILERS A PLENTY

Well I am back and with yet another vampire movie with Jason Connery, son of Sir Sean Connery.  I bet if they crank out a third vampire film with this yahoo we can create our own subgenre in vampire films.  Connery Fangs!!!   Well this brilliant piece of tripe is called The Thirst: Blood War a.k.a. The Thirst a.k.a. Blood Wars.   Hey distribution!  Pick a title and stick with it!    OooOoO POV shots on a scale model and into our feature.  Can’t tell if it is that or CGI.   Handheld HD DVD mini-cam strikes again.  Brotherhood of Blood flashback!   Good God does no one shoot on 35MM anymore?  Hell even 35MM HD would be fine as well but I guess it wasn’t in the budget.   Next complaint is under cranking the footage so it flies around like a crazed vampire bat of yesteryear and killing epileptics left and right.  Great dizzy and annoyed I start this flick off on the wrong foot.

Our film revolves around a hippy college student named Will (A.J. Draven of Spec Ops) who simply bumbles with the female student body because he is a doofus. His roommate/buddy Rico not so Suave (Owiso Odera of Dirt and Three Rivers) proceed to chat up a couple of girls Jayne and Ashley (Allison Lange of Gacy and Christina’s House and Rini Bell of Gilmore Girls and Bring It On)  all the while illuming to the lost of several collegiate members over the past few days.   I mean it’s not even mid terms so the atypical fleeing and suicides shouldn’t be happening just yet.

  The coven meeting between the witches and vampires is amusing for the fact that Tony Todd (Hatchet and Hatchet 2) is miked but his lackey Claudius (Jason Connery of Brotherhood of Blood) isn’t and he sounds like he is projecting for a high school play.  He struts and rants a few moments before he is put in his place by Todd then he just plops down amongst three or four undead hunnies.  Hmm maybe he is a chip off the old block after all.  Get this man some roles of caliber dammit.     Apparently there exists in this universe a type of Warlock.  No not Julian Sands.  A warlock called a sentry and they can defeat vampires.   A slight distraction from this episodic masterpiece is two rednecks with beer and a shotgun.  Shenanigans away!   C.Thomas Howell (Kindred, Outsiders and the Hitcher) and Mark Holton (Leprechaun and Pee Wee’s Big Adventure) are two Billy Bob’s short of a KKK rally head into the woods looking to shoot a cougar only to get snacked on by a couple of rookie vamps.  ENTER THE SENTRIES!!!  Our “Warlocks” slay the vampires in their stylish gunny sack robes.   First off let’s just take a look at the word Warlock.  Last I recall they are practitioners of black magic. Perhaps sorcerer would have worked or say wizard.  Apparently the Sentries and Vampires have a long standing rivalry so yeah no real heroes in this.  We have more back story about how the Sentries and Vampires have been going at it I felt like I was attending a history lecture.  Who can say offhand?   Our writer may have just done a handful of horse tranquilizers and slaved away at the keyboard.   Oh sorry I forgot.  Our creative muse inspired bringer of pain is Ramesh Thandani.  This was his first script followed by Operation Midnight Climax.   With this insight you can see what a treat you are in for.    Back to our wacky sophomores Rico and Will are playing what looks like Left4Dead 2 and Rico fades out after his victory dance.   Will stumbles through his explanation that he is cool with Jayne and likes her boobies.  Okay maybe not that bad but my God this boy needs some lessons in dealing with the opposite sex.   The two are back at his dorm for some action but low and behold a fade so no sex scene for you kids.    So our wacky young lad encounters some weird eroticism vampire dreamscape after he is bitten.  

Let’s give you all, the abridged version.   Ahem.   The fight scenes could have benefited from a stunt coordinator.   I mean it looks like a pre-teen schoolyard squabble in most.   Tony Todd has a very commanding performance that is simply wasted on this film.  Jason Connery was excellent as the impatient vampire to ascend to the throne if you will.  America Olivo, who I felt was seductive but the performance seemed hasty and her lines felt forced.   A.J. Draven and let us spare his feelings appeared to be out of his depth in playing a complex character such as a newly turned vampire struggling to keep his humanity and not give into the dark pleasures of the night.   Hell Denzel Washington would have had some issues with that and that cat is dynamite on the screen.  Also would have been a trifle bit difficult to envision Denzel Washington as a college student now.   Bottom line is this film tried to push where their time constraints and lack of budget and frankly just did not cut the mustard.   You have a potentially decent flick if more time was taken with it.  Maybe with new edits or re-shoots with A.J. and tell him to emote dammit.    Suffice to say this vampire film sucked after many fashions.