Daybreakers (2010)

It is a performances centric movie

a film so unique, intoxicating and bizarre that it not only demands another viewing, but is also forgivable as a satirical comedy where the jokes eventually take the back seat.

Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.

An original vampire flick? Impossible! Yet, the Spierig brothers managed to flip a typical clichéd vampire story on its head to create something as fresh as human blood. That doesn't prevent the overall production from feeling inexpensive, but it maintains your attention throughout. A vampire hematologist is tasked with researching for a blood substitute as the remaining human population dwindles, meaning vampires will have no blood left. Just the originality alone is enough to quench our bloodythirstiness, considering it was released during a period of genre saturation (no thanks to 'Twilight'). The Spierig brothers fortunately managed to perpetuate a sense of intellectual world building, particularly in the first act. Immediately, this dark futuristic world is thoroughly explored, from the degenerative "subsiders" to the laboratory farms that harvest humans. Retaining dark gothic aesthetics without requiring towering spires and grand cathedrals. The story, whilst executed basically, illustrates the desperation that the vampire race is facing. Humanity faces extinction and the chic vampires face degenerating into psychotic bat creatures. There was just enough meat in the plot to keep me invested. Hawke is consistently decent as always, same can be said about Dafoe, both giving convincing and moody performances. Neill was perfect casting as the corporate antagonist, exhuming a menacingly calm demeanour. The visual effects however, were B-grade at best. So horrendously cheap looking that the production value deteriorated instantly and, on multiple occasions, took me out of the film. Laughably poor. The final act loses its intellectual plot and succumbs to mindless action with blood gushing everywhere. Whilst I appreciate the practical effects during these sequences, it just lets the overall narrative down. All that build up with minimal payoff, ultimately leaving a metallic aftertaste. For what it is worth though, the innovative premise, world building and performances converted me.

Daybreakers: Written and directed by the Spierig BrothersThis is a movie about a world where vampires have taken over the planet and the food source is dwindling. This is a movie where world building is the core of the plot. It spends a lot of time showing what the world would be like in the day to day and the changes in societal situations as well. It introduces a conflicted protagionist looking for a solution to the problems facing their world. Bit by bit, what he thinks he knows about the way things work is not entirely true. His world is shattered until you're left with the difficult choices you have to make in order to make things succeed.I know that sounds like a sappy indie mumblecore style drama but it's not. It's in a movie where vampires have eaten everything they can and are now running out of food. When they run out of food, they turn into a bat person, a literal man-bat who lives on the blood of whatever they find. There's so much introduction that when you finally find out, there's almost no story left. It's that simplistic. It works. It's different especially living in the age post Twilight. I enjoyed the film for what it brought to the table. I wanted more. I wanted a more in depth look at a world starving. I wanted to spend more time in vampire land but it was not to be. You were here one minute and then the next minute people were being violently torn apart by starving crazed vampires.I give this movie a C.

What if we lived in a world where vampires have to harvest humans in order for them to survive overpopulation and a dwindling blood supply? That's the basic premise of this Australian horror film and it does stand out midst the over-saturation of vampire films over the last decade. Boasting a couple A-list names in the cast, the performances are quite solid: Ethan Hawke plays Dr. Edward 'Ed' Dalton, a vampire scientist who has been disillusioned with his immortal lifestyle for a long time. After a chance encounter with a human female resistance member (Claudia Karvan), Ed is soon pulled into the fight to end the vampire reign of terror for a new blood supply. Hawke brings a vulnerability and almost youthful world-weariness as Ed, portraying him more like a human trapped in a vampire's body, longing to be free of the curse of needing human blood to live. Hawke's costar chemistry is enjoyable as he has an underlying flirtatious yet compassionate affection for Claudia Karvan's Audrey to a uneasy (at first) but loyal friendship that develops with Willem Dafoe's Lionel "Elvis" Cormac.Playing the bad-ass, crossbow wielding Lionel or better known as Elvis is the bearded and always enjoyable Willem Dafoe. Adopting a solid Southern drawl that draws from his character's nickname's sake, Dafoe brings his usual grizzled persona to the former vampire turned human. Being a world-weary resistance fighter, Elvis doesn't hesitate to remind the new recruit, Edward, what the world has come to in the crisis happening around them. Dafoe doesn't hesitate to add some humor to the character in order to defuse the tension in a scene; most evident in Elvis and Edward's first meeting where Dafoe sings a few bars of an Elvis Presley song or during a tense meeting with one of Edward's former colleagues where Dafoe quips a scorching one-liner to who he and Audrey are, "we're the folks with the crossbows." As the sole female lead, Claudia Karvan's Audrey is no damsel in distress despite being taken hostage near the end of the film. Audrey doesn't hesitate to pull her crossbow on Edward when they first meet when Audrey and some other humans are escaping to the safe-haven of the vineyard. However she grows to trust Ed after he aids her and her fellow humans' escape and when Ed agrees to help find a cure. Audrey's loyalty is more than evident to Ed when he sees the bond Audrey has with Elvis; she saved the latter's life after Elvis was burned by the sun which rendered him back to human form. Karvan and Hawke's Ed almost develop a budding romance as the film moves forward, but the filmmakers don't taint the narrative by keeping the relationship between them as cordial and more like comrades in arms.The movie exudes a gloomy atmosphere by utilizing specific color palettes like grays dark blues for the cityscape where the vampires live, dark shades of yellow for the countryside vineyard where our heroes hide from the threat of being captured by vampire militia and of course red is a dominant color due to the presence of blood in a vampire film.Enjoyable for any vampire movie fan.

With a hint of noir and a dash of sci-fi, 'Daybreakers' starts off as a stylish and fresh take on a very tired genre (vampires) that feels like a kindred spirit to something like the cult classic 'Dark City'. Unfortunately it slowly degrades into a far more conventional B-movie, squandering nearly all of its early potential. It's really a shame, too, because it seemed headed for such great things.Beyond the always watchable Willem Defoe, the cast is rather unremarkable, but they do what's required of them. And though it's a relatively low budget film, it has solid production values and never looks cheap. If only they'd been able to avoid the pitfalls of genre clichés 'Daybreakers' may have been something special instead of merely watchable.