Hey, hey, I'm back! Who knows for how long. Too much of me is too much of a good thing in my opinion...
Hey, hey, I'm back! Who knows for how long. Too much of me is too much of a good thing in my opinion. And that's what it's all about - opinions!
Member since:02.08.2000
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Blade begins, in 1967, with a young mother, obviously in some distress, giving birth. The attendants whip the baby away from her, its fate unknown. We then jump forward to the present day. A young man is being led into what is obviously an exclusive night-club. Loud techno music (I think!) is throbbing, people are gyrating wildly on the dance-floor and doing ‘naughty things’ in the background. Some patrons treat the man a little roughly, but he isn’t too disturbed. He’s in, where it’s happening; he is cool. Until the sprinkler system starts pumping human blood on to everyone. The clubbers reveal their true natures, and he panics as he sees the vampires all around him. His death seems inevitable until there is a sudden silence and the crowd withdraws. A tall, muscular man in body armour stands before them. They call him ‘Blade’ and are clearly terrified of him. Some of them attack him – he just smiles.
Blade uses various pieces of weaponry, including a fancy sword, guns that fire fancy stakes into the vamps’ hearts, and, most of all, his own arms and legs in a furious flash of martial arts. In the style of Buffy, but with loads more violence, he dispatches the demon hordes. There is one uppity vamp, Quinn, obviously not a leader, but perhaps a number two. Blade pins the guy against a wall, literally (!), and sets fire to him. Unfortunately, this allows a unit of armed police officers to storm the place, guns blazing, and forces Blade to run. The charred corpse is taken to the morgue.
Here we are introduced to Doctor Karen Jenson, a haematologist, who realises there is something strange about the corpse’s blood. As she is examining it, we are not shocked to see it come "back to life". It attacks and bites her, regenerating, as vampires tend to do if not properly killed. Then our hero turns up again, to finish the job, but Quinn gets away. Blade takes the doctor with him in an attempt to stop her from turning into a vampire. His accomplice, Whistler, injects her with garlic (yes, really!) but says she is unlikely to survive. She will gradually become a ‘creature of the night’.
(Well, it’s better than becoming a ‘lady of the night’ – or is it?)
Blade, it is revealed, was the baby from the opening of the film. His mother was bitten by a vampire before she gave birth and he has both human and vampire DNA. He is still mostly human, though, and is a ‘daywalker’, envied and feared equally by the regular (if that’s the word) vamps. He has to use a special serum to control his bloodlust but it is losing its effect. Hmmm, I wonder if that haematologist might come in handy?
It turns out that the vampires are divided into ‘pure bloods’ and those who have just been ‘turned’. One of the latter, Deacon Frost, is tired of the traditions of the older vampires and challenges their authority and especially their deals with the humans – they ‘own’ the police, while Frost just thinks they should take over. He is obsessed with a special ritual that will summon up the ‘Blood God’, so when he discovers that the blood of his enemy, Blade, is essential, he sets a trap. And doesn’t his girlfriend look familiar?
The film builds up to a predictable climax - you know that the main protagonists will battle face-to-face – and plenty of room is left for an inevitable sequel. But will anyone be going to see it?
Well, the film has its moments. It was definitely better than I expected and is a fairly entertaining way of wasting a couple of hours. Most people seem to agree with this assessment because it did quite well at the box-office and the rumoured sequel is still in the pipeline. (Blade 2: Bloodlust, is currently in production.) The acting is competent if a trifle mannered. Wesley Snipes as the titular hero is very dark and brooding, but his lack of humour makes him seem pretentious. He deliberately takes on heroic poses, holding himself in such a way that you begin to wonder if he’s just constipated. The makers so clearly didn’t want to make him too camp and have reacted by going too far the other way.
Stephen Dorff is acceptable as the villain of the piece, but while you suspect that Snipes is capable of more in a better role, this is probably Dorff’s limit. He doesn’t stand up to great baddies of film legend, and he comes over as annoying rather than threatening. Kris Kristofferson as Whistler is the only other member of the cast that is relatively well known. His is probably the best performance; underplayed but impressive.
The fight scenes are a bit of a letdown, however. I think the fact that I had just seen "Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon" a few days previously, highlighted the defects. To be honest, some of the recent fights in TV shows like "Buffy" and even "Dark Angel" have looked better than this. There’s also too much gunplay, which is noisy and distracting. The special effects are passable but the vampire make-up is completely uninspiring. Added to lacklustre set designs, there really isn’t anything worth seeing to recommend seeing it on the big screen – video or DVD will do just fine.
All this makes it sound like I didn’t really like the movie, but it’s not all bad. The direction, by Stephen Norrington, is quite impressive. You can tell at least that he is really trying. The beginning is almost ‘arthouse’ in its attempts to be realistic, bleak, and there is a distinct lack of inappropriate banter, which is refreshing. The music is well done, too; a loud bass thump, echoing a heartbeat: quite effective. The story is reasonable. Based on the old Marvel comic book, it tries to be more adult and serious, but as it progresses it becomes ever more reliant on the action and descends into absurdity. The ending is so bizarre that it becomes impossible to suspend disbelief but as long as you don’t take it as seriously as the makers do at the start, by the climax, you should be pleasantly surprised.
***DVD FEATURES***
There are some nice extras on this disc. The first is entitled "Le Magra", a reference to the blood-god which is summoned up in the climax of the film. You may notice that the ending doesn’t quite match your expectations based on what Frost says is going to happen. Well, this is because the ending was changed substantially and re-shot. This section purports to be the original ending but is actually much more than that. Running to about 18 minutes it is a fascinating look into the filmmaking process. We hear the producers and the writer discuss the original ending and why it wasn’t used, and we get to see the alternative ending. You can see why they changed it! You also get an extended alternative version of an earlier scene, which fills in some of the background. A useful little section.
Next up is "Designing Blade". Another look behind the scenes, this 22 minute feature covers production design, make-up, stunts and special effects. The first section is a little gem, as rather than show a static series of design drawings, we are shown the drawings by the guy in charge as he discusses them and explains how they were used to create the finished product; a very nice touch, much more interesting than the usual method. The other sections are good too, and they give you a real insight into the people who made the film, and who obviously worked so hard.
The Cast & Crew section is also a bit different. The information is again presented in a moving format, scrolling text superimposed on a picture of the artist. It’s a small touch but it made me read the bios rather than skip through them, so credit to them for trying so hard. Interestingly, this is only the director, Stephen Norrington’s second feature. I was sure I had heard of him before, but maybe it’s because of some of the scripts he has written also.
The trailer is your standard fare and is reasonably well done. It doesn’t give away too much of the plot and gives a good impression of the film.
Finally, "Behind the Scenes" is literally that; a collection of snippets from the film from the point of view behind the camera. These only run to a few minutes but would lose their novelty value if they went on too long. Again, it gives you a good appreciation of how difficult it is to make even an average film. (I still prefer Buffy and Angel, though!)
Overall, I would have to recommend this; the DVD more than the film perhaps. It’s a good attempt to do a grown-up comic book adaptation, but I still would have preferred to see Snipes in another comic book role - The Black Panther: a film he quit when it got bogged down in order to do this instead.
Perhaps the sequel will realise the potential of the franchise.
How helpful would this review be to a person making a buying decision? Rating guidelines
Production Year: 2004 - Horror - Director: Alexander Witt - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over - Starring: Thomas Kretschmann, Jared Harris, Sandrine Holt, Milla Jovovich, Sienna Guillory, Oded Fehr
l think l might have seen part of this when visiting friends (a long time ago) either on TV or a video (the opening scene sounds familiar)
. . . . . ♥ jes ♥
SouthernComfort 10.03.2003 14:59
Love the review title lol. I agree with you on this film, I loved every minute. I was so excited about the making of Blade 2 and what a pucker movie. Great Op! - Cheers, SC.
chrissm 03.09.2002 23:37
still love this film but i think blade 2 is just as good if not better
The recipe forBladeis quite simple; you take one partBatman, one part horror flick, and ... more
two parts kung fu, and frost it all over with some truly camp acting. What do you get? An action flick that will reaffirm your belief that the superhero action genr...
Postage & Packaging: £1.21 Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days...
The recipe forBladeis quite simple; you take one partBatman, one part horror flick, and ... more
two parts kung fu, and frost it all over with some truly camp acting. What do you get? An action flick that will reaffirm your belief that the superhero action genr...
Postage & Packaging: Free! Availability: Temporarily out of stock. Order now and we'll deliver when available. We'll e-mail you with an estimated delivery date as soon...
A blood chilling action-packed thriller about modern day vampires unlike any previously ... more
encountered. Wesley Snipes is Blade the ultimate vampire hunter and immortal warrior who possesses the superhuman strength and cunning of a vampire but shares n...
Postage & Packaging: £0.00 Availability: 3-5 working days
A blood-chilling, action-packed thriller about modern day vampires unlike any previously ... more
encountered. Wesley Snipes is BLADE, the ultimate vampire hunter, an immortal warrior who possesses the superhuman strength and cunning of a vampire, but shares no...
![Blade [DVD] [1998]](http://picnicb.ciao.com/uk/78542679.jpg "Blade [DVD] [1998]")
May 8th, 2001
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