100 Minutes of Crap!

In Hollywood, adapting graphic novels for the big screen will always yield some fascinating results. In recent years, filmmakers have achieved impressive success with films like Sin City and 300: graphic novels transferred into visually astounding films. The best part with most films using a graphic novel as its foundation is that even if you aren't familiar with the source material, there is room to help you find your footing. Not only that, they are great additions to the respective genre.

30 Days of Night is a visually astounding vampire horror flick. But only visually...in terms of script this is golden crap! This film cannot get close to matching the good preceding films based on graphic novels. Now, look, if you're expecting sheer brilliance like Nosferatu or the original Bela Lugosi Dracula then you've come to the wrong place. 30 Days of Night is not a groundbreaking portion of the horror genre by any stretch of the imagination: this is purely and simply a Hollywood blockbuster hack-job!

The film is set in an isolated Alaskan town that is plunged into darkness for an entire month each year. Most of the town's population vacate the area to escape the darkness: only the boldest remain to suffer through 30 days of night. We are soon introduced to the central character: Sheriff Eben Oleson (Hartnett). When the sun sinks below the horizon to signify the commencement of the 30 days of night, it seems like business as usual. However, a stranger (Foster) wanders into the town speaking crazy talk and begins frightening the locals. Before you know it, the small town is now under siege by a horde of blood-thirsty vampires who establish their new hunting ground. In a short period of time, most of the town's population has fallen prey to the vampires. In a manner quite similar to most zombie/vampire/creature flicks, a small group of survivors band together in the hope of escaping the malicious creatures.

The material that the filmmakers had to work with is simply killer - almost to the point that one must wonder why a film like this has never been tackled before. The originality of the graphic novel now preserved on film is something simply incredible.

Also, because the film is based on a graphic novel we must expect brilliance in the visuals. The filmmakers deliver in that department. The visual effects are nothing short of amazing! This is the sort of stuff we can expect when a movie is filmed in New Zealand, and then the post-production period is spent with Peter Jackson's crew! I also adored the blood effects. Loads of people are killed in explicit, creative ways with geysers of blood staining the surrounding area. Whenever a character wanders into a dark room and discovers puddles of blood, it looks outstanding. These blood and prosthetic effects cannot be faulted...and the visual style is a marvel to behold! On top of this, the design for the vampires is outstanding!

Okay, now that I've spent some time outlining the strengths...time to move onto the weaknesses. Take a seat folks, as this will take a while. With such killer material, I must wonder why the script is so appalling! All the characters are cardboard and one-dimensional. Each character is as conventional as the next! The characters as a whole are clichéd to death! There's the hero, the one that gives them away, the dumb characters who disagree with the group and get themselves killed, the diversions...it's giving me a headache just comprehending it all! I was embarrassed to see so many stereotypes emerging. Also, with a group of characters being bundled together for a month you'd expect it to bring out the best and worst in them and to flesh out back stories. If done right, this could equal some awesome results. Instead there is no character development and nothing to care about...no interesting dialogue apart from stating the blooming obvious, but the worst has yet to come: we don't even see the characters mentally coping with the situation. Instead we see the events of one day, then cut to about two weeks later and see more events...and quite frankly, from the stupidity exhibited by these characters I wonder how they even survived those days that the filmmakers didn't show. How did they manage to evade the vampires?!

30 Days of Night naturally succumbs to Hollywood's worst recent obsession: shaky cam. The choppy editing doesn't help this either. Instead of creating suspense and tension, there's gore and some poorly framed shots that seem like a monkey was actually holding the camera. The first "scare" of the movie is a blurred figure moving around in the distance while the audio flares. Then there's just a body count rise and frankly, there isn't any point! The vampires spew nonsensical gibberish with subtitles that confirm the vampire speech is approximately as dumb and contrived as the dialogue delivered in English.

30 Days of Night is thousands of examples of how not to make a movie all rolled into one. The only redeeming features are the visual style and the satisfying amount of blood and gore. This is the sole reason why someone would want to approach this movie: to see some blood being splattered around...and it looks spectacular! I truly wish that a better bunch of screen-writers were brought aboard to tackle the subject matter. As I said before, the source material and concept are utterly killer. There was lots of potential for this to be the best vampire flick since Nosferatu. Unfortunately, this is just another Hollywood hack-job that I would expect to see from Uwe Boll. If you're bored and need to get high on gore, go rent this. It's vastly disappointing but will keep the "gore instead of suspense" horror buffs happy for sure. A bona fide wasted opportunity!

4.0/10