Follow along with the video below to see how to install our site as a web app on your home screen.
Note: This feature may not be available in some browsers.
Welcome! The TrekBBS is the number one place to chat about Star Trek with like-minded fans.
If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!
It's 2017, and the undead far outnumber the living in this horror film starring Oscar nominee Ethan Hawke. A virus has spread across the earth, turning its inhabitants into vampires. With their blood supply dwindling, the vampires must find a way to sustain their source of food
Re: Daybreakers (Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe, Sam Neill) Grading/Discuss
I'm not much of a vampire person, but I've heard this has a good script and a stellar cast, so I plan to see it tomorrow.
The Tomatometer is kinda mixed on this one, so apparently it produces opinions one way or the other. I usually take that as a good sign it'll be memorable.
Re: Daybreakers (Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe, Sam Neill) Grading/Discuss
I'm kind of looking forward to this one. While it hasn't been faring so well with the mainstream critics, many of the online reviews suggest that it's stylishly made, imaginative, and a lot of fun (if not exactly flawless and brilliant cinema). So to me, it sounds like it's worth checking out.
Re: Daybreakers (Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe, Sam Neill) Grading/Discuss
I just saw it.
1. Beautiful asethetic
2. Plot was good
3. Story was lame overall...but only because it was rushed. Had they split the story out over a movie or two it might have felt better.
Re: Daybreakers (Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe, Sam Neill) Grading/Discuss
I went with Below Average. There were things I liked about it. The fact it was a vampire story where vampirism is the norm and humans are the minority, the world they build with technology turned to keeping vampires safe in the daytime, with cameras and sunshields build in to cars and underground tunnels and covered walkways between buildings, etc. but overall the plot was rushed and the story was bland, which it seemed to think it could cover by throwing in a lot of gore at various points of the film.
Re: Daybreakers (Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe, Sam Neill) Grading/Discuss
The concept was really cool - the thought that a society almost completely vampirized could function pretty much like ours does. And the various vamp touches worked well (such as the car modifications, the 'subwalks' from building to building, coffee with blood, etc.).
The only problem I really had is that it was too easy to convert from a vampire to human and the reverse. A human who's bit is almost instantly turned, and a vampire can be repeatedly burned, as Ethan Hawke's character is, then become human again, but not show the slightest trace of burn damage (vampires do have scars, as most of the vamps we see have visible bite marks on their necks) and also their fangs immediately vanish.
Also the opening scene says that 'one single bat' started the whole thing. Would have been nice to have an explanation. It's implied that the vamp plague is caused by bat bites but you'd think somebody would have noticed before it got out of hand.
I thought the closing scenes were kind of funny, though: Sam Neill's character is forcibly de-vamped (by force feeding him the blood of Hawke's character - the blood of a former vamp is a cure for vampirism), then fed to his own soldiers, who of course swarm all over him and rip him to pieces. Then they start turning on each other, and some of the soldiers are thus de-vamped as well. And those soldiers who do survive are gunned down by a vamp scientist. It's like "How gratuitously bloody can one movie get?"
And I love this one thing they did about the background. Early in the film you see a huge poster with "Capture Humans" on it (it's a military recruitment thing). Towards the end, it's been vandalized with graffiti and now says "CaptureD ALL Humans - NOW WHAT?"
There is also one genuinely sad scene. Throughout the film it is established that a vampire who is starved for blood will turn into a "Subsider" which is basically a monster with flapping bat wings, elongated ears, huge teeth, and little or no reasoning ability (there are lots of scenes with Subsiders living underground and fighting each other, one of them also breaks into a home and tries to steal blood). There's one scene where a procession of vampires who are becoming Subsiders are dragged, in chains, into the sunlight, where they all burst into flames and die.
One of these is the freshly turned 'Alison', who refused to drink her blood rations and instead fed on herself, which accelerates the mutation into a Subsider
Re: Daybreakers (Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe, Sam Neill) Grading/Discuss
I liked this movie, but I can't say I loved it. The concept was very cool and I liked the look of the film. I thought the acting was fine, though Willem Dafoe didn't do much for me. I guess he was supposed to be the wiseacre badass, but didn't care for his delivery. It felt a bit flat. I really liked Sam Neill. But there was something about the film, and I'm not sure what it was, that left me uncaring for a lack of a better word. I didn't really gravitate to any of the human characters except perhaps for the runaway young girl (and I can't say I really cared about her per se, but her arc was compelling), and I thought the lady vamp hunter was attractive. I wouldn't have minded having a Blade, Whistler, or Woody Harleson (sp) (Zombieland) character in this film.
One thing I didn't like is the explanation for how to convert vamps to humans. Even though its a vampire movie, that didn't make much sense to me. I just wish they had made vampirism more like a virus like in Blade and Underworld and then it might've been better to explain how to solve vampirism. That calculated exposure to sunlight didn't work for me. I did like how the cure was passed on at the end though. Gruesome but pretty sweet. I'm not quite sure what Bromley's closing motivations were all about. It seems like it would make sense for him to get this cure so that could just de-vamp people and keep a supply of them for his well paying customers despite the blood substitute they had found. Of course he wouldn't have known about the side effects.
I thought the subsider FX were decent, though not as good as Blade 2's Reapers, Underworld 2's Hybrid, or even Batform Dracula from Bram Stoker's Dracula. I do recommend this movie but it doesn't have the action and urgency of the Blade or Underworld films, nor did it have the tension and foreboding of 30 Days of Night. Though the concept gets points from me. It was a well made film for a small budget and I hope it does well.
Because of the movie's concept, I rate it above average. Hopefully we'll get a sequel.
Re: Daybreakers (Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe, Sam Neill) Grading/Discuss
I discovered by asking around that apparently the Book of Eli is actually
the Bible
.
Which of course can only produce one reaction: GROAN! Not to go all TNZ or anything, but COME ON.
My question would be: if that is going to save humanity, wouldn't it have done so before the events of the movie actually take place?
I could buy if it was a copy of an 1855 version of THE WAY THINGS WORK or something. Because these folks obviously need some help bootstrapping back into a low-power society.
I'm not quite sure what Bromley's closing motivations were all about. It seems like it would make sense for him to get this cure so that could just de-vamp people and keep a supply of them for his well paying customers despite the blood substitute they had found.
He didn't want a cure, because he wanted Bromley/Marks to make money selling the blood substitute (which the vampires would presumably need to keep using). A cure is permanent; a blood substitute isn't. If vampirism is cured, which it seems it will be, Bromley/Marks can't make any money off it.
Bromley wanted *everyone* to be well paying customers. Which they can only be, if they are still vampires.
Re: Daybreakers (Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe, Sam Neill) Grading/Discuss
If we didn't already know that bats started the plague (which, BTW, is a really stupid idea), I'd suspect Bromley/Marks of being behind the whole vampire thing in the first place.
Re: Daybreakers (Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe, Sam Neill) Grading/Discuss
Not bats, it all started with just one retarded bat that appears in the movie, annoying characters and the audience. Must be a metaphor for something.
I found it odd that people turned each other, creating more competition for food. But then, the idea a simple bite to turn a person into a vamp means that would be inevitable, and the concept of a single bite "infection" is more simplistic that recent takes. It undermines the premise of vampires as individual predator entities, more like disease carriers. These vampires unless farming humans for blood, would extinct themselves. Odd that animal blood is mentioned but also as being not common...they said animal life is also infected with vampirism, but as a source of blood it seems disregarded as something weenies like Hawke's character would drink, even though it sustains him somewhat.
Funny they went with the old school "no reflections" thing. No mention of garlic or holy water...in fact IIRC, the movie was largely devoid of religious references, which seems kind of lacking given how pervasive religion is in culture. But it's only 98 minutes long, so...
And why the flipping fudge would a convoy of humans travel at night?
Not to go all TNZ or anything, but COME ON.
