30 Days of Night (Theatrical - 2007)
Columbia Pictures
Director: David Slade
Writers: Steve Niles, Stuart Beattie
Starring: Josh Hartnett, Melissa George, Danny Huston, Ben Foster, Manu Bennett
Review by Adam Tracey

In the small nobody town of Barlow, the northern most city in the US, they are gearing up for the sun to set and not rise again for 30 days. All travel in and out shuts down. This time an evil not before seen is about to descend that will terrorize the small town. Now the Sheriff, his deputy and a small group of others must fight for their survival.

Damn! Damn! Damn! Damn! Damn!

Why the hell did this have to happen? I wanted so much for this to be the next great vampire movie, unfortunately it wasn't. Not to say it didn't have it's pluses, because as a straight up gore movie it was fantastic. Blood flows on the snow in Alaska, but it all the good stops there.

The problem is with the vampires themselves. Gone are the curved smooth fangs we know and love and in their place are a mouth full of sharp teeth. Throughout the entire movie you never once were sure whether the vamps were sucking blood or just biting their necks open to make them die. They felt very much like zombies. They also spoke a different language, that sounded vaguely like Klingon. So here I am watching an American gore movie and I have to read sub titles. The vampires switched between being feral pack animals and upright civilized vampires. They looked and acted weird. The leader of this gang of bloodsuckers is Marlow. All he does is talk like a philosopher. All lines were meant to be dramatic and hopeless.

The biggest problem though is the lack of direction of the vampires. You don't know why they are there. The previews seem to suggest it is too feed, but nobody feeds. They just slice people open and spill there blood all over the snow. Toward the end Marlow drops a couple of lines that might suggest another reason, but you never get more on it.

This was absolutely a fun movie. It was dark, violent, crude and didn't spare anyone's feelings. This is definitely the path you would hope horror movies would go, but if you have preconceived notions on what vampires are or should be, you will have some issues with this movie. There is a serious lack of direction to what is happening.

"The sky is black and the ground is white, but the town of Barlow is about to see red!"