30 Days Of Night [Blu-ray]

Customer Rating:
Summary: For Horror Fans Only
Comment: The reviews of this film tend to be either a four star "nearly perfect" to a one star "superficial and cheesy gorefest." I would agree with both viewpoints. It all depends on what type of movie you're looking for. Fans of cheesy horror flicks will not be disappointed, in my opinion. More discriminating moviegoers will probably walk away rolling their eyes.

The movie is pretty standard as far as horror films go: The characters are paper-thin, and all-star performances by Josh Hartnett, Melissa George, and Ben Foster can't fix the rote dialogue that they have to work with. It doesn't matter, though. The camera-work and sets are lush and beautiful, even more so when the blood starts spraying. The score is creepy as well, and best enjoyed in a decent home theatre system.

At the 90 minute mark, the movie takes its time and limps across the finish line towards its conclusion at just under two hours. It could have benefited from a little pruning, but it's still a fun little horror film.

Customer Rating:
Summary: Ground Breaking Directing
Comment: The vampire genre can provide for some great literature or some truly awful films. The humans vs. vampires or zombies genre has been beaten to death. Until now! '30 Days of Night' provides for a breathtaking amount of visually terrifying life and death suspense.

Based on the graphic novel of the same title '30 Days of Night' takes place entirely in an Alaskan frontier town which annually experiences 30 days without the sun. This reduces the population to just over 150. This gives a gang of Eastern European vampires 30 days to openly drink the town dry.

The film is brilliant in the way it builds tension. First off the setting of a dark ghost town covered in snow could not be more frightening. Light is scarce and shadows everywhere give the villains plenty of places to lurk. Anything could pop out over everywhere. The DVD reveals the set was in fact a New Zealand equestrian center.

Much like `Die Hard 2' the film builds the fear of total inescapable chaos slowly with tragic events building on each other. It's not just "Hello we're here we're the vampires." No, the fear comes from not knowing what is coming. Hartnett and his one deputy don't realize what is happening until it is too late. The fear comes slowly as transportation and communications are eliminated by the mysterious drifter. He's creepy and we shudder to wonder where he came from as the town is surrounded by ice.

The vampires themselves are truly horrifying as they do not look like Anne Rice's disco queens or `Buffy's' rubber masked punks. No, these vampires are Nosferatu except worse. Their faces are white and everything else, eyes, hair, and clothing is black. The only color being the blood on their teeth adds to the fear. Much like the cast of `Name of the Rose' they scrounged Europe for the scariest looking before makeup actors they could find. Danny Huston is an unforgettable villain.

The vampires are so inhuman they even speak their own vampire language far scarier than `Blade.' Although most of the time they communicate with chilling sketches. Their movement is also supernatural and inhuman.

Most effective of all the vampires are hard to kill. We truly fear for our band of heroes. How can humans hope to fight these things? This adds tremendously to the plot as we cannot imagine what will happen. Don't the good guys have to win? Or at least take the bad guys with them? Anything is possible.

While we do get a couple of vampires being bisected by John Deere, incinerated by a UV light, caught in a meat grinder, and a little girl decapitated by a fire ax, the film does not disappoint in its premise that a band of mortals is no match for these vampires. This is summed up perfectly with the classic line, "Just because something worked on Bela Lugosi doesn't mean it will work on these guys."

We do not suffer the token clips of chair legs being carved into stakes, crucifixes being taken down from walls, or Bibles being used to make holy water.

David Slade has truly created a visual masterpiece that like a horror film should, uses visuals and sounds to frighten. Not just entertain.

The only downside is that Josh Hartnett as always still suffers from Down syndrome. "Tell me about the vampires George."

Customer Rating:
Summary: Just a couple Natives in Barrow?
Comment: I read a synopsis of the movie plot some weeks before I saw the movie. I immediately laughed at the movie as silly, and was not disappointed upon watching it.

What made me laugh is when the synopsis stated that the Natives migrated South for the winter. Being an Alaska Native myself, I was incredulous at the silly plot gimmick. I mean really. Does the writer think of the Natives as if they were like the caribou that migrate in winter? I am still laughing about that.

There were other silly things in the movie that made it obvious that no one connected with the move ever set foot in Alaska, let alone Barrow. My home town is a couple hundred miles Southwest of Barrow, so I know Alaska weather, and am familiar at least with pictures of Barrow. I also have relatives from there.

They had the temperature at 10 below 0 in December, heh. Try 40 below with 40 knot winds at that time of year. Skin would freeze in seconds. The vampires must have had Prestone for blood. The movie town was also tiny compared to the real thing.

I realize most people won't care, but couldn't we at least not have factual and racist misinformation while we make a movie? It would have taken just a few minutes research to get the facts right. Otherwise, the action was mostly scary and gruesome, if predictable.

Customer Rating:
Summary: 30 Minutes of Night
Comment: Ok I'm not one of these cats who has only seen the movie,
but has never even so much as heard of the writer or the source material.
I'm a graphic novel/comic book junkie,
so I can tell you without a shred of doubt,
that this movie was missing something;
something I couldn't quite put my finger on at first.
That was until my wife pointed it out to me ........
You never got the impression that these people were trapped for any length of time.
Everywhere they hid, it felt like they were there for mere minutes, not days.
It lacked that utterly "trapped feeling" that most zombie films so accurately portray.
It never felt like they were cut-off from civilization for 30 days,
It felt more like 2 or 3 days tops.
There was never any sense of dread or despair,
something that should have been paramount in this kind of flick,
something that a movie like "The Mist" depicted perfectly.
The pandemonium in the streets should have been an integral part of the film as well,
the creme de la creme,
and yet it was glossed over, and reduced to a momentary overhead shot.
Individual struggles against the vampires would have been a necessary addition too,
especially to invoke a personal sense of horror.
Sadly there were very few, if any of these.
There also should have been a heavier emphasis on the "silence factor"
(The vampires have accute hearing,
so the survivors had to keep perfectly still & silent in the graphic novels)
Instead of taking all this into consideration,
the director & the special effects team opted to waaay over-use the Raimi pulley technique.
Something that became tired very early on in the film.
(I don't think vampires are going to drag EVERYBODY by their legs)
The deaths-scenes also left much to be desired.
The vampire were savage,
so the death scenes should have matched that savagery pound for pound.
Alot more throat tearing would have been in order.
The films only saving grace,was the multiple-chop decapitation performed by Josh Hartnet.
This flick honestly needed another half hour to heighten the tension.
The lack of dread, horror, fear, and despair is what ultimately killed this movie.
So as per my wife, I dub this film, "30 Minutes of Night"

**NOTE**
In most cases the movie is never as good as the material it's trying to replicate.
That's not the case here though.
The graphic novel was equally as disappointing,
but then again, I say that only because the story felt VERY rushed,
& the art was god-awful.
As the series continued, it got better, the story I mean...not the art.
There WAS an entire segment of the graphic novel however, that the movie shrugged off.
But in retrospect it was probably alot better off without it.

MORAL OF THE STORY:
Monster have to eat too

Customer Rating:
Summary: Doesn't make me want to go to Alaska
Comment: I admit I thought this movie was going to be a really great horror story when I picked it up. I was thinking what a terrifying idea it was, a place like Alaska, one of the few places on Earth where there would literally be 30 days of night. There's no where to hide from a vampire!

However, this movie failed to pick up steam. We have the standard subplot with the police force who are estranged and headed for divorce court. The town is shutting down as they are prepping for their 30 days of night, something unique to the residents of Alaska. But ... it just didn't fly. Instead it turned depressing real quick.