“Daybreakers”
Written and Directed by Michael Spierig and Peter Spierig; Stars Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe and Sam Neill. Story: In the year 2019, a plague has transformed most every human into vampire. Faced with a dwindling blood supply, the fractured dominant race plots their survival; meanwhile, a researcher works with a covert band of vamps on a way to save humankind.
“The Book of Eli”
Written by Gary Whitta; Directed by the Hughes Brothers; Stars Denzel Washington, Gary Oldman and Mila Kunis. Story: A post-apocalyptic tale, in which a lone man fights his way across America in order to protect a sacred book that holds the secrets to saving humankind.
Seen by Adam and Lars Jan 24, 2010
LARS:
Post-Apocalyptic Double Feature
When I was a kid, my local movie theatre would have double features every weekend afternoon. They were mostly randomly matched flicks that appealed to fans of trashy action and horror. My favorite coupling back then was the perfect Sunday match-up of the Bruce Lee actioner “Fists of Fury” and the original “Friday the 13th” movie. There’s something wonderful about spending an afternoon with movies that make no pretention to be art. Their only agenda is to entertain you for a few hours and leave anything resembling reality as far behind as possible. That can be done elegantly as in today’s two brain-candy flicks or with total disregard for any resemblance to intelligence that the audience may possess (See “Transformers 2” – sadly the 2nd highest grossing film of 2009. A state of affairs that truly makes me fear for the future of mankind).
Our first post-apocalyptic outing was “Daybreakers”. I sometimes wonder what Bram Stoker, the author of “Dracula”, the first vampire story, would make of it all, if he were reanimated today (although I’ve heard somewhere that that may not be such a hot idea). Would he be fascinated with the extreme elasticity of his original concept and its ability to be pushed in all directions or horrified by the many inane vampire stories told in the last 100 years? “Daybreakers” is a decent entry into the genre. Its core conceit is that vampirism spread so aggressively that the vampires eventually won, leaving humans to exist solely for their blood, kept in sinister looking blood farms. Since vampirism apparently didn’t come with a dose of smarts, no one foresaw that there’d eventually not be enough humans around to feed the vampires with blood. Thank God for Ethan Hawke. If you’re in the market for an offbeat-looking but decent man, he’s your go-to guy. Here he plays Ed Dalton, the Chief Hematologist for the vamps, desperately looking to find a blood substitute that will allow the human race to survive in some form or other. Did I mention that vampires apparently turn into a rat/bat mix, when they don’t get enough human blood?
Written and directed by the Australian Spierig twin brothers, “Daybreakers” looks great and has tons of atmosphere. Due to a good cast that in addition to Hawke also has Willem Dafoe as an ex-vampire (no, can’t tell you how that works – that would be cheating), it is a solid genre entry. Even though it makes zero sense, of course. But who cares about that when your brain is in full gummy bear mode?
After Ethan Hawke did his best, it was time to see how Denzel Washington would pull off his world-saving duties in “The Book of Eli”. This movie looks wonderful too. This seems to be a core part of post-apocalyptic movies: the world is basically screwed, but we’re going to make it look great and dress people like Tom Ford were the patron saint of these post-apocalyptic communities. Lots of layers, people. Hang on to your old tees and scarves and get used to layering after the fall of mankind. You heard it here first!
Denzel plays the titular Eli, a solitary wasteland wanderer, who speaks softly but will totally fuck you up with any number of big sticks, if you get in his way. He is, for reasons that remain unclear throughout most of the movie, making his way west through a world that suffered mightily from a war that tore a hole in the sky and made the sun burn all life out of the planet. All the survivors wear shades, whenever they are outside, much to Ray-Ban’s delight, I’m sure.
As in any western, for that’s basically what this movie is, there’s a bad, bad guy who wants something our intrepid hero has, in this case his bible. Gary Oldman plays the bad guy, Carnegie, in an unusually restrained version of his stock-in-trade shtick. There’s also a pretty young woman, Mila Kunis, who just wants a better life. It all goes much as expected, until a last minute twist worthy of an M. Night Shyalaman (not quite as good as his “Sixth Sense” twist, but not as utterly crap as the one in “The Village” either) makes you realize what was never obvious and seems like a bit of an unnecessary rabbit-out-of-hat ending.
The Hughes Brothers – funny how both of today’s films were directed by identical twins directing teams. I mean, what are the odds? Anyway, the Hughes Brothers do a good job restraining themselves compared to the bloodfest that was “From Hell”, their last outing from 2001. Granted, Denzel kicks some serious ass here, but they never revel in it the same way as they did then. Maybe because Denzel plays a religious man here?
And that is the most interesting thing about “The Book of Eli”, its multi-facetted take on religion. It postulates that the war that destroyed the world led to all surviving bibles being burned, as people were blaming religion for the war. So it’s a staunch anti-religion film, then. Maybe the first-ever mainstream American anti-religion film. But wait a second… the one thing that everyone in the film wants is the last surviving bible. Carnegie wants it to be able to grow and expand this empire, using the demagogic powers of the Word to build himself a following in the new world. Eli has other plans that it would be unfair to divulge here. So maybe they are saying that used for the wrong purposes, religion and the Bible can be dangerous weapons, but in the right hands, they are tools of great power and beauty? I’m sure you’ll have your own interpretation based on what your take on religion is, when you enter the theatre.
Stay tuned until next week, when your intrepid post-apocalyptic movie watching team will see, if the combined stories of “The Road” and “Legion” will change their overall perspective on what to stock up on for life after the fall.
ADAM:
The Decapitation Double Feature
That’s the common denominator between these two films; at least a few characters wake up the next day, one hat too many.
Once again, Ethan Hawke is the brooding, misunderstood idealistic outsider – “Gattaca”, “Training Day”? Hello? Is this thing on? In Daybreakers, he’s the Vampire with a heart, wait, no…wait yes, he has a heart, it’s just not beating. At least at first…Hawke plays Ed Dalton, a chain-smoking vampire Chief Hematologist, which is like Snoop Dogg becoming the Editor in Chief of High Times. The vampires have taken over this noirish world and humans are harvested for their blood in an apparatus that looks exactly like the ones in every other harvesting movie (Matrix, Aliens, etc). But there’s a problem; the human population (read: food supply) is running out. NOTE: why the vamps can’t genetically replicate humans, create test tube babies or use in vitro on the harvested females is beyond me, but just like someone has to kill the babysitter, something has to get this film moving.
Hawke has sworn off human blood, a choice that will turn him into a mutant vampire that looks something like a winged rat man, before too long. Good times. And manipulating Hawke is his boss, played by Sam Neill, who professes his heartfelt desire to find a blood substitute after his young frightened daughter runs away. The connection there? No idea. Naturally, he has a hidden agenda to make more money and keep the good blood flowing. And nearly as predictably, Neill’s long lost daughter returns as a bargaining chip/potential hot meal o’ blood/smokin’ hot slampiece to appease the Twilight fans. And then there’s Willem Dafoe, who really needs no makeup to look either scary or potentially vampirish. Dafoe, as a lieutenant in a humans versus vamps resistance (say that word with a French accent, long A) befriends Hawke. And they’re chased by an army of vampires until they discover an alternative to a blood substitute. And that’s when the wheels really fall off the wagon. Marrying what seems to be the quick and fast vampire story rules: stake through the heart, cutting off the head, etc. to a new wave of rules: what can turn a vamp back to human, what happens happen afterward is a mess and a bit laughable. It’s still entertaining and a good-looking film, but it can’t be that great when my big question as I walk out is, “What happens if a dog bites a cannibal that had eaten a human who was once a vampire?” I’m serious. Part 2, Headless Boogaloo.
Ah, the joy of post apocalyptic action films. Full disclosure: I was part of the team that represented Terry Hayes at ICM. Terry wrote the first and standard of the modern day post apocalyptic scripts, The Road Warrior. Now I’m sure I’m partial to Terry, but I still find his work the best. Maybe its because it sort of came first, I don’t know. But it created a genre, which begat Waterworld, The Postman, Day of the Dead, The Quiet Earth and its own sequel, Beyond Thunderdome. And it’s always the same(or it’s the reverse for much in Waterworld). The Earth is dusty. No one has any water. Everyone is filthy. The bad guys all ride choppers or trucks or chopper-trucks, with long hair and just look like trouble.
In Book of Eli, Denzel Washington is a man on a mission, based on the voice he once heard that told him to take a book (the only remaining copy of the bible in the world) out west. And so he does, walking the Earth like Shaft, getting into adventures and beating the living shit out of anyone that gets in his path and delivering worse to anyone who tries to get his book. Gary Oldman, as Carnegie, attempts to do both in the film and well, that’s just not smart. At first, Carnegie has a small army of thugs at his disposal, which Eli makes quick work of, first as a human Cuisinart — removing limbs, yet still cutting though a tomato with the precision of a Ginsu, then later, showing his marksmanship like he’s Josey Wales with a never ending clip.
After defeating Carnegie’s men and slipping out of town, Eli is followed by Solara (Mila Kunis), who looks like Angelina Jolie light and who manages to own both coordinated layers and designer sunglasses in this wasteland of a world. She sneaks out under the nose of her owner (Oldman) and makes her way on foot through the California desert on Eli’s heels. She wants to join Eli, who refuses her. He soon comes to Solara’s rescue when she’s attacked, the two bond and team up. I’m sure you know where this is going…Oldman catches up with the two, overpowers Eli and leaves him for dead, like some intellectual deficient Bond villain who’s been nothing short of heartless and now refuses to finish the hero off. Y ou can imagine what happens from there. And though there is a big twist at the end of the film, it’s more intellectually stimulating that Earth shattering. The look is nice (very washed out, nearly B&W) but the story is one note – a cat and mouse chase through the desert. And there’s little doubt about where it’s going or who will be there in the penultimate and ultimate scenes. So if you like popcorn action, you like Denzel, you like to escape for a few hours, by all means go – the same goes for Daybreakers. Hey, not all movies have to make perfect sense or be socially redeemable, nor must they be future award winners. You know the roller coaster is going to end up back at the station too. It’s the ride that’s worth the price of admission.
