Great weekend night timepass.....

Rating: 7/10 (23 December 2007)

I saw the trailer of the film and i saw potential the only thing left to determine was the rating, there was no way you could pull off a good horror-vampire movie without blood/bleeding when I saw the confidence inspiring "R", and "Sam Raimi" as the producer I knew i wouldn't be disappointed.
The opening sequence of the movie was artistic but completely confusing and unnecessary, but after that the movie goes on a steep uphill curve.
Almost all the aspects of the movie are self explanatory, the mass migration, the reason the town exists, what who is thinking, etc etc.
Almost no time is wasted in unnecessary and long drawn conversations as too the why how, and that really helps with the feature length, KEEPING A MOVIE WITH A VERY LIMITED PLOT LIKE THIS INTERESTING FOR THE WHOLE RUN-TIME IS NOT A EASY JOB BUT THE FILM MAKERS HAVE DONE IT WITH ELAAN.
However i was not convinced about the flow of the days, the passage of time was very ineffectively captured at best, not only that, the way it was shown will lead to at least 20 improbabilities and impossibilities, this was one area where the film really lost out on.
Character development wasn't much but it was never missed, just the right amount of focus was laid on development, and luckily FLASHBACKS A STAPLE OF MOVIES WHERE EVERYONE KNOWS EACH OTHER NEVER REARED ITS HEAD.
The movie builds the tension and almost never really lets up, the movie lacked in numbers(there were a few good ones),the big tension or horror scenes (the ones where everyone laughs afterwards), but it made up easily on the tension that was maintained throughout.
The action was good but this wasn't that much of an action movie, explosions, guns and obviously hand to hand combat are at a minimum and only used as means to move the story forward.THIS MOVIE IS MUCH MORE OF A HORROR THRILLER AND A WELCOME CHANGE FROM THE MORE ACTION ORIENTED VAMPIRE MOVIES OF LATE (which i am actually quite fond of).
Acting was very good all around, melodrama was at a minimum except towards the end, especially good were Manu as deputy sheriff and The stranger.
SURPRISINGLY ALMOST NO HUMOUR IN THIS ONE.
Technically merely good/OK because the perpetual dark doesn't get to you, even movies like Pitch Black did a better job, fear of the dark is almost a universal human trait and it could have definitely been exploited.
The other weak part was the end, it didn't really follow the tone of the movie, it was a typical FILMY (as we say in India) ending almost taking chick flick proportions its almost amazing this movie holds it own after such a weak ending.
Censorship once again affected my viewing experience with a bunch of dialogues being lost thanks to the shoddy editing, in a bid to cut scenes of what the censors consider inappropriate.
In all a great weekend night movie, can be enjoyed by anyone although it doesn't have enough action for a hardcore action fan.
-s very poor flow of days, VERY WEAK ENDING, technically OK.
+/-s explanations??? some people like/want them.
+s very good acting, interesting plot, tense throughout, a few very tense moments, one liners.
total 7.5/10 (im sure this movie will be better without censorship and I've added a half point for that, it did go above my expectations but i didn't factor that in because that would push the rating to high, the end was just to weak to merit a higher rating, and its a wonder a movie can get such good ratings with such a weak end ).