A frosty reception

Rating: Null/10 (5 November 2001)

The first ten minutes of this film are so visually striking that you know the climax won't outdo it so why go on watching? And thus it proves. A young buck is invited to a rave that uncomfortably borrows from a scene in 'Schindler's List'. Very distasteful, guys. This is an unusual rave, in any case. Ravers with a tab stuck in each fang? Either way, the young buck has a lucky escape as the less than friendly ravers suffer a dehydration problem rarely seen at an all-nighter.
Love the names in this flick. Krieger. Abraham Whistler. Dragonetti. Blade, also known as Eric *giggle*. Better than Fred, I suppose. Is this a Phillip Ridley film? Oh, I nearly forgot Deacon Frost. Mostly because he's hard to see without cricking your neck. He should be called Deacon Blue, he's a 'real gone kid'. In fact, he's positively dead. Deacon Frost, who fancies himself as 'the man', (or 'the vamp', if you want to be pedantic) has trouble stamping authority on the proceedings due to his aforementioned lack of stature and it's the dominating distraction in the film. Christopher Lee used to be lot more imposing playing Dracula due to his height but Dorff reminds me of an anorexic Freddie Starr, although he won't be eating any hamsters. They're taller than he is. His dress sense doesn't do him any favours in the world domination stakes either. Natty seventies puce velvet suit and flares invoke pity rather than terror. Dorff's face betrays the fact that the material is beneath him although it's hard to imagine anything getting beneath this diminutive Nosferatu (I know the lingo!) Truculent and obviously suffering from an inferiority complex, he noticeably stays on his feet around a conference table of distinctly wishy-washy vampire mafiosi who understandably disapprove of his bolshiness. Unfortunately, when he eventually sits down in a leather chair he practically disappears altogether. He's way too grumpy and needs to get out more, which being a vampire is hard. Or is it? in a very funny scene he gets to go out in broad daylight by wearing special make up. What about his eyes and hair? Don't their clothes usually set fire anyway? (And Frost's togs definately need to go). Perhaps he greased them up too. Hey, slimy guy, slimy suit. The reason he needs to go out in the day is to taunt his arch enemy....ERIC! They should have got Buffy the vampire slayer to tackle him, at least they'd be eyeball to eyeball. With Blade, Deacon Frost is eyeball to.....well, modesty prevents me. Anyway, the world's too big for both of them. Actually, it isn't, there's plenty of room for Frost. In fact, he's too small even to audition for a remake of 'The Incredible Shrinking Man' (why can't they make them like that, anymore?) But despite having to stand on an off-camera box the entire picture he aims to get even with Blade and turn into *SUPER VAMP*! Then it won't matter how tall he is, thank you very much.

Wesley Snipes plays Blade with the usual nonchalance we wearily expect from him. He is aided by a doctor played by N.Buste Wright in a performance so flat you could fax her to the set. Ms Wright has an archetypal James Bond moment when she is tossed into a cell to face something nasty but is blessed with possibly the biggest air vent in film history to crawl out of. Kris Kristofferson fairs better as a grizzled old vampire hunter and is rather fun if you're in the right mood, which I'm not.
Since the advent of video games, Hollywood has felt an unnecessary need to compete with the former's kineticism with predictably silly and tedious results and the trend sadly shows little signs of abating. Vampiric.