What a waste of a good concept

Rating: 3/10 (20 September 2003)

You know what I hate? When a movie that has a really good concept just totally sucks. I went to see Underworld today, from the previews I thought it looked kind of cool, sort of a Matrix with Vampire and Werewolf's, not a bad combo I thought. Although, personally I think that the Matrix, as great as it was, has ruined action movies. I mean, how many times do we need to see a super slow motion shot with the camera spinning around in a 360 degree arc while the person is shooting a gun before we just go `ho hum.' You know what I mean? When it was done in the first Matrix it was cool as s***, when you see it on Charlie's Angles, well it's just gone too far! Oh, sorry, lost my train of thought there, I was talking about Underworld. The basic plot of Underworld is a war between the Vampires and the Werewolf's. It stars Kate Beckinsaleas Trini. . . I mean Selene (I kept wanting to say `Dion?' every time they said her name. For all those people out there to who want to write books and stuff, creating good character name is very important!) who is a hunter of werewolf's. During one of her hunts she notices that a pack of werewolfs are stalking a man named Michel, she saves his life but he gets away, from there she wants to know why they were after him and what she finds out will have dire effects on both her, the Vampires and the Werewolf's. That's the plot people, that's it. There are times when simple plots done right can make a great movie. I mean, the Matrix had a pretty simple plot but they did it so right that it made it an awesome movie. This movie had a simple plot, a great concept, a good actress, and some good effects but did nothing with it. It was just a loud, violent mess that made little sense.
My major problem was with the story logic. Trini. . . I mean Selene thinks that Kraven, her boss or something, is working with the wereworlf's for some reason. But, you know, I don't know why she thought that. All we saw was her trying to get to Michel while Kraven yelled at her not too. How to you make the logical jump from Kraven not wanting her to save Michel to Kraven working for the Werewolf's? I didn't see anything myself that would lead me to believe that Kraven was nothing more than an asshole Vampire.
Also, Kraven, for some reason or another, is in love with Trini. . . damn, Selene (Dion?) and I just don't know why. All she did to him throughout the entire movie was disobey him, run away from him, shoot him angry looks, punch him, and totally tell this guy that she hates his guts and will have nothing to do with her. Now, I can see if they gave any hint that at one time they were lovers or something, but they didn't, in fact, from what I can tell, she has hated him for hundreds of years. Geez dude, take a hint would you! So, later in the film Selene (Dion?) I guess fell in love with Michel the way she was giving him, you know, that look throughout the movie, how they sort of kissed at one point, oh and how she pretty much got excommunicated from the Vampire's because of him, I guess she was in love with him. But, how? Don't you need, oh, I don't know, some time together to fall in love? Or to maybe have some sort of common bond to fall in love? Here it just seemed that they were in love because the scripted called for them to fall in love. Really though, they could have come up with a better reason for her to be protecting him as much as she did besides the love story. I don't know, it's like you need to have the two main characters fall in love or something, even if logic dictates that they shouldn't. At least in the Matrix they had some downtime to make Trinity and Neo to fall in love, this movie was pretty much action from start to finish. Well, I always like to say something nice about a movie, so here it goes. The final fight was pretty cool! Not a good reason to see the movie, but the last 10 minutes or so had some really good action between Vampire and Werewolf. What really bugs me is this movie had some really good ideas, the Vampire/Werewolf war, the reasons for the war, the whole part about the elders (there are three Elders, one awake, two asleep, at all times) and the secret of Michel were all very good ideas. But, a movie just can't run with some clever ideas, you need a well told story behind it, you need to know and care for the characters, you just need something this movie didn't do. I just hate it when a movie with good ideas doesn't follow through with those ideas and instead of a fantastic movie we have a run of the mill one that will be forgotten within a few months.