The Red Circle

[201]0 004 // Daybreakers [2010] dir. The Speirig Brothers

Dammit. This movie was so close to being GOOD.

Daybreakers introduces us into a world run by vampires. And by run, I mean run. There are vampire governments, with elected officials. There are vampire companies, who cater to vampire needs. There are vampire agencies, that provide underground walkways so vampires can get to work in the daytime. Hell, even Chrysler is catering to the undead set. It’s this part of the movie that is genuinely good. The filmmakers have really, really created world with history. One that makes sense, and is actually interesting. Unfortunately, where all of this falls apart is in the details.

Ethan Hawke plays a hemotologist vampire. The company he works for harvests human blood for distribution to the vampires of America (the world?), and underpopulation and overhunting have caused a massive human blood shortage. Hawke is charged by deliciously evil Sam Neill to create a human blood substitute. You see, the vamps only have about one month of blood supply until it’s all out. And it turns out that a lack of human blood causes a rapid and violent de-evolution in vampires. The turn into mindless batlike creatures that will attack and eat anything, even corpses and other vampires. The vamps in charge have to deal with both the blood shortage and the ever-increasing population of these “underdwellers.”

Needless to say, humans aren’t an endangered species. They are food. Plain and simple. Humans caught out in the open will be harvested. There are some, like Ethan Hawke, who won’t drink human blood out of principle (for him, it was because he was born a human – most other vamps don’t have this ethical concern), and others who are out to help keep some fragments of humanity alive. But, after meeting a man who claims that he has found a way to reverse the vampire “disease” (Willem Dafoe), Ethan Hawke attempts to turn his blood substitute into a cure.

I said something about the details being the breaking point in Daybreakers. It’s half true. There are some brilliant touches put on this world of bloodsuckers. For one, virtually every vampire smokes. Constantly. Even better, not a single one mentions anything about the whole “can’t get cancer, can’t die, so fuck it” situation. It’s a smart addition to a pretty smart concept.

But all of this world building  comes to a retarded head in the third act, where blatantly obvious reveals are treated as if they were truly capable of pulling the rug out from under even the most remedial audience. Combined with a series of ridiculous action pieces (which generally revolve around a whole bunch of vampires killing lots of other things in waves), and the set up of a real world with real issues kind of gets ignored. It’s nice to bring up underdwellers, surround them with a sense of dread, and then use them effectively. Although that last part was apparently not apparent to the filmmakers.

There’s a lot to like here, and one of those things is not Willem Dafoe. His character, named Elvis, seems to be a redneck at heart but Willem Dafoe has no idea how to play that character. He plays him as an oddly spiritual gruff guy, with a really annoying speech-giving habit. His introduction is so mind numbingly stupid in context, that the character never fully recovers. He summons Ethan Hawke to meet about a cure to vampirism, and greets him with a completely ridiculous speech about how vampires are like trees. He does the same thing later in a badly presented third act reveal.

What follows next is a complete and utter ruination of the end of Daybreakers. If you care, please read on. If not, here’s a nice little sum-up: Daybreakers is an uncommonly smart straight up horror film that sort of sullies its well thought out and presented premise with a slightly silly third act, and characters that never quite seem to work. It’s certainly a lot better than a lot of movies in the same genre, but it just doesn’t quite summon the strength to be actually interesting or good.

SPOILERS: THIS WILL RUIN THE END OF DAYBREAKERS.

There is a cure. Actually, two. One is to expose the vampire to the sunlight for just the right amount of time. Apparently, right before it kills them it strips away the virus. It’s a little silly, but I chose to believe in it. The second cure is the blood of the “cured” vampires. Drinking it causes the virus to be fought off by the “cleansed” blood, and those vampires go back to being human. Ethan Hawke is cured the with the first method. The biggest problem in the movie is that the main conceit – there is a blood shortage, and a possible cure – comes to a perfectly tied-up conclusion in the third act. AND THE MOVIE COMPLETELY IGNORES IT.

You see, one of Ethan Hawkes hemotologist vamp friends creates a viable substitute. Evil Sam Neill shows Hawke the vial containing the liquid. And then tells him that this vial is going into mass production the following week. You see where this would go? A newly cured Ethan Hawke with a body full of vampire-cure, could simply fill that vial with his blood and get it shipped off. Thereby curing most, if not all of the vampires in the world – which is what he has been trying to do the entire movie. Instead, he kills Sam Neill by allowing himself to be bitten. This turns Neill human, and Neill is then attacked by a vampire army. Turning them all human. And then they are attacked by more soldiers. Turning them all human. And then everyone gets gunned down (except the main characters, who go on a cross country trip to cure vampires).

Not only would that have totally tied up the story were there to be no sequel, it would have set up a second film where the remaining vampires are holding out against the previously persecuted humans. But, making a logical film within the rules established with the promise of a good second film (currently they’re planning a prequel which is rubbish) was not something on the Speirig Brothers to-do list.

There have been reviewers that have compared the vampires to Americans – people who have been on top for so long, that they don’t see the oncoming fall – and this isn’t an unfair comparison. Plus, the Speirigs have certainly created an interesting vampire mythology and universe. But I sure wish the whole movie would have explored that theme instead of ignoring good plotting in favor of a good ole U.S. of A machinegun bloodbath.

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