Henry Saw: Daybreakers

There are some clever ideas here but this is nothing but an average B-movie...


Another quick review coming up...

Daybreakers was made in 2007 but was put on the shelf until earlier this month. The strategy kind of worked as Daybreakers has made 25 million domestically from a 20 million dollar budget. The film takes place in a world where Vampires have taken over society and there are only a few humans left. Unfortunately, this means that the blood supply is running low, and the Vampires are facing a national crisis. A major corporation, run by Sam Neil, entrusts a vampire hematologist (Ethan Hawke) to invent a human blood substitute. Before he can achieve this goal Hawke meets a group of humans, led by Willem Dafoe, who ask him to go a different route and invent something else...a cure for vampirism.

This film exists in the same genre as Surrogates, Gamer, or the upcoming Legion, in that it is a science-fiction action film, that quickly establishes the world it inhabits, and the principle characters and conflicts. Daybreakers is more intelligent than those other films; there are some genuinely clever ideas to be found here such as the idea that in a vampire ruled society all the coffee would be laced with blood. I also liked how all the cars are completely covered up to protect the driver from the sun and the driver sees the road via cameras placed all around car. Daybreakers' strongest asset is how effectively the film-makers thought out what the world would be like if we were mostly vampires.

Unfortunately, the writing/directing duo of the Spierig Brothers used up all their creativity in thinking up the background of their film. The plot itself holds almost no surprises and is just one cliche after another. The action is boring, the scares aren't scary, and the characters are all tedious. Neil just hams it up as the evil corporate villain, Hawke sleepwalks through the movie, and Dafoe is slightly ridiculous as the crossbow wielding Elvis.

I wouldn't say that Daybreakers is worth seeking out, but I will give it credit for being more creative than similar movies of its ilk and for playing with some real world issues in a silly way. If you see that it is on TV some Thursday night then you should leave it on...it does keep your attention...it's just not very good.

Grade: C

Best Scene: A crowd demands more blood be put in their coffee....