Daybreakers – B-movie fun

First there was Bram Stoker.  Then, out of his legend, came the ‘Twilight’ franchise.  Since then we’ve had good vampires, bad vampires, modern vampires, vampires in space, zombie-vampires and pretty much every other version of the monster you could care to imagine.  With a genre where we’ve basically seen it all, ‘Daybreakers’ does try to do something a bit different with such a tried and tested formula.

Basically, vampires rule the world now (and, no, that’s not another reference to the ‘Twilight’ franchise!).  The ‘virus’ which turns a human into a bloodthirsty creature of the night has spread to almost everyone and now the vamps are almost to the point of extinction due to their ever dwindling (human) food source getting smaller by the day.

Ethan Hawke plays our lead vamp, Edward Dalton, someone who works for one of the many companies that are trying to produce a synthetic substitute to blood, while at the same time rationing out the remaining ‘livestock’ (if you know what I mean).  Luckily for humanity, Dalton is a vampire with a conscious.  He feels sorry for those reduced to mere two-legged cattle and gets involved with a resistant movement who even boast of finding a ‘cure’ to the plague.

It’s a neat premise and it does the best it can.  I’ve seen it a few times now and enjoyed it every time.  However, despite treating it like a bit of a ‘guilty pleasure-type’ film, I always think there’s something missing.  Maybe the script needs a little polishing?  Maybe the idea is just too big to be contained in one simple hour and a half B-movie film.  Perhaps it would have made a better TV show where the characters and world they inhabit can be fleshed out a bit more?

As will as Hawkes, the film also has Willam Defoe as the (not particularly fleshed-out) leader of the resistance and Sam Neill as cliched evil villain in a suit #836.  Both do the best with what they’re give, but, as you can probably guess with my tone, they’re hardly given much to work with.  The special effects can’t be faulted.  There aren’t too many visual effects which will wow you and it’s just a case of adapting the world around us to reflect how it would look if vampires were in charge.

Overall, it’s fun if you’re a fan of vampires and want something a little different.  But, just don’t forget that it is just a glorified B-movie, so don’t go expecting too much.

7/10 if I woke up on Groundhog Day and had to watch this again, I could live with that