Daybreakers

I blame Pattinson and Stewart, but I pretty much can’t stand anything vampire related these days, with the notable exceptions of Let The Right One In and Interview With The Vampire, which are the only two vampire related films released in the past twenty years that really have/had anything original to say on the subject.

When Daybreakers was released, however, there was the promise of something original. An alternative and altogether less appealing vision of vampire and human co-existence. The Spierig Brothers have taken a phenomenally simple premise and then ran with it, seemingly just happy to see where it goes, but still following set mythical parameters. So when faced with the question, ‘what happened when vampires ruled the earth but then ran out of blood to feed on?’ is posed, you can expect an unusual take on the genre, not overly concerned with vast, lonely lifetimes and aching, unfulfilled, misunderstood passion that can only be truly felt by those that can live to be hundreds of years old. Daybreakers dispenses with the romance and the physical drama of being a vampire almost as much as it ignores the benefits of extended life, concentrating on the potential end of two wildly different races with a seemingly common goal instead. The film does away with the glamour of an eternity with fangs and great dress sense, choosing instead to wallow in the mire of two desperate needs to survive.

The films attempts to approach some difficult moral questions and even some theological ones and whilst it should be applauded for doing so, it really fails to drive home the messages that the answers to those questions provide, still having to deal with the sometimes inconvenient truth that not only do the vampires want blood, but so does the audience. This demand for action and adventure could easily be accused of taking away something from the film as an interesting philosophical argument is trying to push itself forward, but then has to contend with hackneyed dialogue and now predictable, all too familiar, lapses into bloodletting of one form or another.

Comparisons have been drawn, not least by the marketing, to the Matrix and it is easy to see why. The human race at the very near end of its existence, defeated and cowed by an opposing and occupying force smarter, quicker and generally superior in almost every department, but one. That being humanity, of course. The fight for survival against a massive opposing force is uppermost in both films, but Daybreakers lacks a believability due to its ancient subject matter, often the butt of schlock television mini-series and ‘Classic’ wielding Goths the world over. Essentially, in order for this film to engage on a moral and mentally visceral level, it requires a narrative dependent upon a realistic outcome to a believable, or even possible, threat. In short, Vampires will never rule the planet. Machines could easily manage it in time. And here the difference really lies.

To take nothing away from it, Daybreakers provides both some insight and the confirmation of some inalienable truths. With all pro’s, you will invariably find some cons lurking in the background, and while it may be great to live forever, you still can’t walk about in daylight and you are probably going to go hungry, and often. Unfortunately, Daybreakers does go the way of most films and a perspective that was initially blurred showing a non-human society doing quite well for itself does away with a morally ambivalent standpoint and ends up chest thumping for the small band of humans that are doing the decent thing and fighting for their survival. No great shocker, but what started out as an admirable attempt at philosophical argument slowly descends into something far more formulaic.

The acting is all well and good, but never borders on what we would call ‘highs’, but is still acceptable enough for the demands of the plot and character development. The films’ mood and lighting are suitably toned down to represent a world without any real humanity, except on occasion where the sun is called into play as saviour to the human race. In all, an entertaining hour and a half that could easily have provided more questions and answers about what it means to be human, but settled in the end for just being entertaining, instead of provoking and confrontational which it threatened to do in the early part of the film.