The story takes place in
Japan in 1966 as a young lady named Saya
(GIanna Jun) is part of a secret team
destroying daemons.
She goes undercover as a highschool
student at the Yokota Air Base in
Fussa-shi, Tokyo, just before Halloween.
She discovers that two of her classmates
are vampires along with others around the
town in which she goes to the aid of one
of the students named Alice McKee
(Allison Miller) to help her out and
flush out these evil forces since some of
them were responsible for killing both
their parents.
The cover of the
DVD looked cheesy and I had to tell ya
this film was a disappointment based
after the video game in which the effects
you could tell were very computer
animated. I just had a hard time
reviewing this movie as the story was
happening way too fast and almost seemed
more of an action flick than a horror but
there's vampire's in it with monsters
attacking too which the makers tried to
make these characters original but didn't
cut it right.
There's the odd interesting flashback
sequence between an asian father and
daughter which tries to explain the story
and where this lead character came from
but yet it's still difficult to
understand no matter what these writers
did to bring everything together.
There's a good moment with both Alice McKee and her father having a heated
argument in their vehicle with Alice herself acting ignorant and her father getting
stern with her which looked like a
convincing dysfunctional relationship
between the two of them.
I also loved the school bully scene in a
gymnasium with two of them using blades
against one school girl making you wonder
if they were gonna actually kill her or
scare her and then this lead character
comes in to slaughter them. I was
thinking "You kick ass girl!"
Plus it can be enjoyable to anyone who
hated school. Bit again te scene was
terribly cheesy with the rest of the
story that carried on in the film. There's good camera shots circling around Alice and two teenage bullies
circling her with swords
ready to attack her and then Saya running in to save the day with
her telling her to leave
along with good shots on Alice in a doorway watching Saya springing into action as well as good
shots looking down on her slaughtering
these two and a nice close up shot on Alice looking shocked by this.
There's a good moment with Alice entering a nightclub and then a supporting
character named Powell coming up to
her and getting strange with her as well
as shots on locals
turning to stare at her with fangs and
then him turning into a vampire trying to
chase after her with good shots on her
running away from him. There's terrific
side camera shots on Alice in
the street with her running outside in
the rain with the rest chasing after her
with good suspenseful shots on all of
this as well as a good shot on her in the
middle of an area with these locals
cornering her and then Saya swinging a sledge hammer against them
with good martial arts fighting on all of
this. There's nice camera shots looking
down on the two of them running away in
the street and then being outnumbered by
a flock of them along with a good close
up shot on them back to back looking
nervous and holding each others hands.
There's a nice approach by Michael Harrison acting slick towards Alice's father in his office with a good shot on
supporting character Frank Nielsen in
fast action pointing a gun at him which
leaves an impression that this person is
bad news as well as some good camera
shots on Michael sticking a
needle in Frank's neck and
alot of fast paced scene's with gunshots
happening between everyone.
There's a nice red light effect shot on Saya drinking blood from a bottle with a good
camera shot looking up her on while doing
this along with a nice close up shot on a
doorknob jiggling and then her acting
nervous while opening it which looked
well paced.
There's a nice effective brief discussion between Alice acting emotional towards Saya by asking who she really is with a nice serious answer.
There's some good shots on Alice crying while driving in an army vehicle
with Saya.
There's a good camera shot on Alice placing Saya on the ground along
with her slitting her hand and bringing
it to her mouth to drink.
There's are good flashback scene's that
involves a supporting character Kato Takatora in the woods doing some deadly karate
fighting with alot of deadly shots with
a bunch of warriors jumping
out of the ground and other areas
attacking him and doing neat spins and
kicking too. There's also a good shot on Kato being
chained up to some tree's with him
struggling and a shot on Saya running through a forest and then her
screaming after she spots what has
happened to him. Then there's good sword
fighting shots with her against the
warriors and slicing them up.
There's alot of fast action shots on
creatures swooping down to try to attack
both Saya and Alice while they are next to a cliff clinging
onto their vehicle with good close up
shots on their fears and struggles.
There's a good approach by Kato holding an umbrella speaking softly
towards Saya with her acting tense towards her and then lots of
good shots on their battles towards one
another with their swords clanging one
another and their leaping back and
fourth. Plus good moments with Kato still speaking softly and evilly towards
her when there's a break between their
battles before fighting one another
again. I found this to be the best scene in the story.
Bottom line is this film is a
disappointment and not the least bit
scary due to the cheaply looking CGI
effects trying to make you jump when
something happens and fails. Apparently
the video game and animated flick that
happened 9 years beforehand was alot
better. It saves from bombing and just
made it below average due to the good
fighting sequences and some good
performances but that's it.
The acting is done
in average taste as the lead actress Gianna
Jun (Saya) showed a nice seriousness to her
role with her still expressions and her
cold words as well as really bringing it
on with her energy and really knew her
craft with her martial arts and came
across greatly with her menacing
attitude.
Allison Miller (Alice McKee) showed a good typical
teenage behavior going through a phase as
well as having good upsetting emotions in
the spots where she needed to do so. She
also was good at acting forceful too. She
brings some good spunk into the flick and
one of the best cast members in the film.
Liam Cunningham (Michael Harrison) showed a good slick
attitude and came across nicely as an
evil scumbag in the film by acting
deceivingly charming in which he shows
that he's not trustworthy at all and knew
how to act like a violent killer too. He
could portray a nice mobster or pimp in
future films due to his role in this one.
Koyuki (Onigen) has a great key role in the
film as a wicked one in which she was
perfect acting too mellow and soft spoken
until she lashes out. She studied this
role incredibly well as you can tell and
also had the beatiful looks too in which
helps portray a horror character. I found
her the best out of the whole cast even
if this film was a flop.
Heads are chopped
off
Bodies split open
Hands cut off
Alot of this happened during many scene's
in the film when there's a fighting
scenario but the CGI effects were very
computerised looking and looking
incredibly phony.
There's alot of low
trombone playing and many thunping noises
with some odd violin playing but however
the music wasn't for my taste at all. Not
saying that it was terrible but not
superbly orchestrated. It sounds like the
typical music for a movie based on a game
which was what this was based after all
done by Clint Mansell.
There's also great classic
rock music through the first bit which
was fun to listen to such as the hard
rockin "Space Truckin" by Deep
Purple during a battle sequence with
the bully girls in a gymnasium fighting
against Saya and her butchering them to
death.
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