Sometimes, even The A.V. Club isn't
impervious to the sexy allure of ostensible cultural garbage. Which is why
there's I Watched This On Purpose, our feature exploring the impulse to spend
time with trashy-looking—yet in some way irresistible—entertainments,
playing the long odds in hopes of a real reward. And a good time.
Cultural infamy: "Infamy"
might be too strong a word for 30 Days Of Night, which
debuted last October to tepid reviews and so-so business. But general
indifference is its own sort of infamy when it comes to a movie in which
vampires attack Barrow, Alaska, the northernmost city in the United States,
during a month in which no sun shines. Do premises come much more inspired than
that? Also, music-video director David Slade was hot off the success of the
indie thriller Hard Candy (which I still haven't seen). Also:
Vampires in Alaska during a monthlong polar night. But I may have mentioned
that already.
Curiosity factor: My reasons for
watching this are fourfold, but all of them are completely nerdy:
1. I liked the comic book: First
published as a three-issue miniseries in 2002, 30 Days Of Night built on its
ingenious premise with a gripping story, three-dimensional characters, and
striking chiaroscuro art. Written by Steve Niles and drawn by Ben Templesmith,
it's an inspired collaboration that spawned numerous spin-offs and sequels.
None of the ones I've read match the original, and I've been left cold by
Niles' writing elsewhere, though Templesmith's work is always pretty great.
Still, there was every reason to believe it would translate into a great horror
movie.
2. It's a horror movie: I'm a fan. I'd
rather watch a good movie than a bad one under any circumstances, but in my
heart of hearts, I would rather watch a truly awful horror movie than a merely
okay film of any other kind. I used to try to keep up by watching every horror
movie that played theatrically, but the truly awful spate of horror movies that
started popping up in the wake of Scream (which I like) ended that
habit. I can even tell you the movie that broke me: Dracula 2000. It was 99
minutes of, "Wait, why am I doing this?"
3. Solitude: I love horror
movies. My wife does not. At all. I never thought I would marry someone who has
never seen the original Dawn Of The Dead, and yet we're somehow making
it work. Mostly I watch them in theaters, or when she's not around. I watched 30
Days Of Night while she was away on business. (Yes, dear, this is exactly the
kind of debauchery that goes on when you're not around.)
4. Technology: I recently
purchased a PlayStation 3, in part because of the allure of the built-in
Blu-Ray player. I didn't think that DVDs really needed improvement, but as long
as I was getting a game system, I might as well get one that plays next-gen
movies, right? I rented 30 Days Of Night from Netflix on Blu-Ray. After
watching No Country For Old Men the previous night, this was my
second Blu-ray movie.
The viewing experience: If nothing
else, watching 30 Days Of Night put my Blu-ray skepticism to rest.
I'm not about to throw out my DVDs—they still look great, especially when
up-converted by my PS3—but when it comes to capturing the crisp detail
and elaborate sound designs of digital-age filmmaking, they're pretty great.
Yay, Blu-ray.
But boo, movie. Well, not boo. It
could have been worse. There were some striking images in this movie, and Danny
Huston was amazing as the head vampire. He hasn't inherited the directing
skills of his father, John Huston—I say this based only on the
soft-pornish biopic Becoming Colette; maybe the direct-to-video 1995
thriller The Maddening, starring Burt Reynolds and Angie
Dickinson, was awesome—but he's definitely inherited screen presence from
his dad, and his grandfather, Walter Huston. In 30 Days Of Night, he's simultaneously
aristocratic and feral. The IMDB lists Huston as being in five upcoming movies.
I hope to see all of them. (Although at least one YouTuber took issue with his
occasional looks of confusion.)
Elsewhere, however, the casting is a
problem. Josh Hartnett and Melissa George play an estranged husband-and-wife
pair. He's the sheriff of Barrow. She's some kind of state inspector type who
gets stuck in Barrow when she misses the last plane out for a month. The
characters have been written as having a long, complicated love/hate relationship,
which would make sense if they were played by, say, Chris Cooper and Patricia
Clarkson, or some other pair able to convey world-weariness, and with enough
years under their belts to validate it. But when did Hartnett and George's
relationship hit the rocks? After prom?
As for the rest, I like that the look of the film
is inspired by Templesmith's art, and I really dug the overhead shots of the
vampires running amok in the mostly abandoned town. In fact, the whole
practically post-apocalyptic middle section pretty much lives up to the
premise, especially the scenes of the vampires using terrified innocent people
to lure others out of hiding. There's nothing particularly romantic about these
vampires. They're just mean and hungry.
Too bad the end just drags on and on, and the film
never really provides a reason to care whether the characters turn into vamp
food.
How much of the experience wasn't a total waste
of time?
I used to hold to the idea that no movie was a waste of time, since it
contributed to my professional ability to talk about movies. I also used to
believe in Santa Claus. That said, this was more passable than bad, and Huston
and a handful of scary scenes made it worth watching for me as a fan of the
genre. It isn't Dracula 2000, in other words, so let's say 55 percent.