With so many variations floating around, a truly novel vampire film at this point would be one that adheres sharply to all the old rules. Not so Immortality, in which dapper, condo-dwelling London bloodsucker Jude Law strolls through sunlight, checks out his appearance in mirrors, and snatches crosses with abandon. If a DVD version ever surfaces, the smart money says its deleted scenes will feature Law devouring garlic-laden meals and chugging holy water like Gatorade. Close to the spirit of Abel Ferrara's The Addiction, Immortality (originally titled The Wisdom Of Crocodiles) uses its vampiric theme as a jumping-off point for a discussion of the nature of good and evil. Law is a medical technician with an unfortunate need to feed on humans. His most recent crime begins to catch up with him soon after he begins dating (or stalking) asthmatic engineer Elina Löwensohn, who, outside of her work with Hal Hartley, seems to specialize in offbeat vampire movies. Followed by intrepid but slow-working detective Timothy Spall, Law does his best to stay off the hook while still attending to his murderous needs. Where Ferrara's ambitious Addiction collapsed under its mounds of hyperbolic symbolism and philosophical pretension, Immortality suffers from the opposite problem. The stylish, understated direction of Hong Kong veteran Po-Chih Leong mutes the film almost into nonexistence: Any vampire movie in which the late-film administration of an emergency tracheotomy exponentially ups the excitement ante has made some wrong choices along the way, though Law's performance occasionally comes close to redeeming the dullness. A skilled professional with a sensitive soul, and a good person by most people's reckoning, he never expresses regret for his crimes. Recognizing their source as a place beyond or beneath good and evil, he seems to have a better sense of what Immortality is trying to express than the film does—portentous shots of elevators ascending slowly toward a tastefully appointed hell on Earth and all.