30 Days of Night Review

Written by: TheDemon   

This film, which has been advertised for what seems to be about 2 years, was finally released this weekend for our viewing pleasure.  Someone needs to advise Hollywood that they are ruining films by having clips constantly shown on various sites and running trailers that ruin any kind of suspense the movie could build.

It seems a clan of vampires have decided to converge on Barrow, Alaska, because this town experiences "30 days of night" every year.  Why they waited until this particular year to show up still escapes me, but I digress.  Josh Harnett plays the local sheriff, Melissa George plays a Fire Marshall employee (and I don't know if she was the previous wife of Hartnett or just a girlfriend and they broke up; it never was clear to me) who are thrown together because she has a wreck on her way to the airport and misses her flight.  It seems for yet ANOTHER unexplained reason , planes are now allowed to fily in and out of the airport after nightfall.  A grungy, bad-toothed, dirty stranger shows up at the local diner asking for raw hamburger and scotch (what a combo!).  After a run-in with the sheriff, he's carted off to jail where he starts his bit as the town crier, and he's warning that "death is a-comin'."  Polly-Wally-Doodle-All-the-Day. 

I didn't hate this movie.  It was average.  I enjoyed the vampires because they were plain, old, MEAN creatures, and not one of them was interested in seducing someone from the town.  They were there to feed, and that was it!  Also, I like that they spoke in their own language (which was subtitled).  These creatures were savage, and I liked that.  What I didn't care much for was the subplot involving the romance--or lack thereof--between Hartnett and George.  It bored me and didn't add a thing to the movie.  There were two other GLARINGLY bad/OBVIOUS mistakes, but I'll let you see if you can spot them.

The movie was directed by David Slade, whose previous directorial debut was in "Hard Candy"--a much better horror movie than this one.  It is rated R for violence and language.  Go (if you must); just don't expect to be "wowed."