Rise - Blood Hunter (2007)

Sadie Blake (Lucy Liu) dies and comes backs to life several times in Rise—Blood Hunter, which gives this revenge tale impetus to continue perhaps longer than it needs to. At over two hours long, this film, written and directed by Sebastian Gutierrez (Snakes on A Plane), is beautifully filmed and acted at times but drags due to the drawn out story of a LA Weekly reporter who seeks revenge on her murderer, the vampire head of an underground blood-sucking cult. This handsome monster, Bishop (James D'Arcy), charms women, kidnaps them, and slits their throats with his claw-shaped necklace, stumping the entire LAPD minus Clyde Rawline (Michael Chilkis), a hard-drinking policeman who eventually teams up with Blake to hunt and destroy the vampiric ringleader. The scenes depicting initial doses of violence, like when Blake wakes up in a metal casket at the morgue, or when she's originally killed in Bishop's bed, covered in black trash bags to avoid bloodstains, feature crisp film footage awash in blue and red, setting a semi-poetic mood. Mostly, Rise—Blood Hunter operates on the vampire tales' conflation of sex and death, taking a sexy tone throughout, especially when Sadie or her fellow vampire, Collette (Cameron Richardson), feast on blood then strip off their sullied clothing. Blake's vengeance underpins her rebellious attitude, as she shoots her crossbow at each person she meets on the trail to Bishop. Though Rise—Blood Hunter is not a classic in the genre, it is enticing to add Lucy Liu to the list of gorgeous vampire slayers. —Trinie Dalton Amazon.com

unintentionally funny horror film

After she's murdered and partially devoured by members of a cannibalistic death cult, investigative reporter Sadie Blake (Lucy Liu) returns to earth as a flesh-consuming, bow-and-arrow-wielding member of the undead bent on exacting revenge on those who killed her.

If you can swallow this premise, you might just possibly enjoy this ludicrous, frequently laughable, two-hour-long foray into sadism, cannibalism, vampirism, necrophilia and supremely bad acting. Sadie is at least a ghoul with a bit of a conscience - she feels really really bad when she has to eat someone - so we'll give her points for that, but the movie dedicated to telling her story rates a big fat zero on every other conceivable count. August 17, 2008

Silly and stupid, but kind of fun.

Rise (Sebastian Gutierrez, 2007)

Perhaps the most telling sign that the demise of my favorite currently-running TV show, The Shield, is coming quickly: Michael Chiklis' presence in a movie that played, in its widest release, on sixty-three screens. Gutierrez, who was responsible for the execrable She-Creature in 2001 (despite the presence of Rufus Sewell, it's one of the handful of movies I've seen over the course of my life that I simply couldn't get through), cranks out another formulaic, unscary horror flick, this one about vampires instead of mermaids.

The plot: Sadie Blake (Lucy Liu) is a reporter who finds herself involved in a story that seems to involve vampires. She initially blows the story off, but when one of her co-workers disappears, she starts investigating. I'll fast-forward through the spoilery bits and get to Michael Chiklis, who here plays (surprise!) a police detective who's also on the case; jumping to conclusions, he pegs Sadie as the ruthless killer who's stalking the streets, and goes after her. Cue buddy-cop movie. The only problem is that by the time we get to the buddy-cop movie, there's about half an hour of screen time left.

I find it hard to characterize this as in "indie film" given its cast (aside from Liu and Chiklis, the cast includes Mako, Carla Gugino, James D'Arcy, Marilyn Manson, Elden Henson, and Nick Lachey-- yes, that Nick Lachey-- among others you will instantly recognize) and its Ghost House connections (they were the ones responsible for the remakes of Shimizu's Grudge films); hell, it's got Sam Goldwyn's name right up front! If that's not big-studio Hollywood, nothing is. And yet I can't believe some stuffed shirt in a penthouse office would have let this script through the way it is; it's jerky, unfocused, contains a slew of plot holes that make the notoriously holey Tara Reid vehicle Incubus look like a masterpiece of scriptwriting. And yet, Samuel Goldwyn. You understand my confusion, I hope. The acting is, in most cases, barely competent, but there are a few surprises (Chiklis is exempt, since he's playing Vic Mackey)-- Lachey lends at least a breath of believability to his character, and Liu proves she is, in fact, capable of emoting at least once in a movie.

Thing is, with another script rewrite and in that hands of someone who hadn't directed a monstrosity like She-Creature, I think Rise might have actually been worth watching. As it is, though, it's a mess. **

July 18, 2008

Marginal rental material

I watched this rental in a brain candy frame of mind. If not for my girlfriend and a Stinger or two, the basic 20 minute rule would have kicked in and despite some lush camera work and one or two well done scenes, the predictable dialogue and slow pace would have would have sent me to bed. 2 stars is a reasonable rating - unless you're a blood drinking fan. June 6, 2008

Sex and murder

I thought this was actually a good movie. Lucy Liu does a good job of carrying the story, and Carla Gugino (smoking hot), as the vampire who sires her, and James D'Arcy as the lead villain are quite good. The title of the review is their opinion of the important things in their world. Michael Chiklis has kind of a thankless role, but his scenes with Lucy are good. The story jumps back and forth, unnecessarily, but as several other reviews have mentioned, the scenes where Lucy's character comes back to life and her feedings are well done. The photography was striking, especially the scene where she is hanging upside down with the other bodies. Oh, and viewers will learn that Marilyn Manson looks better with his makeup! May 17, 2008

2.5--Lucy Lui what have they done to you ?!?!

While Rise: Blood Hunter isn't a terrible film, it's a predictable one. This is meant to be a revisionist vampire film (no one actually uses the word vampire in the movie) but these are the same trendy vampires that have haunted the screen since Blade. Is it too much to ask someone to try and shake up the vampire film the way Kathryn Bigelow and Eric Red did with Near Dark? Or Larraz did with Vampyres (over 30 years ago)? Can't we just get a little Nosferatu around here? Instead what we have here is a journalist by the name of "Sadie" (Lucy Lui) who discovers that a young goth girl she briefly covered in a recent article has been found dead and a hidden message she left behind may lead to her killer's whereabouts. What she discovers is a secret underground group of vampires, who feed on unsuspecting women. Sadie becomes their latest victim, but instead of being left for dead, is turned into one of them. After she awakens in the morgue, she must come to terms with her new self and is enlisted by a mysterious Spanish man, who gives her the means and know-how on how to find and destroy the vampires that turned her.

This movie proved to be another interesting take on the vampire mythos. The vamps in this flick are fangless and really show no signs of being Nosferatu, with the exception of their strength, lack of a reflection, and thirst for blood. They're not afraid of crosses, and we're not shown whether the old garlic theory works on them. Sadie doesn't even use wooden stakes to kill them; instead she seems to use metal bolts shot from her small crossbow. Although the flick is very slow-paced and doesn't offer a whole lot of the typical vampire action we're accustomed too, it does show a different side to the legend, by following Sadie from the moment she awakens in the morgue, to how she gradually copes with her thirst, and eventually finding strength in herself to confront those that harmed her.

The whole sequence where she awakens in the morgue, to her trip to a homeless shelter, where she feeds on her first victim, was somehow mesmerizing to me. I also liked a scene where she finally accepts the fact that she needs to feed and picks up a hitchhiker in a secluded road. From the homeless shelter to her reactions and awkward dialogue with the hitchhiker, the film seemed to portray a kind of realism behind vampirism and the need to feed. That, and my general interest with revenge-type flicks, led me to enjoy the movie mildly. Since this isn't your typical vampire film, there's no flying, clawing, or neck biting, so the gore is kept at a minimum. There is, however, a lot of blood spurting and bolts to the heart. In the end, what it lacks in gore and action, it makes up for in story.

April 22, 2008

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