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Printer-Friendly Mode30 Days almost refreshes night
October 22, 2007 —
The horror genre really is lackluster nowadays. Of course, most genres seem to be now, but horror--to me--is at the root of that problem. As evidence of this, I offer the Saw series (which should have stopped with the first), the recent Halloween remake, The Reaping, Hostel, etc. I'm happy to say that 30 Days of Night isn't on that list.
Albeit based on a graphic novel of the same name, the pretense alone is rather original. The northernmost town in the United States--Barrow, Alaska--stands on the brink of its last day of sunlight for thirty days. A stranger appears in town and a number of crimes take place to rid the town of satellite phones, computers and dogs. Soon after the sun sets, a band of ravenous vampires begins preying on the remaining people. The local sheriff (Josh Hartnett) and his estranged wife (Michelle George) attempt to keep a group of survivors alive.
The film doesn't waste much time with exposition, which is nice. We get a remote amount of character backgrounds and jump right into the horror. Of course, this sort of pace is expected, as the movie focuses on the characters attempting to survive for thirty days.
What really makes the film so refreshing is the vampires themselves. They aren't anything like the vampires of other films. They move fast, animal-like, scream during their attacks and enjoy torturing their prey. All of these aspects make the first half an hour of their attack very frightening, with numerous shock-related scares. Plus, these vampires are brutal. There are times that their cruelty makes them scarier than their animalism.
Essentially, director David Slade utilizes 30 Days to revamp the vampire genre and image - much in the vein of Danny Boyle's 28 Days Later. This may be a bit unsettling for those who are looking for the classic vampire stereotype, but I welcome the revision.
Which is why, a little more than halfway through the film, unease overcame me, as I started noticing the things that weren't working, like the near nonstop pacing at times during scenes that were meant to be character development. Other than the sheriff and his wife, the other survivors weren't given nearly enough back story or dialogue to make me really care about them.
Pacing also becomes an issue in the opposing way. Sometimes the film skips ahead ten minutes or more at a time during what seems to be a climactic moment. Or, it skips ahead and the characters are in completely new locations--which left me wondering how they got there or why. And those moments don't parallel well with the very logical moments going on most of the time. The film also never really explains the vampire's motives.
I will say, however, without giving anything away, that the last fifteen minutes of the film redeems some of these misgivings, and the final scene is very nice, reemphasizing what makes the film a refreshing take on the vampire genre.